Previous studies have compared the effectiveness of PR and advertising, but no research has examined how PR impacts advertising.
Communications professionals at ABX, a global advertising research firm, hoped to change that. ABX collected net positive audience impressions from Hotels.com and AT&T over a nine-month period to compare changes in its creative test scores against audience impressions. The researchers — Angela Jeffrey, ABX vice president, brand management; ABX President Gary Getto and Sandra Duhé, associate professor at Southern Methodist University — wanted to determine if news coverage pushes scores of advertising up or down, or has no impact.
“Since advertising creative is the main driver behind the success of multi-million media buys, PR has a bigger role to play than we ever knew,” they state in a blog post for the Institute for Public Relations. “With the merging of traditional paid/non-paid media channels today, it is crucial to understand the inter-relationships between these media disciplines and how one can influence the other.”
When News Devastates Ad Campaigns
Negative news can devastate advertising effectiveness. After news broke about misbehavior of a company spokesperson, ad effectiveness dropped by a third.
Positive media coverage can help increase advertising score. “Captain Obvious Runs for President,” was supported by PR campaigns, which likely helped drive the creative score from an ABX Index of 85 to 91. An ABX Effectiveness Index score of “100” is considered average.
Simple math illustrates the power of PR, they say. Suppose a TV ad receives an average ABX Index of 100 and had a $2 million ad buy. If a positive PR campaign increases the score by 20 percent to 120, that means the PR delivers an additional $400,000 worth of business outcomes.
The researchers note they are seeking new participants for more research on how PR impacts advertising.
Recommendations for PR & Advertising
The ABX team recommends that PR work together with marketing and advertising to develop methods to test PR’s impact on advertising. PR could take the credit if ad effectiveness improves. “What PR needs from advertising is the chance to have a big-dollar ad measured by the company’s copy testing firm both before and after the PR campaign,” they urge.
Keep studies small and focused for clear results, they advise. The Hotels.com study provided only 109 key media clips over the 9-month period, which were very focused. The AT&T study, by contrast, provided 31,976 clips on all relevant topics. Limiting clips to demographically or campaign-focused subsets can improve the chances of determining the PR impact on advertising scores.
Bottom Line: Whether positive or negative, media coverage can have a huge impact on advertising effectiveness, new research reveals. While negative news harms ad campaigns, effective PR campaigns can greatly increase ad effectiveness. PR can work with ad departments to measure how PR affects ad effectiveness.
William J. Comcowich founded and served as CEO of CyberAlert LLC, the predecessor of Glean.info. He is currently serving as Interim CEO and member of the Board of Directors. Glean.info provides customized media monitoring, media measurement and analytics solutions across all types of traditional and social media.
