We’re super excited to be able to turn the mic over to Tayler Cusick Hollman of Enji for this blog post – she’s truly a thought leader, and we’re grateful to her for sharing this amazing insight!
If you’re invested in doing PR for your business, you’ve got some real goals you’re working towards. From building your brand into one with national recognition to establishing yourself as the subject matter expert in your field, it takes a lot of time and effort to really start reaping the rewards public relations has to offer. Because, while it doesn’t take a lot of time to start stacking up small wins (a feature here, a podcast interview there), the real win is a longer play—building your reputation isn’t something that happens overnight! So, when you’ve made the decision to put energy, patience, and likely money into PR, seeing the wins stack into progress is an important thing to do. Today, then, we wanted to make sure you’re doing just that! Read on to learn more about what KPIs are as well as which ones will help you understand the impact of your wedding PR.
What are key performance indicators?
Simply put, key performance indicators are the numbers you track in order to understand how things are going in your business. And they are an important thing to have and watch because they are a way to quantify your PR goals. For example, if one of your goals is to build your brand, what are you looking at to know if that’s actually happening? (Pssst…the answer is your KPIs).
But when it comes down to what we’re talking about today, the KPIs you end up tracking will help you better understand the impact of your wedding PR—which can be harder to know past what your gut is telling you. That’s because a lot of PR has to do with this intangible thing that is your brand, and a lot of the “chatter” that comes along with brand building happens in proverbial rooms you aren’t necessarily in. But some of that brand and reputation building you’re pouring over does happen in places you’re in (or at least aware of), so it is more than possible (and very beneficial) for you to watch these numbers.
Pro-tip: Your business can and should have KPIs for all the facets of your business because they help you understand the overall health of your business as well. So, after you think about what you want to track for your wedding PR, take some time to think about other marketing and business KPIs that would be good to track as well.
Must-track KPIs for wedding PR
When PR is one of your main marketing channels, there are a few KPIs that fall into the “must-track” category. And whether you say the reason is the are basic, common, or foundational, the key takeaway here is this is where you want to start.
- Pitches (this includes submissions)
- Accepted pitches
- Guest blogs
These numbers are good to track since they help you understand your effort you are putting into your PR as well as the scope of your wins.
Pro-tip: It’s great to get in the habit of tracking your numbers on a monthly basis. My personal workflow is doing it on the first day of the new month and looking back at the past month’s metrics.
KPIs to track if you are on the speaking circuit
For anyone reading this who is trying to book themselves for speaking engagements, there are 3 more KPIs to add to your list.
- In-person speaking
- Virtual speaking
- Podcast interviews
Pro-tip: My favorite way to track these metrics is in a single pie chart in Enji so I can quickly see the breakdown of where the bulk of my wins were in the past month. I also include guest blogs in this chart.
Additional KPIs you can track to better understand your PR
Which brings us to what I like to consider crossover KPIs—because even though they aren’t solely related to PR, they very much can be impacted by your PR efforts.
- Mentions
- Social media shares
- Increased brand awareness
- Website traffic
- Backlinks
These are all different ways to measure the “chatter” we talked about earlier but also the SEO benefits of PR as well as the interest or buzz it helps to build (driving people to your website to learn more).
There you have it—the KPIs you should track in order to really understand the impact of your PR efforts. The good news is, you can start tracking these at any point in the year, so start now if you haven’t. You’ll have valuable insights to help you make even better decisions as time goes on and you work to refine your PR approach and reach all of your business goals.
A marketing consultant and small-business builder, Tayler is the Founder of Enji—an exciting new startup that launched in May 2023. (Though you might recognize her from one of her other companies: TAYLRD Media and Designs and Sourced Co.). In her newest endeavor, Tayler is taking everything she has learned over nearly a decade of helping small businesses with marketing to design and build a suite of online marketing tools that fit your lifestyle and make sense for you.