Gain the most from your clipping service expenditure

Published 2003

Clipping, or media monitoring services, are something that most companies with a PR function subscribe to, costing anywhere between a couple of hundred dollars a month to some thousands of dollars a month.

The sad fact is though, that while companies that pay for clips generally count them, few sufficiently analyse them to really benefit from paying for them in the first place.

One of the reasons for this is that too often the clipping service is there to simply confirm whether a media release was picked up by any media or not. It is done basically to see whether the time spent writing the release was worth the effort.

Clips however can be a rich source of information for a PR professional. Analysed thoroughly, clips can show anything from share of voice to your competitors current market focus.

Here are a few simple things companies can do with their clips without necessarily having to spend money on analytical software or excessive amounts of time compiling and studying clips:

Share of Voice. This is simply a ranking by volume of you against your competitors. Consider tracking your, and your major competitors’ share of voice quarter by quarter. Or, comparing each quarter’s share of voice against the previous year’s quarterly results. This will allow you to see your performance over time, along with that of your competitors. It’s the fastest way to see if you need to readdress the way you are doing things in the media.

Tone of voice. This is whether, in each clip, your company or its product was mentioned positively, neutrally or negatively. Whilst that’s easily done for each article, consider looking at those clips dealing mainly with the industry itself, in which your company was included, to see if your company shared the same tone as that of the industry in each article. This will let you know for example whether you are seen as a positive player in a neutral industry or a negative player in a positive industry.

Brand Recognition. Not too many companies do this, but if reputation is important to your company, as opposed to its image, it’s a great measurement tool. As a test, look at your clips and see what percentage of your mentions were in the body of the article and what percentage were in the headline. You can then compare this with competitors’ results to see whether you need to raise the profile of your company by appearing in the headline more often. This can be achieved by using different media approaches such as pitching for more interviews or writing specific opinion pieces… activities that are more likely to result in your name being part of the headline.

Key Messages. If you’ve spent quality time developing key messages, then your media releases should be expounding them. And your spokespeople should be including them in any media interviews they undertake. Therefore, if you have five key messages, count how many of the applicable ones appeared in articles or transcripts. If the results are good in articles and poor in interviews, then you know you need some media training. If the count is poor overall, then you need to look deeper to see if you have old messages that are no longer relevant to media, and develop some new ones.

If you’re really serious, you can do the same message measurement with your main competitor. Try and analyse the messages they are putting out. By studying a few clips on similar topics you will easily see what the consistent points are that they are driving home. Is this what they were pushing six months or a year ago? If it’s not, does it mean they are now taking a new approach to the market?

Not everyone needs to go to this level of clip scrutiny. But it does illustrate just what can be achieved with a little planning, detective work and analysis.

Note: The author of this articles is a senior Sydney-based independent corporate PR consultant who advises, coaches and mentors PR Managers  and undertakes PR audits of PR Department structures and programs as well as helping to review or select PR agencies. As well he also provides specialist corporate PR and communications advice where issues or change are impacting on an organisation. He also blogs regularly on PR and communications topics similar to those in this article.