Uppers & Downers - a valuable lesson

Today I had my first taste of success in PR.

It all started yesterday afternoon...

I stumbled across an interesting group on facebook about a local grad from Guelph in a contest for the "best job in the world". I went online, saw his video, voted for him then realized he needed at least 100,000 more votes in 14 days...talk about an objective. Looking at his facebook enrollment of about 5,000 I decided he could use a little help and took it upon myself to write a few e-mails.

This morning, as usual, I was watching Breakfast Television. My heart skipped a beat as they featured my story in their newscast...despite a 1/2 hour GO delay, a woman killed by a car, a stray bullet in North York and a murderous rampage in Germany dominating other headlines. Adrenaline rushed through my veins. What a coup for me.

Or so I thought...

Later, as I was sitting in class listening to the difference between measuring output and outcome I realized that my coverage, while satisfying exhilarating meant nothing if I couldn't measure it.

PR measures of AVE and MRP's don't really mean anything because they are just impressions, they don't tell you about any behavioural change in your audience You can actually measure real PR and communications outcomes according to Scott Langdon. Communication is behavior, not words on a page, realize this and you are ahead of the game.

Perfect example: my brilliant coup for Mitch Moffit, sure he was on a popular newscast, but voter ship didn't grow that day...or at least you couldn't prove the correlation to the coverage...that is the importance of measurement and what I promise to try and change throughout my career.


d.