How do I… measure my PR to determine my ROI?

How do you track and measure your PR activities?

Depends on who you ask. Unfortunately, there isn’t one overarching PR measurement tool to help you track whether what you’re doing is working. Depending on your business, your PR strategy, and your PR goals, how you measure your outcomes can vary.

Below are some basic ways to align your sales with your PR strategy.

Make use of Google Analytics

Are you familiar with Google Analytics? If not, then get on it! Google Analytics can help your business understand the behaviour flow of your target audience, especially after your media feature is published. Set up conversion goals to track where your traffic is coming from – blog, social media, media placements. Google Analytics can also help your startup gauge what messaging appeals most to your target market. Ask yourself, does the audience I’m tracking have clear needs? Is the messaging in our published feature meeting those needs? Answering these questions will help you understand how to leverage your media wins in order to see impact.

Track your website visitors

After an interview or feature with a top-tier media platform gets published, many startups tend to jump on their social media to see who’s sharing or talking about their most recent media win. While it’s important to know this information, don’t neglect your website analytics. Tracking the volume of visitors after a published piece has appeared is an easy way to see how much traction your media win generated and whether your messaging is having an impact.

Don’t forget to update the press/blog page of your website and your social media platforms to reflect the recent media interest in your startup.

Keep a pulse on the trends

Many startups pull major PR efforts for the launch of their business, new product or service. Although the timeframe of your startup’s goals is important, so is the seasonality in your business cycle. Make sure your PR campaign is timed with the market you’re addressing. For example, if you’re the founder of a startup that supports the learning process for students, your PR campaign will see a higher ROI during the back-to-school season. If your company addresses a current concern that’s being widely covered by the media, go out with a PR strategy and pitch a team member as an expert on this topic, while providing clear messaging on how your startup is the solution for this growing public concern.

Keep your story alive

Successful coverage doesn’t only depend on which outlet picked up your story, but how well you promote the story to your audience. For example, you land a story with The Globe and Mail and it’s shared through their Twitter account, don’t just retweet their post and consider your job done. Find ways to ride the wave by amplifying it with various marketing initiatives like sharing it through your company’s monthly newsletter, re-promoting it through your social channels weeks and months later and even venturing into paid social advertising. These efforts will continue to generate leads and help you track possible future leads.

Sales and PR can speak the same language. With this information, you can start to analyze how your PR efforts can be better suited towards your business development strategy.