Cirrus, a service from agencyfaqs, is a quantitative evaluation tool that evaluates a company’s media relation activity in relation to that of the competition by tracking on daily basis news and articles featuring more than 1,000 companies in over 100 leading publications. Each piece is run through two measurement tools—the first measures the visibility of a company, while the second interprets the exposure tonality. A number of companies are now employing Cirrus to bring in measurability and, hence, accountability to their media relations programs.

The model assigns quantitative weights to factors like gross reach, article space and prominence of coverage. Each news item is then measured for these positive determinants and collectively they make up the calculation of visibility points assigned to the company. The visibility points, however, represent only the coverage received by a company but does not address the nature it. To measure exposure tonality, each news piece is interpreted for its reporting tone (positive/neutral/negative slant).

Once the tone level has been established, the visibility score is overlaid with the tone to arrive at the attendant Cirrus Image Points. A piece that has been ascribed a negative level will bear negative image points. Therefore, greater the item visibility, greater the negative image points credited to the company.

(Write to sandeep@agencyfaqs or to srinibalram@agencyfaqs.com for more details on Cirrus)

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