LU 1 - Integrated Research In Public Relations Practice Flashcards
Describe research as art vs science
A more scientific approach to evaluation is emerging based on developments from media studies, market research and from both audience and social psychology research tools. These provide essential information for the justification of PR budgets through quality assured evaluation of strategic PR programs.
The dozier model provides a conceptual matrix by which practitioners can classify and report the impact of their activities.
Evaluation and research play an important role in the underpinning of strategic PR systems and processes through the systematic gathering, recording and analyzing of data relating to image, identity, reputation and perception by all stakeholders having an interest in the success or development of an organization. These include research into such elements as advertising effectiveness,media efficacy and corporate image, both internally and externally.
As the source of information grow and become more easily accessible, PR decision making improves all the time. Added to this is the better quality of industrial and other surveys.
In successful companies, systems are constantly changing and so executives knowledge and daily contact with operations, the marketplace and consultancies create an ever evolving strategy formulation process. At PR conferences and meetings, workshops and committees, people from competing companies, suppliers and customer talk to each other and learn about the first signs of significant developments In the tools and techniques available.
The implementation of a communications strategy is often not thought out until the business strategy has been adopted by a main board. Implementation is then sometimes left to the tactics people without clear guidelines, with the result that top down approaches often ignore the contribution that PR makes to competitive advantage in a knowledge economy.
At strategic level PR affects the whole organization and so, inevitably, the involvement of all top management is crucial for success, at an operational or tactical level, awareness of PR outcomes at the very least is crucial and needs to be coordinated and managed effectively, particularly at the point of decision making. Tactical communication decisions have to. E seen to fit into corporate or business objectives and this requires corporate communication coordination and integration at board level.
Preparation Dissemination Impact
Communication activities prepared via application of internalized professional standards of quality
Dissemination of messages evaluated by reactions of mass media professionals
Impact of PR activities evaluated via subjective qualitative ‘sense’ of publics’ reactions
Communication activities prepared via application of scientifically derived knowledge of publics
Dissemination of messages evaluated by quantified measures of media usage of messages
Impact of PR activities evaluated via objective, quantitative measure of publics’ reactions
Name and explain the 9 different research designs.
When initiating research of any kind, the research should first consider which design to follow. Research design articulates what data is required, what methods are going to be used to collect and analyse this data, and how all of this is going to answer your research question.
Public relations involves the following types of research design:
- 1 Exploratory Research
This is a design that would provide the public relations researcher with ideas and insights about the broad and vague research problems. A typical example would be doing focus groups with stakeholder groups to understand their concerns. - 2 DescriptiveResearch
Research designed to provide answers to questions about the: who, what, when, where and how of a topic is called descriptive research. An example would be using quantitative methods such as a survey to understand more about a particular stakeholder group.
2.3 QualitativeResearch
This research design seeks in-depth, open ended responses. This research uses qualitative methods such as observation, focus groups or interviews to get a deeper insight into, for example, why employees are feeling demotivated.
- 4 Quantitative Research
This research design seeks structured and quantifiable responses. Quantitative research typically uses quantitative methods to collect the data, such as surveys, where a respondent can only select one answer and do not have the opportunity to share his/her own view. Numbers are then used to make sense of the data. - 5 PostHocResearch
Public relations opportunities and threats should ideally be identified before they actually occur. Post hoc research attempts to investigate variables and predictors of future happenings in the public relations environment. This type of research is used similarly to the term environmental scanning, where the environment is explored, looking at the past, history around a particular event/issue, and the information is then used to predict the outcome in the future. - 6 ExPostFactoResearch
This design investigates a public relations phenomenon “after the fact”, which means that a post mortem is done to explain, describe and clarify the issue. Ex post facto research will be used for example, to determine the reasons why a public relations campaign failed to reach its target public. - 7 Longitudinal Research
All other research designs can be described as a snapshot of a certain research problem whereas longitudinal research designs have the objective of obtaining information over prolonged periods of time. For example, an organisation may hold an event annually to thank staff for their contributions throughout the year. Every year research is done to understand how staff experienced this event. Over a number of years, it becomes possible to see if there is an increase in the satisfaction of staff with this event or not. - 8 Casual Research
Most public relations variables exist in correlation or in close relationship with other variables, and public relation strategists need to be informed of any cause-and-effect relationship that exists between these variables.For example, doing research to determine if the monthly internal newsletter helps people to understand their jobs better. - 9 PredictiveResearch
This is conducted to forecast future values, for example sales income and market shares.
Discuss various research methods
Action Research
This research method focuses on finding a solution to a local problem in a local setting. It forms part of qualitative research.
Example: A PRP investigates whether a campaign implemented leads to improvement in stakeholders understanding of values.
Case Studies
A type of qualitative research in which in-depth data is gathered relative to a single individual/programme/event for the purpose of learning more about an unknown or poorly understood situation.
Example: A PRP may gather data to gain insight into how employees responded to an internal communication campaign. This is then collated and presented as a case.
Content Analysis
A detailed and systematic examination of contents of a particular body of material (e.g. television shows, ads, press releases) for the purpose of identifying patterns, themes or biases within that material. This method forms part of qualitative research, although computer programmes can do it quantitatively as well.
Example: A PRP may collect comments made by customers on the company blog to conduct a content analysis to identify similar, different and interesting themes that appear consistently.
Correlation Research
A statistical investigation of the relationship between two or more variables. Correlational research looks at surface relationships but does not necessarily prove for casual reasons underlying them. This forms part of quantitative research.
Example: when a PRP conducts a survey to gather quantitative data on the perceptions of the media of the organisation. The PRP looks at the relationship between how often the particular media is contacted in relation to their perception. This can be investigated through the use of specialised statistical packages.
Developmental Research
An observational-descriptive type of research that either compares people in different age groups (a cross- sectional study) or follows a particular group over a lengthy period of time (a longitudinal study). This is important to look at developmental trends. This is both qualitative and quantitative research.
Note: not used often in PR, but reports done by research houses can advise management on the strategic direction and communication of the organisation.
Ethnography
A qualitative inquiry that involves an in-depth study of an intact cultural group in a natural setting.
Note: not used often in PR, but reports done by research houses can advise management on the strategic direction and communication of the organisation.
Experimental Research
A study in which participants are randomly assigned to groups that undergo various researcher-imposed treatments or interventions, followed by observations or measurement to assess the effectiveness of the treatments.
Note: not used often in PR, but reports done by research houses can advise management on the strategic direction and communication of the organisation.
Historical Research
An attempt to solve certain problems arising out of a historical context through gathering and examining relevant data.
Note: not used often in PR, but reports done by research houses can advise management on the strategic direction and communication of the organisation.
Grounded theory Research
A type of qualitative research aimed at deriving theory from the use of multiple stages of data collection and interpretation.
Note: The inductive approach is used here and from collecting data a theory is developed and so is not often used in PR.
Survey Research
A common method used to describe the incidence, frequency and distribution of certain characteristics in a population.
Example: a PRP may commission or conduct a survey to answer predetermined questions such as perceptions of stakeholders about the organisation or a particular issue.
Explain validity and reliability
Validity and reliability
Experienced practitioners are only too familiar with the dangers inherent in allowing style and creativity to run away with the substance of the original brief and its message, not least when a campaign takes on a life of its own outside the remit of the strategic plan. With the internet having driven general awareness of the importance of sound information as a means of influencing group management and their governance policies, the corporate communication industry finds itself revisiting post-war European precepts.
The global public relations industry has tended to rely until now on research developments from the United States and so most of the principles that Europe follows are deemed to be fairly universal, albeit with a clear caveat in terms of cultural similarities and differences alongside national and professional ethical protocols. This could change as the social sciences increasingly offer sophisticated methodologies because of new technology and software. Most practitioners are familiar with the advantages and disadvantages of internet-based research methods, not least in terms of environmental scanning or monitoring of media and other information sources.
In the 1960s, at the dawn of mass communication as we know it today, social scientists published their now classic model of the four elements of communication: information, influence, impact and empathy. For many practitioners the internet is no different from collecting data by telephone, letter or fax, but it does facilitate the collection of data from larger groups of people and thus produce wider sampling. These secondary research methods are informal and can support formal research methods that require inferential reasoning, both quantitative and qualitative.
The most popular form of research into online communication is ethnography. Online discussion groups can reveal patterns of social relationships even though participation is taking place in a virtual space via chat rooms or video conferencing. Another use is gathering qualitative research via focus groups, and here the advantages and disadvantages compared to face-to-face, including personal interviewing, are about equal. The other key use is online social surveys by e-mail and web surveys, which can be used to supplement traditional questionnaires. This is the area attracting most government interest as a means by which democracy can be supplemented via the ballot box. The critical differences between synchronous and asynchronous methods of data collection, the former being in real time, eg online in a chat room; the latter where there is an online time lag between the parties which is of unknown duration. This has critical implications for long-term public relations planning.
Some of the most interesting developments in online communication are the integrative approaches being taken by large organizations to teleworking, which concerns itself with both top-down measures of effectiveness and efficiency as well as bottom-up concerns for operational competencies. The implications for the public relations and communication industry are significant. Broader strategic considerations, beyond the immediate impact on the bottom line, influence the decision to adopt teleworking or remote working, because teleworking requires setting clear performance objectives and measures
to a sophisticated degree ’as business and society becomes increasingly IT capable’. Clearly ’the study of telework in multinational enterprises may be particularly important. . . to assess the impact of location and activity scope of aflilxates within a single firm on the adoption of this practice
Examine and explain the balance scorecard tool
Balanced scorecard
The balanced scorecard as a tool for in-house communication practitioners is only helpful in facilitating and controlling public relations performance measurements for management if it is applied as a strategy implementation tool and not just as a performance measurement system at particular moments in time. When exploring the performance effects of using the balanced scorecard in Holland, ’mechanistic use without a clear link to corporate strategy will hinder performance and may even decrease it’ and that the way it is used is important when translated from strategy into action.
However, at strategic and practice level an efficiently managed corporate communication scorecard supports coherence between conflicting goals of a company and helps to coordinate the various activities within the medium next to the PR goals. For example, media response analysis plays an important part in controlling multi-dimensional communication as well as helping to develop competent PR research. Scorecards are likely to increase in use because of the knowledge they produce as organizational performance indicators. One of the challenges associated with the use of scorecards is that they are unstructured and
non-standardized and so must rely on expert linguistics and sensitive interpretation even when tailor-made for a company.
Use of the Corporate Communications Scorecard (CCS) by large companies in Germany doubled during the last decade. A Leipzig professor, Ansgar Zerfass (2008), suggests five perspectives: financial, process, sociopolitical, potential and customer. These factors ’blend into the balance scorecard of a company’, he argues, without loss of the ’intrinsic tension between control and creativity’.
Discuss PR industry analysts
PR industry analysts
Perhaps the best informed about the design and application of the balanced scorecard as a strategic management tool are the industry analysts who gather data, news and information. Tailor-made analysis can be expensive and sound briefing is essential if managers are not to waste precious resources collating market data that is either too broad to be of value to the company, or whose accuracy is questionable. This is particularly true of service industries. The risks inherent in outsourcing this element of public relations management is probably no better nor worse than outsourcing much PR campaign work to PR agendas, given the level of experience required in working with in-house management and their diverse internal cultures. Strategy building may require non-disclosure agreements because to do their job properly, analysts need in-depth information that is more intrusive than, say, questions from journalists. In a typical public relations department 30 years ago, the public relations director was the in-house contact for both media and industry analysts. Today, with the acceleration of technology, it is probably wiser to keep the roles separate so that everyone channels requests for information through to an analyst relations manager reporting to the director for press release or announcement approval through the normal communication channels.
The main barriers to cost-benefit analysis measurement are cost, time, lack of expertise and questionable value of results. The value-added components of non-financial company reporting such as attitude and behaviour are well understood and public relations practitioners with organizational psychology backgrounds are helping to develop research methodologies for the public relations industry, with the aim of moving away from simple input/output measures.
Explain grounded theory
Grounded theory
Hence the current popularity of applying grounded theory for analysing qualitative data. Academics still argue about a definition of grounded theory, but broadly speaking, it concerns itself with the development of theory out of data, with data collection and analysis proceeding in tandem, consistently referring back to each other. This approach is called ’iterative’ or ’recursive’. It works through a process of coding, where data is broken down into component parts and given names. It does not fit into preconceived standardized codes, but emerges as the research progresses. At different phases of grounded theory, the outcomes produce concepts, categories, properties or attributes of a category, and hypotheses or intuitive sensing about the relationships between concepts.
Computer software is helping to develop this methodology for qualitative data analysis in multi-culture scenarios. It seemingly offers a more democratic way of creating knowledge through less rigid relationships between researchers and participants. Such mixed research methods of applying quantitative and qualitative techniques in the same project are deemed to be more compatible with today’s real world where information can be misinterpreted or the cultural dynamics too complex to pin down.
With the speed of electronic communication, bad research can damage global as well as local reputation overnight. For example, PricewaterhouseCoopers’ report (2006) showed that ’consumers and stakeholders do not understand the drug development decision process in the pharmaceutical industry and do not understand the risks and costs involved in researching new drugs and bringing them to market’. The pharmaceutical industry now recognizes that drug companies must do more to ensure that clinical trial outcomes are reported accurately and completely.
PWC’s perspective in terms of recommending PR actions essential to research and development and rebuilding trust (here, in the pharmaceuticals sector) is to:
- Communicate to stakeholders the differences between chemical and biological innovation and educate stakeholders about the difficulties and nuances of fostering breakthrough medical products.
- Address consumer misconceptions about the costs and risks of pharmaceutical product development.
- Understand the most effective channels for the accurate and complete reporting of clinical trial outcomes by collaborating closely with health care workers and patient groups and establish links so information can be provided for relevant stakeholders.
In a democracy this means not only complying with the letter of the law, but complying with the spirit of the law in all activities, from the start of the research to its conclusion and public presentation.
Analyse narrative methods in PR programs
Narrative methods
Many successful public relations programs tell a story. A story is an account of incidents or events but, ’narrative comes after and adds plot and coherence to the storyline’. While the public relations industry recognizes the inevitable bias in any story rolled out in a public relations programme, it also recognizes that deconstructional analysis has a place in case study writing, the development of objectives, data collection, drafting a case, testing and revising. However, in the broader sense of public relations as public affairs, cultural considerations and ethical dilemmas, the following eight story deconstruction guidelines can produce useful pointers to forward planning in terms of the acknowledgement of sensitivities and the identification of potential problems or issues ahead.
Discuss story deconstruction guidelines
Deconstruction guidelines
- Duality search. Make a list of any bipolar terms, any dichotomies that are used in the story. Include the term even if only one side is mentioned. For example, in male-centred and/or male-dominated organization stories, men are central and women are marginal others. One term mentioned implies its partner.
- Reinterpret the hierarchy. A story is one interpretation or hierarchy of an event from one point of view. It usually has some form of hierarchical thinking in place. Explore and reinterpret the hierarchy (eg in duality terms how one dominates the other) so you can understand its grip.
- Reveal voices. Deny the authority of the one voice. Narrative centres marginalize or exclude. To maintain a centre takes enormous energy. What voices are not being expressed in this story? Which voices are subordinate or hierarchical to other voices (eg, who speaks for the trees)?
- Other side of the story. Stories always have two or more sides. What is the other side of the story (usually marginalized, under-represented, or even silent)? Reverse the story, by putting the bottom on top, the marginal in control, or the back stage up front. For example, reverse the male centre, by holding a spotlight on its excesses until it becomes a female centre in telling the other side; the point is not to replace one centre with another, but to show how each centre is in a constant state of change and disintegration.
- Deny the plot. Stories have plots, scripts, scenarios, recipes and morals. Turn these around (move from romantic to tragic or comedic to ironic).
- Find the exception. Stories contain rules, scripts, recipes and prescriptions. State each exception in a way that makes it extreme or absurd. Sometimes you have to break the rules to see the logic being scripted in the story.
- Trace what is between the lines. Trace what is not said. Trace what is the writing on the wall. Fill in the blanks. Storytellers frequently use ’you know that part of the story’. Trace what you are filling in. With what alternative way could you fill it in (eg trace to the context, the back stage, the between, the intertext)?
- Resituate. The point of doing 1 to 7 is to find a new perspective, one that
resituates the story beyond its dualisms, excluded voices or singular viewpoint. The idea is to re-author the story so that the hierarchy is resituated and a new balance of views is attained. Re-story to remove the dualities and margins. In a resituated story there are no more centres. Re-story to script new actions.
Critically discuss reading behavior for PR campaigns
Reading behaviour
Few people in the public relations industry believe that face-to-face contact with journalists and clients is obsolete because of technological developments like the new social networking facility Twitter. This micro blogging platform was used by Barack Obama to communicate with US voters during his 2008 election campaign and is used by top agency and corporate in-house departments as well as journalists. Like corporate blogs, Facebook and YouTube for marketing, Twitter is a new online channel of communication that is growing fast. With users sending updates in 104 characters or less, there are advantages, say, in crisis management but disadvantages, say, in the potential for misunderstanding. As more and more people follow each other with their updates and start to depend on social media, professional public relations practitioners must be aware that the benefits of using these new media tools will accrue only if the fundamentals of best practice are understood. The art and science of public relations strategy in the knowledge and expertise to be found in corporate communication literature and empirical PR research, is readily available to the thinking practitioner, but the gulf between knowing and doing can be wide.
This raises important learning issues, such as the difference between reading news and campaign messages in print and online, as well as issues about the use and abuse of the English language itself. Journalists and PR practitioners assume a lot about how people read news in print and online. The American Pointer Institute used eye tracking research techniques to test some assumptions by tracking readers’ eye movements, comparing their reading behaviour and analysing the implications. In what is possibly the largest eye tracking experiment ever undertaken, 582 reading session recordings yielded more than 102,000 eye stops or fixations. These were coded and analysed from the data set and eight key findings were produced:
- Reading depth participants read deep into stories in print and online, although reading decreases as story length increases.
- Reading patterns appear to fall into two categories, namely methodical readers and scanners. Online readers were equally likely to be methodical as they were to be scanners. Print readers were more likely to be methodical, but both types read about the same amount of text.
- Information recall alternative story forms such as Q&As, FAQs, time lines, lists and fact boxes, help readers to remember facts presented to them.
- Reading sequence there was a key difference between print and online points of entry, with headlines and photos being the first visual stop for print readers, but navigation being the first stop for online readers.
- Story packaging - lead stories and package stories attract more attention in print than other stories, where a lead story is one defined as having the largest headline on a page.
- Voice and opinion - the voice of the paper such as editorials or celebrity journalists and columnists in broadsheet and tabloid newspapers generate less attention than might be expected, although print readers are clearly interested in the voice of the reader content. Letters to the editor and reader feedback are also categorized as voice of the reader.
- Photographs and graphics maps and explanatory graphics are viewed more than charts in print and online and as might be expected large photos and documentary photos draw more eyes than small photos and staged photos. ’Mug’ shots receive relatively little attention including the pictures of columnists themselves.
- Advertising - with broadsheet ads, a half page or almost full page attracts as much attention as full page ads. Colour advertisements in broadsheet newspapers generate more than twice the attention of a black and white one, but online, advertisements with moving elements attract more than a quarter of the total eye stops, with banner ads and small ads generating the most eye stops.
I’ve read 80 inch stories that I could have read another 20 inches on and I’ve read 10 inch stories that were too long, so it all depends on. . . how was it done? What’s the reporting? How’s the writing? Is it a topic that really engages and captivates?
In a different setting and in collaboration with the Arts and Genomics Centre in Leiden, Netherlands artist Rune Peitersen also used eyetracking techniques to create a series of works to confront viewers with questions of what it means to see and be seen. The artist wanted to get an impression of what the eye receives in terms of overall position and speed by using a MobileEye, a tetherless eye tracking device consisting of two small cameras mounted on a pair of security glasses and a portable DV recorder. One camera records the eye while the other records the scene in front of the eye. The human eye moves constantly, several times a second, which we do not consciously control. These are called ’saccades’, which are proving of considerable interest to psychologists and neurologists in terms of our understanding of perception, underpinning all human communication. The relationship between newspapers and new media gets closer, with the internet increasingly taking classified advertising from newspapers and reporter bloggers rivalling opinion-makers. Although print media is in trouble, blogs are no substitute. Sullivan argues:
the terrifying problem is that a one-man blog cannot begin to do the necessary labour-intensive, skilled reporting that a good newspaper sponsors and pioneers. A world in which reporting becomes even more minimal and opinion gets even more vacuous and unending is not a healthy one for a democracy.
Such comments lead the competent PR practitioner back to the issue of language and the English language in particular, as the world of business and commerce largely depends on it. American professor of linguistics, Roger W Shuy, argues for three levels of language consciousness. The first level is ’relatively automatic and unconscious’, the second is ‘exemplified by those who write or speak publically such as. .. politicians or journalists’ and the third level he calls ’the highest consciousness… evidenced by the fact that, in spite of the careful protection provided by executives and attorneys, corporations sometimes use language in ways that lead to business disputes, even law suits’. Thus PR practitioners face a new skills area, namely forensic linguistics, if they are to avoid litigation in an increasingly litigious global economy.
In a 1992 advertising dispute, Shuy used ’linguistic research on narrative structure, morphology and semantics to illustrate how dictionary definitions are not always completely reliable and how electronic searches on language use can be helpful’. He applied Labov’s analysis of narrative Structure to the narrative part of a potential litigious advertisement anddeconstructed it to show a six-part structure or portrait made up of abstract, orientation, action, evaluation, resolution and coda. Although the case never went to court, the company agreed to discontinue the advertisement. Shuy argues that there is a ’need for forensic linguists to be well trained in the sounds and grammar of various dialects of English and to be knowledgeable about available research in language variation’ (p 150). The key areas he suggests are phonetics, morphology, syntax, semantics, pragmatics and speech acts, discourse analysis, historical language change and comprehensibility.
Although linguistics is an academic field in its own right, the in-house corporate public relations practitioner is well advised to seek the advice of the legal team when in doubt about global or local meaning. Alan Durant, a professor of communication in London, endorses the working relationship between linguistic experts and legal teams because of the way different interpretations can be made about everyday language as well as ’commercial transactions and negotiation’. He remarks on ’how easily it can become a minefield in social relationships. . . important issues not only about linguistic evidence in the court room, but about how contemporary public communication is best managed and regulated in a period of interpretive mistrust’.
Justify intertextuality analysis as a research technique
lntertextuality analysis
Clearly, one area that is of particular significance to public relations practitioners is the way that press releases are written and designed to be read by different audiences. It is therefore useful to understand a little about intertextuality analysis so as to appreciate how each story is ’informed by other stories that the writer or reader has heard or read and their respective cultural contexts’. Boje believes that the narrative analysis of novels can be applied to organizational narratives as well, namely textual productivity, social and historical intertextual networks, intertextual distribution and consumption, intertextuality and carnival -what Boje describes as ’the theatrical resolve… to render various class, race, gender distinctions harmonious and therefore hegemonic with the commonsense legitimation of corporate texts, including strategy, identity and harmonious rationales’. Figure 7.6 shows historicity and social questions for intertextual analysis.
A key method of storytelling analysis out of the eight offered by Boje is theme analysis. Inductive theme analysis is popular among some public relations research agencies in their search for patterns, particularly of cultural meaning based on taxonomies of similarities and differences. For creatives in a global context, awareness of basic narrative themes is likelyto prove beneficial. In the taxonomy shown in Figure 7.7, four types of narrative are considered: bureaucratic, quest, chaos and postmodern.
Given that the sequence of public relations objectives will normally include informational, motivational and behavioural objectives, narrative methods for communication and public relations research play an increasingly significant part in qualitative research.
In telling stories, an attempt is often being made to persuade through simple or straightforward explanation. With the popularization of science and technology, even generalizations must be based on clear, impartial evidence. Illustrations often contribute to clarity, with television and new media excelling in the speed at which they produce diagrams for news and current affairs programmes. Even when announcing a medical breakthrough or presenting topical issues such as nuclear energy, accuracy and clarity in reporting relies on the judicious use of language in its cultural context. Barrass reminds us that, although scientists and engineers are being asked to write well these days, many technical terms have additional meanings in everyday use and cites the words ’allergy’, ’neurotic’ and ’subliminal’ as examples, with the reminder that scientific and technical evidence must ensure that such words are used ’in the restricted scientific SEnse’. Narrative methods must never deflect from consistency and Predictability (reliability) or from validity, which challenges our perceptions both culturally and psychologically during the collection and measurement of data.
Explain PR as a social science
PR as a social science
The public relations and communication industry relies on inter-disciplinary and multidisciplinary research methodologies in the conduct of social research, including quantitative and qualitative theories, epistemology, ontology, the impact of values and the practical considerations of each factor. In a complex web, a crossover between market research and communication research can occur at any point in the choice of method, in the formulation of research design and data collection technique, in the implementation of data collection and in the analysis, interpretation and conclusions reached about that data.
A stakeholder approach clarifies the boundaries in that the quantitative and qualitative research strategies for collecting marketing communication data will address issues specifically related to the needs of customers, suppliers and buyers/producers. This is true whether the research design is experimental, cross-sectional, longitudinal, comparative or a survey on a single case study. Even with the development of value-added public relations to the bottom line via integrated marketing communication models, the strategic elements are straightforward, particularly in respect of sampling -both probability sampling (random sampling) and nonprobability sampling (non-random sampling). Although market-related public relations may appear to dominate financially in terms of fee income for consultants and agencies from consumer products compared to fee income to the public relations industry from corporate, environmental and governmental areas, the impact and often negative criticism of the industry is felt less because it has little or fewer social and political implications. This is particularly relevant when measuring public relations campaigns and communication programmes, such as surveys of levels of awareness or related attitudes, when measuring audience reception or measures associated with changes in behaviour, eg the behaviour of managers following an internal communication audit and corporate governance initiatives. The range of other stakeholders such as shareholders, educators, media opinion leaders, churches and state may be appropriate targets for the selling of a product or service but, in terms of public relations theory, selling is usually a one-way process (information) not a two-way process (communication).
Population classification systems may rely on research lists such as Mosaic, which is based on census data in the UK but also includes other data sources to produce a system of 11 groups, including Urban Intelligence and Rural Isolation. Other geo-demographic systems include The Acorn Consumer classification with five groups: wealthy achievers, urban prosperity, comfortably off, moderate means and hard pressed. These have been adapted to serve the classification needs of specific sectors such as investors and financial markets. Theory can of course emerge from the collection and analysis of data, and qualitative research is often applied in the testing of theory ahead of data collection. However, multi-strategy research requires considerable research experience, skill and training and the ability to handle the outcomes, which can be planned or unplanned, qualitative or quantitative. Although this book is not a ’how to’ book and so does not instruct the reader on how to carry out quantitative methodologies such as bivariate analysis, multivariate analysis or statistical significance methods, nor qualitative methods such as interviewing, surveys or participant observation, a chapter on research Would be remiss without mentioning the software package, SPSS for Windows. This is the most widely used package for analysing data because It saves time and is fairly easy to learn. Most public relations postgraduate programmes include training in it, or if they don’t they should do so, because experience of SPSS is necessary at research planning and publicrelations programme design stage, where it is particularly important for coding or labelling data or units of analysis and the coding frame in respect of the coding of open questions. In content analysis, coding schedules are produced as forms on which all the data about an item being coded is entered and preserved. There are statutory ethical governance and regulations on research that must be adhered to in the UK and which underpin the Cll’R’s code of conduct and ethical statements.
Analyse the case study
PGA 148
