PS Takes on the Measurement Agencies, Rd. 1

Ding ding ding...

In a scathing post of measurement agencies entitled sponsorship measurement agencies fading into irrelevance, Power Sponsorship's Kim Skildum-Reid poses the question whether measurement agencies have lost their relevance in today's environment. Here's the crux of the argument she makes:

Sponsors need to know what results they get. Exposure is a low-value mechanism that says nothing about whether the sponsor has changed their target markets’ perceptions or behaviours.

Counting logos and assigning some arbitrary figure to them has a big history, but no relevance in our highly accountable environment. The problem is, there has been a whole industry of “measurement agencies” set up around this inherently flawed concept, and it is 100% in their best interest for sponsorship measurement to stay in the dark ages.

I don't know many people that still view media valuations as the end all be all of sponsorship measurement, but rather they extrapolate data for refining tactical elements of a sponsorship. However, I think the point is solid - measurement should be made against a mix of organizational business objectives, not in simple quantitative media metrics. When viewed with the right context I still think this data can provide value on a tactical level, and I think many of these agencies have refined their value prop to reflect this acknowledgement.

A good read, whether you agree or not, and one that by Kim's account has gotten the attention of a dozen or so measurement agencies.

Anyone want to air a counter-argument? If you've got 'em, let's hear 'em. Do measurement agencies need to "repurpose?"

photo credit via flickr: kate.gardiner