Media monitoring is the Communications equivalent of a utility – it’s an essential part of the team’s day-to-day existence, with many hours dictated by developments in the morning cuts or the real-time alerts. It is the electricity of Comms.
But equally like a utility, it is something which is only really noticed when it goes wrong. There is no Pulitzer for a well-crafted summary nor any special commendation for a delivery ahead of schedule. These are expectations of normal service rather than instances of going above and beyond the call of duty.
Furthermore, the frustration of a missed clip or a delayed delivery is palpable – it is something which interferes with a Comms team’s daily workflow and costs time, and can cause embarrassment in the organisation since these summaries are one of the most visible outputs of the Comms team.
While many clients will acknowledge that no service will be 100% accurate all the time, this has often been used as a defence by traditional media monitoring agencies to obscure poor quality deliveries and an unwillingness to dedicate the time and resource needed to improve.
This both betrays a lack of empathy on their part as to the impact of poor service on the day-to-day functioning of a Comms team, while also revealing the downside of a duopolistic industry.
Having worked with Comms professionals for many years, we at alva understand the frustrations that poor media monitoring can bring and indeed, we’ve led the way in innovating an old-fashioned industry through consolidating sources, speeding up alerts and fixing costs.
Our latest innovation is another step in empowering the client – full accountability and quantification of the success of our media monitoring service.
In true alva fashion, we agree KPIs with a client at the outset of any media monitoring engagement and then to track and report on these on a weekly basis.
- What percentage of daily summaries are delivered on time?
- How accurate is the story selection?
- Is the summary ordering optimum?
- How accurately is the meaning of the article conveyed?
- Are the summaries free of spelling and grammar errors?
We track these and many other KPIs to 98%. Do you know how your current daily monitoring is performing on these measures? If you had to guess, where would you put it?
This level of transparency increases the trust our clients place in our service and is used as a measure of success – are we delivering on our promise?
Additionally, it quickly highlights any areas that can be improved to fit the preferences of each client, meaning these can be identified, agreed upon and amended early in the process so issues don’t emerge at a critical later point.
We are so confident in our ability to deliver to our KPIs that we will even link payment to their achievement. If we don’t keep our end of the bargain, why should our clients? Our clients tell us that this way of working means they see us as an extension of their core team.
If your monitoring agency is unable to provide you with the accountability that you would like or you would value seeing how our accountable approach can work for you please do contact us for a complimentary trial.
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