media update’s Adam Wakefield explores four reasons why media monitoring, also known as brand tracking, is critical in today’s public relations industry.

PR agencies have to measure their campaign successes  

Running a campaign costs time and money and, in an ideal scenario, every communications decision will make the right impression – in the right market, at the right time. Return on investment (ROI) has become the real currency of performance and, for clients, an essential measure of success.

Media monitoring, in particular, is a fantastic tool to show a campaign’s impact, as well as its shortcomings.

“Clients want to know how successful a campaign is and where their expectations were not rewarded,” says Catherine Dabbs, marketing executive at Newsclip, a brand tracking company.  

“Getting as much mileage as possible with your budget is the priority. Quality brand tracking, using advanced automated systems, offers immediate and accurate media intelligence for your communication strategy.”

It’s a vital crisis communications tool

Listening tools, the technologies used to monitor client mentions, give PR professionals a head start in knowing what is being said and reported in the media, and judging whether there is potential for a client’s brand to be impacted.

Newswire’s Brand Exposure: Media Monitoring & The Bottom Line white paper indicates that no public relations agency, no matter how powerful, can control a brand’s message. In the past, reporters could be influenced through the building of relationships, but, today, anyone with a significant social media following can harm a brand’s reputation.

Speed matters, and monitoring tools can help speed up response times to issues as soon as something is mentioned in the media.

“When a PR agency knows that talk about its client has turned negative, it can take control of the situation on the client’s platforms,” the paper reads.

Jennifer Zingsheim Phillips, partner at Boston-based agency 4L Strategies, says while few PR practitioners want to think about crisis communications, it doesn’t mean you can’t be prepared for a crisis.

“While you cannot prep for everything, there are ways that your media monitoring can make a crisis more manageable, better prepared, and, on the back end, provide you with valuable data so that you can use what you’ve learned from one crisis to be even better prepared for the next one,” she says.

Proving ROI helps you justify marketing spend

In times of economic stagnation, budgets are tight and communication competes with other arms of the business for extra spend. This is why it is a priority to achieve optimal ROI.

“As digital technology has changed the way campaigns are measured and analysed, there is less room for error when allocating PR and marketing spend. You must make an impact with what you have done,” adds Dabbs.

“Our automated systems help PR firms to save time and gain spot-on insights into their communication efforts. In essence, brand tracking answers the question: Did we put our money in the right place?” she says.

Media monitoring levels the playing field for smaller PR agencies

Public relations agencies vary in size, from large multinational firms to small local ones. While large firms have greater capacity due to sheer size, media monitoring companies don’t discriminate against who uses them.

“Media monitoring tools developed and managed by outside companies can help small and mid-size public relations agencies compete with larger entities. Software can handle mundane tasks, from producing earned media reports to providing comprehensive analytics of a PR campaign,” the Brand Exposure white paper says.

“They identify placements so PR pros don’t waste time flipping through newspapers or annoying reporters with ‘Is it published yet?’ phone calls,” the paper notes.

Dabbs agrees, noting that Newsclip has a wide variety of PR agencies that use its services. “Newsclip’s aim is to meet the client’s needs. It does not matter how large your PR agency is – brand tracking is essential for all agencies, big and small.”

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Amidst the ever-growing haystack of data, the proliferation of fake news is having real, negative effects on the media industry. Read more in our article, Why fake news is a real problem for PR.