Best Practices in Public Relations Research

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Best Practices in Public Relations Research

• Don W. Stacks, Ph.D.
• School of Communication
• University of Miami
• Coral Gables, FL 33145

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What is Research?

• Controlled, objective, and systematic gathering
  of data
• Strives to describe, understand, predict, and
  control social and business phenomena
• Seeks to answer questions
• Reliable and valid way to access data
• Systematic collection and interpretation of data

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Theory vs. Applied Research

• Theory
• Abstract, conceptual
• Builds a body of knowledge for PR
• Academic or Basic Research
• Serves as a framework for understanding and
  predicting why people act the way they do.

• Applied Research
• Concrete, practical
• Strategic Research develops programs, messages,
  and benchmarks
• Evaluation Research determines whether
  communication campaigns works

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Main Uses of Public Relations Research

• Monitoring developments and trends
• Examining public relations position
• Assessing messages and campaigns
• Measuring communication effectiveness
• Tracking studies
• Gap studies
• Evaluation research

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General Research Assumptions

• Decision-making process is uniformly the same in
  all companies and organizations
• All communication research should
• Set objectives
• Determine strategy to establish objectives
• Implement tactics which bring strategies to life

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Assumptions (Contd.)

• Research can be divided into three general
  phases
• Program or campaign development
• Program refinement
• Program evaluation
• Communication research is behavior-driven and
  knowledge-based

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Public Relations Research Assumptions

• Research must be behavior-driven and yield data
  that help design campaigns that lead to desired
  behavior
• PR campaign research must parallel decisions
  communication pros make otherwise, they are not
  knowledge-driven or information based
• Effective research is integral to campaign
  creation, implementation, and evaluation

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Best Practice Public Relations Research Programs

• Conduct background/secondary research to
  establish benchmarks
• Establish achievable goals
• Ask appropriate research questions
• State measurable objectives
• Employ the appropriate methodologies
• Understand the need for programmatic research
• Have the budgets/resources necessary

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1. Does Homework Secondary Research/Benchmarking

• Establishes both an understanding of what has
  been done and how it was done
• Adds to an understanding of theory
• Provides a window into past practice
• Not a new concept espoused by John Hill in the
  50s
• Reduces the costs associated with needless
  replication
• Provides possible benchmarks against which to
  gauge progress

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2. Establishes Achievable Goals

• Goal General outcome expected by campaign end
• Objective Very specific projected output
• Outputs individual communication elements
• Impact of specific tactics
• Written, visual, verbal

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3. Asks The Appropriate Research Question(s)

• All research addresses four research questions
• Questions of Definition
• Questions of Fact
• Questions of Value
• Questions of Policy
• Best practice research asks and answers them in
  order definition, fact, value, policy

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Questions Contd.

• Definition
• What is it?
• How do I operationalize it?
• Fact
• Does it exist?
• In what quantity?
• Do groups differ or did change occur over time?

• Value
• How good or bad is it?
• How well was it done?
• Addresses aesthetics
• Policy
• What should be done
• Answered through research on definition, fact,
  and value

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4. States Measurable Objectives

• Management must concur about objectives
• Do they meet the business objective(s)?
• Precise, results-oriented objectives
• Stated in measurable ways?
• Realistic, credible, measurable, and compatible
  objectives
• Are they realistic or are they simply goals?

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Objectives (contd.)

• Informational objectives fairly clear cut
• What information does the public need?
• When do they need it (before, during, after)?
• Motivational objectives require
• Research
• Means to isolate effect provided by public
  relations
• Behavioral objectives state
• What you expect the public to do

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Programmatic Approach
Secondary/ Benchmark
Informational/Evaluation
Behavioral/Evaluation
Motivational/Evaluation
Planned benchmarked evaluations
Time Development (Evaluation)
Refinement (Evaluation)
Final Evaluation
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Objectives, contd.

• Informational Objective(s)
• Motivational Objective(s)
• Behavioral Objectives
• Business objective(s)

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5. Employs Appropriate Methodologies

• A public relations campaign hardly ever employs
  only one method
• Best practices triangulate methods to ensure
  that all research questions are addressed
• Methods are often classified as qualitative and
  quantitative or informal and formal

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Public Relations Methods

• Surveys and Polls
• Descriptive
• Explanatory
• Attitude
• Opinion Polls
• Content Analyses
• Descriptive
• Readability
• Readership

• Communication Audits
• Delphi Studies
• Focus Groups
• Field Observations
• Participant-Observation
• In-depth Interview
• Case Studies
• Experiments

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Qualitative or Quantitative Methods?

• Qualitative Questions of definition and value
• Intense, but small sample
• In-depth knowledge vs. Generalizability
• Examples
• Focus Groups
• Participant-Observation
• Informal Observations
• In-depth Interviewing
• Case Studies

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Qualitative or Quantitative Methods? (Contd.)

• Quantitative Questions of definition and fact
• Scientific
• Large samples
• Generalizability vs. In-depth understanding
• Reliable, representative sampling
• Examples
• Surveys (descriptive, explanatory, attitude)
• Opinion polls
• Delphi studies
• Experiments

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Triangulation
Secondary
Qualitative
Quantitative
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Qualitative or Quantitative Methods? (Contd.)

• Triangulation
• Uses secondary, qualitative, and quantitative
  methods to better describe, understand, predict,
  and control public relations campaigns
• Provides both representative sampling and
  in-depth knowledge of the publics or audiences
  under study
• Takes the case study into the real world

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Quantifying via Measurement

• Assigning numbers to categories
• Four Levels
• Nominal (distinguishes only counts, percent)
• Ordinal (distinguishes and orders counts,
  percent)
• Interval (assumes an equal distancing between
  categories counts, means, dispersion)
• Ratio (assumes absolute distancing between
  categories counts, means, dispersion)

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Measurement Examples

• Nominal
• England, France, Germany, Austria
• Ordinal
• GNP Austria (1B), England (2B), France (3B),
  Germany (4B)
• Interval
• Strongly Agree, Agree, Disagree, Strongly
  Disagree
• Assumes that the distance between SA A D SD
  (problem is that SAA, and DSD, but D?A)
• Data are interval, but not scalar in that there
  is no arbitrary zero point
• Ratio
• Actual date and time of birth Bank account
  balance

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Attitude Measurement

• Most Often Likert-Type Measurement
• Assumes interval data
• Respondents react to statements, typically by
  degree of agreement
• MUST have a zero point a midpoint
• MUST have an ODD number of responses (3, 5, 7)
• MUST consist of two or more statements
• Strongly Strongly
• statement1. Agree Agree
  Uncertain Disagree Disagree
• Strongly Strongly
• statement2. Agree Agree
  Uncertain Disagree Disagree

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Attitude Measurement (Contd.)

• Creates a scale of statements that
• Range from Positive through Neutral to Negative
• Strongly Strongly
• Public Relations is an excellent career.
  Agree Agree Uncertain
  Disagree Disagree
• Strongly Strongly
• Public Relations is a career. Agree
  Agree Uncertain Disagree
  Disagree
• Strongly Strongly
• Public Relations is no career at all.
  Agree Agree Uncertain
  Disagree Disagree
• Actual reaction to statements is 2
  1 0 -1
  -2
• Coded as 5 4
  3 2
  1
• Scale Range 3 (negative) to 15 (positive)

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Surveys vs. Polls

• Polls
• Short and quick
• fact-based
• Surveys
• Longer
• Definition- and fact-based
• Allow for limited questions of value

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Poll Survey Sampling

• Sampling
• Scientific Sampling Probability Sampling
• Group sampled represents the entire population
  from which it is drawn (cross-sectional trend
  panel cohort trend)
• Non-Scientific Sampling Convenience Sampling
• Group sampled is not representative of entire
  population, but only one limited segment
  (volunteer, snowball, quota, man-on-the-street

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6. Programmatic PR Research

• Best practice research is programmatic
• Divided into three phases
• Program development research
• Program refinement research
• Program evaluation research

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Program Development Research

• Program Development stage requires
• Communications goals
• Research goals
• Communication Goals
• Establish actionable and measurable objectives
• Design overall strategy to achieve these
  objectives
• Research Goals
• Understand the situation
• Relate this understanding to the communications
  opportunities

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Program Development Research Should Tell You

• The circumstances creating the opportunity or
  challenge
• Target audience(s) characteristics
• What needs to be communicated to realize the
  objective
• How ideas can best be communicated
• Go beyond just turning out information
  development stage helps to change, modify, or
  reinforce behavior

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Program Refinement Research

• Communication Goals
• Make correct decisions implementing the PR or
  communication program
• Research Goals
• Validate that decisions made are correct
• Supply the information necessary to choose
  between alternatives

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Why Program Refinement Research?

• Pre-testing of messages
• Informative, Persuasive, Attitude Change,
  Attitude Reinforcement
• Pre-testing of public/audience stance on
  objectives
• Pre-testing communication strategies
• Pre-testing for gatekeeper selection
• Pre-testing for publics (Active, Aware, Passive,
  Latent)

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Program Refinement Research Examples

• Types
• Concept/Message testing studies (definition)
• Spokesperson selection research (fact)
• Format testing (fact/value)
• Methods
• Focus Groups
• Polls (telephone/Internet)
• Informal Field Research

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Program Evaluation Research

• Communication Goal
• Determine program/campaigns effectiveness
• Research Goals
• Performance measurements in terms of
• Outputs Air time, clippings, Internet hits,
  etc.
• Impacts What program/campaign did to
  audience(s)
• Behavior Were desired behaviors realized?

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7. Research and the Budget

• Research is a necessary, not sufficient condition
  for public relations
• Research is a part of EVERY program/ campaign
  budget
• Research permeates the program/campaign, plan
  research across the process
• Integrated research is essential to effective
  public relations and should be built in to each
  budget

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Budgetary Factors

• Circumstances
• Availability of in-house personnel to conduct
  research
• Commercial research firm availability
• Whether the research has been budgeted across or
  simply as a budget item
• The research question(s) asked

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Research Costs

• Focus Groups 1,000 4,500 per group
• One-on-One Interviews 250 2,000 per
  interview
• Telephone Surveys
• Small 3,500 35,000
• Large 20,000 95,000
• Mail/Internet Surveys
• Small scale 5,000 30,000
• Large scale 12,500 85,000

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Stretching the Research Budget

• Never sacrifice quality for price
• Seek competitive bids
• Never take the low bid without examining the
  individual or firms credentials
• Learn about research questions and budget
  appropriately
• Dont conduct a survey when a focus group is more
  efficient
• When looking only for facts, consider a poll over
  a survey
• Never stop participating in the research
  experience
• All good researchers are Participant-Observers
• Continually seek informal data in the field

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Conclusions

• Best Practice Public Relations Research
• Is programmatic
• Has clearly defined and achievable goals
• Has its objectives stated in measurable terms
• Addresses the appropriate research question(s)
• Employs a triangulated methodologies
• Has the necessary resources allocated to the
  research program