Reputation is everything?

Mar 25, 2013 by Tania Harasimiuk

Reputation is everything? Maybe it’s time we took more time to address our own

As I am sure that news of the BBC story on NHS London PR spending reached all corners of the industry at pace, I am equally sure that I am not alone in feeling both aggrieved and somewhat concerned. Aside from the lazy headline and negative rhetoric, the summation that PR cannot provide value, and instead dubbed ‘a total waste of money’, appears to have the ability to transform me from a level-headed, well balanced chap, into a fire-spitting, claw-wielding dragon.

However, I am not utilising this space to speak in defence of PR spending within the NHS. Both CIPR, and notably Sarah Pinch, published in The Holmes Report, have argued robustly on the topic, with the latter stating that taxpayers’ money is not allocated to fluffy campaigns, but to life-changing and life-saving work. Unfortunately this doesn’t make the national press, but what is concerning is that not only does the language within the news piece relate to ‘spin doctors’, the character trait that irritably lingers, but to the presumed incalculability of the value of PR.

Plenty of discussion has taken place on how reputation can be improved by enthusing clients in transparency and ethical and moral practices (not lying being key), and sure, PR needs to do more of its own PR, but focus should settle on changing the public perception that PR is not an investment but an expense and cost to business. This is by no means an easy task, virtually every profession has perception issues, but measurement and evaluation at every possible outcome, and provision of a monetary value where possible, can go a long way to changing those perception and reputational issues. I mean, if the PR and Communication agencies together with the PCTs had clear ROI figures to convey value against investment, would the story have even been written?

Emphasis on evaluation and measurement should be a mandatory exercise for any practitioner, and through the provision of an ROI value, increased transparency on the impact of PR becomes available. However, what is important to emphasise is that it is not just measurement, but what you measure, and ensuring that the attained results can represent a real value to a business.

Stephen Waddington, Digital and Social Media Director for Ketchum’s European Operations, outlined in a recent blog for CIPR that social media indicators can be easily manipulated or faked, and thus concentration should fall on metrics built on business outcomes and not just engagement and audience building. Although the results of media relations, for example, cannot be manipulated or faked, it is important to relay this code of practice across all our activities as public relations practitioners.

Keeping it simple, measurements of our PR services and initiatives must be focused far more intrinsically around client business objectives. Selecting which indicators we use for measurement is therefore paramount, and although positive ROI values cannot always be provided, it at least provides a transparency which can be digested by both the business community and the general public. For all we know, 50,000 London women may have averted cervical cancer through early screening and pre-cautionary day case procedures thanks to increased awareness as a result of PR campaigns. I wonder what saving this may have brought the NHS in radiotherapy and chemotherapy treatments? Effective measurement of what matters could prove a large step forward in changing those age old perceptions.

Blog by David Bertram