Okay, we’re not allowed to flog our own wares on this blog, but I trust it’s okay to flog someone else’s! Since so many of us wax on about the challenges of figuring ROI on communications efforts, I would be remiss not to share a cool new tool that one of our fellow bloggers, Merry Elrick, has created to make this a whole lot easier. Merry kindly walked me through her system a month or so ago, and I found it fascinating, and very different from anything I’ve seen in the PR measurement space thus far.

Merry’s web-based system, called DataDriven MarCom™, is a one-stop portal in which to store all costs related to each tactic in your marketing communications arsenal, along with (most importantly) details of every resulting lead and/or sale from each of those efforts. In other words, for every campaign, you (the communicator) would log-in costs for every ad, every direct mail piece, every media campaign, and so on. Then, as leads roll-in, you work in tandem with your sales department to insert contact information for leads generated by each campaign. The sales person assigned to each lead works it, and logs in the appropriate sales revenues if/when a sale results. (If your company is already working with a CRM package, I believe there is a way to link databases.)

A suite of report options allows you to quickly see which campaigns and tactics are working, and which are not, by comparing the costs of each effort against the numbers of leads and revenues resulting. Since the tracking is done in ‘real time,’ the communicator is able to change strategy and/or tactics quickly when necessary.

Anyway, it’s darned clever! I have to congratulate Merry on her innovativeness, (and bravery in expanding her career as a counselor into software entrepreneurship), and hope others on this blog will give it a whirl. The thinking behind the drill-downs is an exercise in good measurement, in my opinion.

In a recent BtoB article by Kate Maddox, “Measurement calls for more resources,” she cites a study that indicates marketers place a high priority on marketing measurement and analytics.

And last week the Association of National Advertisers released a study that found accountability is the No. 1 priority for senior marketing executives.

But if measurement is so important, then who can explain these astonishing stats in Maddox’s article:

In a recent survey of marketing executives, 47% said increasing brand value is a priority, but only 19% have a process in place to track this.

In the same survey, 48% of respondents are expected to measure ROI on individual campaigns but don’t have a process for doing this, compared with only 9% of companies that are expected to measure ROI on individual campaigns and have a process to do this. The remaining 43% are not expected to measure ROI on campaigns.

There may be a lot of resources available for those who want to measure, as Angie Jeffrey said in an earlier blog, but there’s a big gap between those who say they want to use them and those who actually do.

What’s up with that?

First, hello to all! I confess to being a blogging newbie, so have been avidly reading your posts and comments in an effort to get into the swing. Good questions and comments to date.

Second, I’ve just got to share my new view of PR’s measurement challenge since spending what felt like months reviewing white papers, speeches, articles and the web in preparation for an upcoming measurement speech at Bulldog’s Media Relations 2006. Bulldog wanted an industry scan of the very latest and greatest tools and techniques, so I ended up (exhausted!) with a seven-page spreadsheet of options.

Here’s the thing: we now have SO much information, SO many tools, SO many vendors and SO many approaches, that I am at a loss to understand why anyone is NOT measuring today. From web-based surveys to website tracking/analysis services; from sponsorship research to loyalty and brand-equity services; from CGM media analysis to traditional monitoring; and from 24/7 measurement platforms to cheap DIY tools … there are answers out there for just about any situation — including many FREE offerings (particularly for e-surveys and website measurement).

I’ve concluded that the biggest callenge facing us (besides getting through the long lists of options!) is thinking through the mixing and matching of output, outgrowth and outcome measures so that you end up with a truly integrated or linked set of results. Is this a left-brain or right-brain function? Test yourself sometime over a glass of wine, with a few different types of objectives … and see what you come up with. I found one glass of wine wasn’t enough …

Blogs are great for a lot of things. Archiving resources isn’t one of them. Among new media tools, wikis can fulfill that role. That’s exactly what Constantin Basturea has done with the valuable wiki, The New PR. Among the lists and links collected by The New PR’s many contributors is a section on PR Measurement. So far, links to a variety of articles and blogs have been assembled, although the page — defined as “a discussion space for those interested by PR measurement” — still lists “to be determined” under “How to use this space.”

I see this blog and The New PR’s measurement page as complementary — in fact, I’m going to add this blog to the list of The New PR’s measurement resources. Even in its nascent stage, the wiki offers some terrific links. And, for those of us interested in communication measurement who haven’t yet experienced a wiki, it’s a logical place to get started.