This time of year is brutal.
We’ve hit Reality Check Season here at Matter. In addition to the regular, end-of-year PR stresses of chasing reporters and stories, staying on top of the latest holiday trends, and planning for the New Year ahead, we fine PR pros subject ourselves to something called metrics.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s busy around these parts, but we wouldn’t have it any other way. We’re in this business because we thrive under pressure and deadlines are like crack to us. We push ourselves partially because we like the thrill of the chase, but mostly because we’ve promised our clients that we’ll meet our metrics and we’re desperately afraid to fail.
What are these “metrics,” you say? They’re the measurement against what we promised our clients we would do versus what we did. At the start of each year, we sit down with our clients to learn about their impending business goals. We then plan and implement PR campaigns with agreed-upon metrics that support those objectives to ensure we’re focused on the right areas of their businesses.
Depending on a client’s needs, those metrics might quantify our target number of media hits, bylined articles, interviews in trade pubs, awards won or speaking opportunities secured. Or maybe they are more qualitative, like message pull-through or shifting the perceptions of a few key influencers. Regardless, we set the bar high and sure, sometimes we fall short for one reason or another, but our teams bend over backwards to meet these goals.
This time of year, we’re in our final stretch of bending, if you will, and the last-minute scrambling can take its toll. That said, the accountability that comes with all of that hard work is oddly refreshing. You can tell that clients respect our honest approach to PR and, as a team, there’s no question about where we need to improve a campaign or whether or not we’ve accomplished our goals.