Reserach and Evaluation in Public Relations

Before reading this chapter I understood that it is important to conduct research and practice evaluating this research in order to execute a successful public relations campaign. What I had not previously considered was the specific ways of going about acquiring information and the importance of selective choice of methodology dependent on the amount of information required and budget restrictions.

There really is a lot to think about when acquiring information for a campaign. Once a methodology has been chosen, such as qualitative or quantitative varieties of techniques, care must be taken that not enough or too much research isn't undertaken as too little research may leave a practitioner without enough knowledge of the situation at hand and too much reserach is costly in time and money. To ensure this doesn't happen, the setting of clear goals and objectives must be set prior to undetaking research. For me this is an important point of the readings, and one that is laying out a firm theme across PR practice. The most obvious rule I have taken from this weeks readings and previous weeks is that before doing anything in a PR campaign, one must have clear objectives set out in order to achieve success.

The information on SWOT analysis also extended my knowledge of the PR plan and report assignment ahead of us. The readings also outlined that to use a SWOT analysis to its full potential and understanding of related opinions and attitudes surrounding the issue is paramount. The following list of questions will greatly help me narrow down my PR plan for the Maitland Repertory Society:

*Who is the public?
*What are their characteristics?
*Where do we find them?
*Why are they important to us?
*How active or involved is this public relative to our interests?
*What is their hierarchy of importance?

I also found the ethical considerations in reasearch interesting as I previously hadn't considered them. PRIA's Code of Ethics adresses the issue of research, with guidelines to follow such as "Give full disclosure of the reserach procedure".


See John Hanlen's blog for critique.