The #PR measurement “Hail Mary.”

7.8 billion.

Those of us in PR and marketing immediately knew there was a problem because we’ve all experienced it before. How do you reasonably measure the success of media exposure?

It’s the age old question.

It’s a question that once again reared its ugly head when reports circulated that the Redskins claimed more than 7.8 billion people (that’s more than the total population of the earth) were exposed to stories of the 2014 Redskins training camp in Richmond. It was the Redskins’ version of the PR Hail Mary designed to justify their continued Richmond training camp existence.

I believed it as much as I believe that RGIII can still hit DeSean Jackson in stride from 70 yards out.

Most PR folks know numbers like that are not biologically impossible. However, most in the past have blindly followed the lead of their monitoring companies.

In the good old days of media relations when print and TV ruled the day, it was as “easy” as counting circulation numbers and multiplying by pass-around rates. We took Nielsen viewership and listenership numbers as gospel and happily reported huge numbers back to our clients.

Then came the internet.

Over the last 15-20 years, the internet has changed how we market and more importantly how we count and then market success. No longer do those big numbers add up.

At the same time, the art of media relations — how we pitch, how we practice, and how we succeed and gauge success — has changed dramatically.

In the past, it was good enough for PR firms to get stories in the paper, on TV or online and declare success just for getting the story placed. Those days are dead.

Now clients not only want the ego rush of seeing themselves in the paper or their product on TV, they want the phone to ring, the website to click, and the sales to come in.

In the new EOP (earned, owned, paid) world of PR, media relations for media relations’ sake is no longer and should no longer be the driver. It is a piece of the broader equation that also includes content that you create, own and place on your website or somewhere online, as well as paid and unpaid ways to amplify that content to targeted audiences.

So how do we gauge success across the board?

Media (relations) exposure is still important for three reasons: general awareness, ego/credibility, and as a way to leverage stories for third-party purposes like sales or raising money.

PR pros need to set media relations metrics with the client on the front end. Discuss what you are going to count and how you are going to count it. For many of our clients, we’ve dropped counting impressions and set goals against specific tiers of media outlets depending on their importance to the client. For some it is national, regional and local outlets. For some it’s specific consumer and trade publications. It’s a much more targeted approach and much easier to track and measure.

The days of tonnage are over.

In today’s media relations world it is difficult to maintain the frequency needed to drive web traffic for expertise positioning or sales reasons. If you are expected to deliver those results using media relations alone, then you should throw your yellow penalty flag.

Driving consistent web exposure/traffic, leads and sales are the place of earned (media relations) media PLUS owned and paid media. In EOP world we can:

• Track media relations success against placement in defined targeted media.
• Measure traffic to specific web pages.
• Create calls to action and offers to generate leads to hand off to sales people.
• Or at the very least create databases of email addresses to continue the content conversation.

In short, we can do what PR people never thought could be done. Truly measure ROI.

If you don’t believe me, I can give you 7.8 billion reasons….

Would love to hear your thoughts on this.