Études de cas

The French National Committee for the Rehabilitation of the Disabled (CNRH) has broad responsibilities but, like many not-for-profits in the sector, little or no budget. It relies primarily on media and public relations. It turned to Echo to help improve its media targeting and PR effectiveness.

Echo reviewed the content of its media coverage and provided a benchmark for further improvement. Echo focused on how and what the organization was able to communicate through the media. With a view to securing greater attention and vital donor support, Echo's recommendations were:

• To actively promote interviews with the most persuasive spokespeople identified in the research
• To promote awareness of the activities of the organization beyond being an information provider
• To differentiate CNRH from other support groups crowding the arena
• To make CNRH the source of more insights and thought leadership in important areas of public interest, such as old age and disability, and the isolation of autistic adults and children.

As a result of Echo's work, CNRH revised its communication strategy and plan, with a far more focused media outreach and with a public affairs program to help reach its objectives.

"Echo's assessment of our media coverage helped us to identify precisely the drivers of our image in the media and evaluate the impact of our proactive communications," said Catherine Dedieu-Lugat, (then) Communications Director. "Echo's study came at a time when our organization was faced with a real threat to its existence and had to consider new or different ways of standing out from the crowd."

The Ministry of Defence has the role of defending the United Kingdom and its interests, and strengthening international peace and stability. Like many government departments, it is continuously under scrutiny by the public and in the news media and responds to many calls for information and explanation. Echo Research analyzed the profile of the Ministry of Defence and Armed Forces across all their operations, including Operation Telic (Iraq), assessing in particular the media debate around the case for Allied action in Iraq.

Surrey Police wanted to establish tools for ongoing evaluation, assess coverage of key messages, monitor reputation and monitor fear of crime as a running story.
Echo provides Surrey Police with a monthly Scorecard that reviews the month's media relations activities. Our award-winning work includes charts showing local and national press coverage, the impact of fear of crime as a story, media sources, reputation drivers, mentions of key messages and the impact of critical stories and proactive communications.
Echo found that a high proportion of Surrey Police's coverage is generated from uncontrolled incidents, which have a dramatic impact on ratings. Echo ensures Surrey Police are able to track the impact the media has on the readers' perceived fear of crime. Echo and Surrey Police communicate on a regular basis to be sure that key messages are current, relevant and strategic.

Echo identified six reputation drivers, tracks them in the media and tells Surrey Police whether and to what degree they have built or are losing reputation in those areas.
Echo is also now providing a more detailed breakdown of the components that make up Surrey's reputation drivers, allowing Surrey to gain a much better idea of how the public actually see it portrayed through the eyes of the media.

The Environment Agency protects and improves the environment, for both current and future generations. Its role includes legal action against infringements of environmental regulations. In this context, Echo Research tracked media coverage to see how the Agency's actions to "name and shame" organizations violating environmental regulations had penetrated the public consciousness. The Agency also has a public information responsibility to help people deal with environmental hazards. Echo Research evaluated the extent to which people had access to safety information in times of flooding - a hazard likely to increase in tandem with the effects of global warming.

With almost five million supporters across five continents, WWF has a global network active in over 90 countries and can safely claim to have played a major role in the evolution of the international conservation movement.

Like all not-for-profit organizations, WWF does not have market mechanisms to help judge the wisdom of its investment. It has to find other means to demonstrate accountability and assess opportunity costs. One of the ways it does this is to communicate honestly and fully on how it is doing in terms of the efforts it is making to find solutions to the dilemmas associated with abuse and overuse of natural resources.
WWF monitors and evaluates all its activities including communications, emphasising that it has a responsibility to communicate continuously, to all its stakeholders - project beneficiaries, executants, staff, commercial partners, donors and Trustees via any useful channel - the media, internet, e-mail, publications and in person.

WWF encourages an integrated approach between its programmes, fundraising and communications so that it can demonstrate not only its achievements but also the value they all bring to the perception of the organisation. In one of its key markets, Echo provides a monthly Communications Scorecard on a pro-bono basis evaluating media coverage, and also undertakes campaign analysis and specific survey research work as required, such as conducting focus groups to gauge the public's perception of energy saving and their likelihood of moving to 'green' electricity sources.

"Like many in-house communicators we have struggled to move management away from very basic measures, like advertising equivalence, as the key indicator of success. By working with Echo to deliver regular reports, detailed analysis and participate in internal seminars on communications evaluation, we can improve our understanding of the true value media activity brings to the delivery of brand profile and our conservation mission." Anita Neville, Head of Advocacy, WWF