The development of broadly accepted key performance indicators for the social media and online PR sector looks set to become a key theme of the coming 12 months, according to PR, search and social media agency Punch Communications.

Over the last decade, brands and communications specialists have placed greater and greater emphasis on the role of digital comms within an integrated marketing campaign. Whilst the measurability of some aspects of digital marcomms have been measured in a way that outsrips the accuracy of traditional channels, some components, notably social media in particular, remain an anomaly in terms of both analytics and an industry consensus on what constitutes an effective return on investment.

Consequently, with several marketing industry bodies, that span sectors such as online PR, social media, traditional PR, along with other marketing disciplines, all discussing the subject at present, the industry looks set to work towards some level of consensus over the coming twelve months or so. However, in tandem with this taking place, it’s likely that the leading social sites will provide considerably more robust data – which can, in turn, feed into agreed communication campaign metrics.

Pete Goold, MD of Punch said, “There remains an interesting dichotomy between the absolute figures that one can now get hold of easily via any number of online tools to measure many aspects of digital marketing disciplines and the principal concern of most marketing directors, namely: ROI.”

“With social media in particular emerging as such a force within the communications sector, it’s notable that many sites either provide no usable analytics or very poor levels of information. Even the market leading social sites are yet to provide anything truly comprehensive, which is certain to change as the sector matures.”

For more information, enquiries regarding jobs in PR, search or social media, or an informat chat, please contact Punch on +44 1858 411600, or via www.punchcomms.com.