Vague Won't Do

One thing I have learned with in the book “Measuring What Matters” is when it comes time to set a goal ,or to measure, it is not the time to be vague. As PR practitioners we should not be vague anyway, but in these moments it is crucial.

            On page 35, author Katie Payne says when businesses are asked to set a goal they sometimes say something like this “To reach our target audiences with our key quality message.” Payne says this is a good goal but the objectives are mixed. I agree with her, but I would like to be even more critical. There is a larger problem than just overlapping objectives. This is too vague. What is the message? Who is the target audience? What do you want to achieve by sending this message out? If you do not know what you are enacting it will be difficult to achieve a measurement at the end of the campaign.

            Vagueness should also be expelled from the workplace when picking Key Performance Indicators, or KPI. Payne talks about this on page 38 and 39, that KPI’s are valuable assets when it comes to output and outcome measures. A KPI can be downloads received, attendance records, retweets, comments and so on.  They indicate the performance of the campaign and should reflect back to the initial goal. The goal and the future KPI should be thought of before ever launching a campaign to avoid stumbling around searching for a metric.

            I believe one of the key aspects of measuring is planning; and in this endeavor vagueness won’t work. Be creative and think outside the box! It can be fun planning a unique, well-planned campaign and then seeing its results at the end.