Following on from Metrica's recent post on predictions for the future of the media, two of our most admired PR measurement experts based in the United States have been busy making predictions of their own.

Don Bartholomew, until recently at the MWW Group, but who has recently launched Acumentics Research, has posted an excellent article on his blog, 'Proving the Value of Public Relations'.  In '5 Social Media & PR Measurement Trends to Watch', Don argues that social media measurement is going to start to dominate the metrics agenda this year. This in turn will lead to an outcry for the industry to standardise the metrics - the search for the elusive magic bullet. 

In the 15 years that Metrica has been measuring public relations programmes for our clients, this has been an ongoing issue.  Yes, it would be lovely to have a standardised metric in theory, but in practice there are so many problems that need to be overcome.  Any decent PR measurement programme should look to tie outcomes back against objectives.  How can you standardise this when different organisations have so many varying objectives? 

This is at the heart of the reason that so many of Metrica's clients have come to us over the years asking us to make sense of the PR scoring systems that they have previously been receiving from our competitors. For more information on the debate around the valididty of scoring systems in media evaluation, see Flaws in PR Scores.  Another post, Rebranding the AVE, has an excellent debate in the comments section which is well worth a read too.

Metrica's approach has always been to focus on measuring our clients' outputs and outcomes against their objectives.  At the heart of this we focus on whether they have delivered the right message to the right (highly-defined) target audience, and then what the outcome is in terms of changing behavious etc.  This enables us to close the PR implementation / PR measurement /  PR planning loop through our PR planning tool, UKPulse. 

Social media and social networks have changed some of the rules though.  Message delivery to audiences is still (obviously) a crucial metric.  However with audiences fragmenting, consuming social 'media' that may not have audited figures, and hijacking control of the conversation and message from the PR team, it is becoming ever harder to provide accurate audience reach information.  And it is for these reasons that so much work is being done on new metrics for the new media.  Common consensus says that this should be around an 'engagement' metric which is Don's next point in his post.

The search for relevant engagement tools should not be at the expense of this crucial fact though - social media can provide an audience as engaged as you like, but if it's not the right target audience, its highly questionable what value it is generating.  It makes me think of the old line that if a tree falls in the forest but no one is there to hear it then did it really make a sound?  If you run a great and engaging social media programme but your target audiences aren't there, did it really achieve an objective?

Meanwhile, Katie Paine has also been busy providing common sense advice and recomendations.  Katie is known in the US as the Queen of Measurement but in her own tongue in cheek style says she would prefer Seshet the Goddess of writing measurement.  Carrying on with her tongue in her cheek to a certain degree (Katie, I am sure you will see this post, perhaps you could let us know what percentage!) she predicts 12 somewhat controversial things that are likely to happen this year.  These include the death of traditional press cuttings services, the rise of Twitter, and the firing of the 50% of communicators who still don't get social media. 

Katie also shares with everyone what she asked Santa Caluse for this year.  Her Top Ten Measurement Tool Wishes for 2009 makes interesting reading for media evaluation and analysis consultants as well as PR practitioners in general.  And for those who arefinding their PR budgets under increasing stress in 2009, she also lists 6 quick and simple techniques to start measuring your programs and impress your boss.