If you've ever sent a coverage report to a client or asked to share pr campaign success, you've probably shared a number. For years, that number was AVE.
It's easy to see why. AVE turns media coverage into shillings, and possibly the procurement team reads monetary value as success. Most PR professionals now call AVE inaccurate and misleading, though, and we agree with them.
Here's what goes wrong with AVE, and what we suggest as a measure of impact instead.
What is AVE?
Advertising value equivalency (AVE) is the amount a story would have cost if it had run as paid advertising. You take the space a story occupied and multiply it by the outlet's advertising rate. Print space is measured in column centimetres. Radio and TV are measured in seconds.
Many organisations then apply a "PR factor", multiplying AVE by two or three. The argument is that editorial coverage is more credible than an ad, so it must be worth more. The result is usually reported as a PR value.
The maths is simple. The trouble starts when you try to read the result.
Why AVE is an insufficient benchmark
1. PR isn't advertising
A news story and an ad serve different objectives. Audiences trust a columnist's story in a way they don't trust an ad, and a story gives your brand context.
2. Bad news still scores well
AVE counts space and ignores sentiment. A damaging front-page story about your brand can produce a bigger number than a positive brief. On an AVE report, a crisis can look like a win.
3. Bigger isn't better
A long, bland mention in a big publication can beat a short piece that reached exactly the right people. AVE rewards volume.
4. There's no standard
No one agrees on a single AVE formula. Rate cards, discounts, and multipliers differ. One agency can report 500,000 for coverage that another reports as 5 million. It's difficult to consistently benchmark against and scale.
5. The number has no meaning
Is KES 40 million in AVE good? In comparison to what? AVE has no ceiling and lacks a reference point, so it can't infer whether a campaign met its goals.
6. The industry has rejected it
In 2010, AMEC brought the PR industry together in Barcelona to agree on how to measure PR. The result was the Barcelona Principles, updated in 2015 and again in 2020. One principle says it plainly. AVEs are not the value of communication. AMEC and the PRCA have both publicly denounced the metric.
Why AVE is still around
If AVE is so flawed, why do communication teams still use it?
- It's quick to calculate
- It gives non-PR stakeholders a figure they recognise
- It's considered commensurate with advertising investment.
In the region, AVE (often reported as PR value) and the media publicity index (MPI) remain the most common ways of measuring PR.
Stakeholders are right to want a single number they can wrap their head around. AVE answers the wrong question. It does not account for important elements: sentiment (perception), audience reach and media prominence.
Meet the PRI
The Public Relations Index (PRI) was established in a series of brainstorming sessions between ReelAnalytics, some agencies and other PR practitioners in Kenya. We wanted to keep the part of AVE which PR teams like, which is an attributable value, and drop the parts that mislead.
The PRI is a percentage score from 1% to 100%. It shows how effective a PR campaign was in print, radio and TV over a given period. The PRI doesn't cover social media or online news.
What goes into the score
The PRI combines three parameters.
- Media space allocation, 40%. The share of ink or airtime on the topic.
- Opportunity to Experience (OTE), 40%. The number of people the coverage reached.
- Prominence, 20%. How conspicuous your brand was in each story, rated Excellent, Good, Average or Poor.
We then adjust each parameter for two things. The first is tonality, where positive, neutral and negative coverage carry different weights. The second is outlet ratings, with separate publication and station ratings for print, radio and TV.
| PRI Score= (x + y+ z) % | ||
| where x, y and z are the weighted scores for the 3 parameters |
Why the PRI is a better measure of PR success
It measures communication efficiency
The PRI leaves AVE out entirely. It scores how visible your coverage was, how many people it reached, and how favourable it was. There's no multiplier either. The weights are fixed and the same for every client.
Sentiment is accounted for
Tone runs through every part of the score. A wave of negative coverage lowers your PRI, so the number moves the same way as your reputation.
Every score sits on the same scale
The PRI always falls between 1% and 100%. That lets you compare one campaign with another, this quarter with last, and your brand with competitors.
Audience counts as much as space
OTE carries the same weight as media space. Coverage in a high-reach, well-rated outlet scores higher than the same space in a marginal one. You can also track the PRI by target audience, which AVE-based indices can't do.
It tracks placement and key messages
Prominence separates a headline story from a passing mention. The PRI also factors in key messages. These are the points a brand repeats to build its identity and earn trust over time. A story can be large and prominent and still miss them entirely. AVE would count that story at full value.
It follows the Barcelona Principles
The Barcelona Principles call for measurement that drops AVE and mixes quantitative and qualitative analysis. The PRI does both. Space and audience are hard counts. Tone and prominence are qualitative ratings.
The PRI doesn't meet every principle yet (it excludes digital publications); however, performance on traditional media over time can be consistently compared over a timeline.
Stakeholders who ask for AVE want proof that PR is working. The PRI gives them that proof in a form they can check.
The PRI scores coverage out of 100 based on reach, prominence and tone. Therefore, communication objectives are strategic, evidently visible and comparable.
Most PR teams measure coverage with AVE (usually reported as PR value, or PRV) or the MPI. We built the PRI to fix five gaps we see in those indices.
That makes the PRI a replacement for AVE, PRV and the MPI in print, radio and TV reporting. It has no score for social media, so a campaign that runs mostly on X, Facebook or TikTok still needs separate social measures.
AVE answers "what would this have cost?" The PRI answers "how well did this work?" You pay for PR to work, so the impact you state should be defensible, scalable and account for context.
Talk to us about proving the value of your media coverage in Kenya, Uganda, Cameroon, Malawi, South Sudan and Somalia.
