Missy MacFarlane, principal and account director with Bayview Public Relations, has successfully achieved Accreditation in Public Relations. The APR designation is the mark of distinction for public relations professionals. 
Accredited PR professionals demonstrate a commitment to the profession and to its ethical practice and competence in knowledge, skills and abilities associated with the profession, including strategic thinking and planning, business literacy and legal standards.
In the Accreditation process, professionals complete an extensive application and compile a campaign portfolio to present to a Readiness Review Panel; participate in a two-hour oral board comprised of three accredited practitioners who judge candidates on 16 areas of knowledge, skills and abilities; and, after a series of classes, pass a three-hour computer-based examination covering 44 key areas ranging from ethics and law to communication models and theories.
Missy is among a group of seven PRSA (Public Relations Society of America) Tampa Bay Chapter members achieving Accreditation in 2011. Other members successfully completing the APR process include: Susan Barnes of Girl Scouts of West Central Florida, Travis Claytor of Tampa Bay & Co., Lori Hudson of Hillsborough County (Fla.), Kate Sawa of American Heart Association, Heather Sugg of William Mills Agency, and Marissa Segundo of City of Largo Recycling.
Karen Mess Frashier, APR, chairs PRSA Tampa Bay Chapter’s Accreditation committee and mentors candidates throughout the process.
Jesse Landis, principal and strategy director with Bayview, is also Accredited in Public Relations.
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PR measurement isn’t perfect, but it works
September 7th, 2011 by JessePeople ask us: “So, Bayview, how do we measure this PR stuff anyway?”
We might say: “Well, client, the best that we can.”
There’re many ways to tell if a PR program is working – though, notably, there is no agreed-upon standardization by the governing body of our profession. (The Barcelona Principles provide some nice guidelines, but it’s not a formula where businesses can just enter numbers and simply quantify results).
And that makes sense, as the approach to PR measurement really has to be specifically tailored for each individual campaign. There’s an array of possible metrics to choose from – and a different combination is required for each unique situation.
Foremost, we look at: “What exactly are we trying to change?” Is it an enhanced reputation, or register-rings, or new customers, or more business with existing customers, or ticket sales, or increased attendance, or sponsorship money, or more volunteers, or votes, or web hits, or phone calls, or traffic in your store, or… you get the point? There needs to be at least one overlying objective to a campaign, and your PR representation should be clearly contributing to that.
Then, breaking that down, we consider such factors as:
If the campaign is mostly or heavily focused on media relations, we can also look at such factors as:
And finally – sometimes most importantly – qualitative elements contribute to the long-term value of an organization’s brand, including:
PR works (well, good PR works) – that’s why it’s a growing industry. But without a precise, uniform, accountant-friendly form of measurement, isn’t it sort of a gamble? Yeah, sure, especially with the abundance of firms out there that hide a lack of achievement in graphs and charts that are as colorful as they are meaningless. The key is to focus not on outputs but on outcomes – focus on what resulted from the PR results.
If you’re working with a firm that is still measuring column inches and using advertising-equivalency-values, maybe it’s time you suggest they leave their fancy charts back at grandpa’s agency, then shop around for a PR firm that’s focused on and proven in creating real-life bottom-line results.
Tags: measurement, public relations
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