The document summarizes the discussions and findings from the 'hard to measure' roundtable event held on November 23, 2012, focusing on the complexities and significance of brand reputation measurement in businesses. It emphasizes the need for organizations to establish a clear definition of reputation, integrate it into their core objectives, and manage it as a critical business issue rather than solely a marketing concern. The document also highlights the challenges in measuring reputation accurately and the importance of strategy in both proactive management and crisis response.

1. HARD TO
MEASURE 1Hard to Measure - Roundtable Discussion 23 November 2012
Steps To
Successful
Reputation
Measurement
Report Following Roundtable
Hard to Measure Event
23 November 2012
8
HARD TO
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2. HARD TO
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HARD TO
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HARD TO
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Brand Reputation Schematic
Impact on Reputation
HARD TO MEASURE ROUNDTABLE, NOVEMBER 2012
A
B
C
D
E
F
GEOGRAPHIC /
BUSINESS UNIT
PERFORMANCE
PROFIT PROCESS
ENVIRONMENT
+20%
share value
+15%
brand valueCUST. SATISFTN
HRREPUTATION
HISTORICAL
& FUTURE
PERFORMANCE
Strategy
Values/Culture
Reputation
Identity
A
B
C
D
E
F
A
B
C
D
E
F
A
B
C
D
E
F
A
B
C
D
E
F
A
B
C
D
E
F
Strategic
Brand
Perspective
Key Factors
Business Performance
Dashboard
A
B
C
D
E
F
A
B
C
D
E
F
A
B
C
D
E
F
In 1290 AD, the Mapa Mundi was created, a large vellum map
of the world. It currently hangs in Hertford Cathedral. This was
an extraordinary document, part history, part theology, part
guesswork, partly factual. It was created at a time of flux, when
Europe was struggling through the ‘dark ages’ and the view of
the wider world was little known, but more and more important.
By its very creation it shaped the view of the world, and
expanded people’s views of what was possible.
In a similar (but historically much less significant) way, we are
trying to map the hard to measure landscape of brands and
their relationship with customers, to provoke debate, develop
tools, and provide insights into a business world which is also in
flux, and the understanding of
which is being fought over by
different groups.
Whatever industry you operate
within, and whatever your market,
brand reputation has an impact
on your company’s effectiveness –
and yet few companies track and
manage this in a comprehensive
way in the same way as, say, stock
levels, pricing strategy or R&D. If
we can ‘map’ the priorities and problems when understanding
reputation, we can find powerful ways to measure, track and
manage performance.
This document summarises the discussions and our findings
from the first ‘Hard to Measure’ roundtable, on 23 November
2012. The next event will be covering ‘Customer Centricity’ on
18 January 2013, and will continue next year with workshops and
seminars planned.
We hope you find this document interesting and useful. If you
would be interested in coming to a future event, please let us
know at enquiries@hardtomeasure.com.
James Bridgman and Karen Topp, 17 December 2012.
Introduction
A common problem, but no common solutions
What is
‘Hard to Measure’?
Hard to Measure is an
ongoing investigation into
best practice, insights
and tools to deal with the
‘intangibles’ of business
performance.
We set up the initiative
after realising that our
clients faced similar
challenges, despite coming
at business projects from
very different perspectives.
Karen
Topp is a
performance
management
and
management
information expert, who
specialises in the alignment
of performance indicators
to business strategy. She
helps directors understand
how far they are from their
division’s objectives, and
what to do about it.
James
Bridgman is
a branding
consultant
and Creative
Director of
Silverleaf, a creative agency
specialising in helping fast
growth startups, SMEs
and corporates develop
and deliver compelling
brands. With over 16 years
experience working with
every type of company,
James focusses on
creativity as a method
to meet and develop
business objectives.

3. 54 54
The Event The Event
Karen Topp James Bridgman
uk.linkedin.com/in/karentopp uk.linkedin.com/in/jamesbridgman
Karen Topp Consulting
Performance Management Consultant
Brand Consultant
Creative Director Silverleaf
Surinder Hundal
Owner | Director at Rippleseed
Previously head of Brand Engagement at Nokia, Int. Business Leaders Forum
View Linkedin profile: uk.linkedin.com/in/surinderhundal
Arno Castanet
Product Management & Development at MNI - Deutsche Börse Group
Previously at Fitch Solutions, Dow Jones
View Linkedin profile: uk.linkedin.com/pub/arno-castanet/1/76b/760
Madlen Nicolaus
Julie Strawson
Senior Marketing & Community Manager EMEA at Salesforce Marketing Cloud
Previously social media manager at Kodak and account supervisor at Ketchum PR
View Linkedin profile: uk.linkedin.com/in/madlennicolaus/en
Director of Marketing - Monotype Imaging, Founding Partner, Brand Perfect Tour
Previously Marketing Network Consultants Ltd, Lernout and Hauspie Speech Products
View Linkedin profile: uk.linkedin.com/in/juliestrawson
Jeremy Waite
Head of Social Strategy EMEA at Adobe
Previously head of TBG Digital, Phones4u
View Linkedin profile: uk.linkedin.com/in/jeremypaulwaite
Ben Claxton
Founder at nativeye
Previously Director of Consent and Head of Strategy of Panlogic
View Linkedin profile: uk.linkedin.com/in/benclaxton
@rippleseed
@jeremywaite
@benclaxton
@nonofromlondon
@madleeeen
@connectricity
Facilitated by...
Attended by... Location and Agenda
We had a great line up of expert participants who came to
Adam Street on 23rd November to contribute to the debate and
discuss issues from different perspectives. We would like to thank
everyone for attending and contributing – it would not have been
so successful without all of you there.
Our objective was to create a fairly open debate covering core subject
areas that impact brand reputation and businesses’ ability to track,
measure, control and understand it. It was also important that the
participants could shape the direction of discussion if relevant, as they
came from different backgrounds and perspectives.
Adam Street Club,
Central London
Start, personal introductions,
roundtable introduction
Wrap up
First two topics/areas
Follow up discussion topics
(group will determine which)
Final straight
— focussing on concrete conclusions
KEY AREAS FOR DISCUSSION:
• Who cares about your brand?
• Does everyone ‘live’ the brand?
• Prerequisites for a good reputation and
successful brand
• What is reputation?
• Monitoring and measuring techniques
• External drivers of reputation
• Sources of data, best practice and
resources
AGENDA

4. HARD TO
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If the measurement of reputation, and the promotion of related
metrics onto the overall board-level scorecard, are to happen,
then our very first hurdle is to ensure that the executive
management team actually trusts both the metrics themselves,
and the people who sponsor their use.
Branding and reputation are business problems
— not ‘design’ ones
It is no coincidence that the companies with the strongest brand
presence have significant buy-in from the board to put brand
at the centre of the discussion – a focus often championed by
one strong individual (Steve Jobs, Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson),
which fades when they are no longer there.
The understanding of ‘branding’ is often limited to visual identity
and marketing campaigns, which tend to be run by design-led
marketing departments.
This makes it hard for those
defending a ‘strong brand’ case
to be included in the debate over
business fundamentals. Placing
reputation KPIs on board level
scorecards demands the translation
of chiefly qualitative data into
profitability figures.
Marketers should not be the only ones concerned with
reputation, because all layers of the organisation are affected
in some way by reputation changes, and all of them can in turn
affect the business’s reputation. How much does a positive
reputation support the ability to hire talent? How much can it be
compromised by one poorly trained customer service agent?
Conflicting metrics
It is also hard to make a case for the use of certain metrics when
they deliver vastly different results depending on the parameters
used to calculate them. Brand value is an example, with
competing metrics differing by billions of pounds when assessing
large brands.
How much does a
positive reputation
support the ability to
hire talent? How much
can it be compromised
by one poorly trained
customer service agent?
Secure Sponsorship and Buy-in
Who cares about reputation, and why?
1
Definitions
There are many ways you
can define reputation,
depending upon your
perspective — usually
either customer / market
focussed (what your
‘audience’ thinks) or what
those involved in the
business think (what the
‘stakeholders’ think).
1. Reputation is the
beliefs or opinions that
are generally held about
someone or something
Oxford English Dictionary
2. An organisation enjoys
a good reputation when
it consistently meets or
exceeds the expectations
of its stakeholders. A bad
reputation results when
the organisation’s words or
deeds fall short of
stakeholder expectations.
Managing Risks to
Reputation
Jean-Paul Louisot,
Jenny Rayner
3. a. Reputation is an
intangible asset that allows
the company to better
manage the expectations
and needs of its various
stakeholders, creating
differentiation and barriers
vis-à-vis its competitors.
b. Reputation is the
intellectual, emotional
and behavioral response
as to whether or not the
communications and
actions of an organization
resonate with their needs
and interests.
Reputation
Elliot S. Schreiber, Ph.D.,
Drexel University

5. A
B
C
D
E
F
A
B
C
D
E
F
A
B
C
D
E
F
A
B
C
D
E
F
A
B
C
D
E
F
A
B
C
D
E
F
Key Factors
Reputation is...
HARD TO
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2
This is about establishing a brand vision. Do we want to become
visible in the first place? Do we want to be seen as the most socially
responsible superbrand in the world? Do we want 90% of our target
market to think highly of us? Is our goal to have a strong brand, or a
good reputation?
The goal is to evaluate the gap between how the business wants to be
perceived and how it actually is perceived, and to understand why the
gap exists.
Businesses need to measure:
• the aspects of reputation that matter the most to them
• their performance against the brand objectives they want to reach
• the correlations between their own activities and this performance
• the correlations between external events and this performance
Ultimately this ‘definition’ of reputation should be unique to every
business and based on qualitative information, the challenge being to
then deliver a quantitative indication of progress against goals.
Here are, however, some pointers towards a generic definition
of ‘reputation’:
• Delivery on promises
• Recognition of such delivery
(by the people whom we want to impress)
• Values
• Trust
A business’s brand image is built from the reactions, opinions and
activities of those exposed to it, and it is this behaviour, the reasons for
it, and the results it leads to that companies need to capture.
Define ‘Reputation’ and Your
Reputational Goals
In order to measure something, you need
to know what it is. To you.
Delivery
Recognition
Values
Trust

6. Reputation
Fragility
The example of Starbucks,
Amazon, etc. in the UK
recently shows that
once an issue relating to
reputation takes off, not
only does it have a serious
impact on the bottom line,
but it can be very difficult
to control.
Researchers from
Manchester Business
School have calculated
that public anger at
Starbucks’ payment of just
£8.6m in UK tax over the
past 13 years on sales of
£3.1bn and staff disbelief
this week at being told
paid lunch breaks, some
sick leave and maternity
benefits were being axed
could result in a fall in
sales of as much as 24% in
the next year.
[source Guardian 7.12.12]
With the impact of social
media, a slow response
to problems can be as
bad as no response at
all. Similarly, running
social media in ignorance
of what is happening
elsewhere in the company
can be equally disastrous
– Quantas recently
launched a #quantasluxury
campaign at the same
time as industrial action
was running, leading to
a firestorm of sarcastic
social media comments
from customers caught
up in the dispute.
HARD TO
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Can customer or ‘crowd
sourced’ content be
directed and controlled
for the benefit of a
brand’s reputation?
Only a clear and honest
dialogue will work.
Understand the Reputation Timeline
Short-term, tactical issues
The timeline of reputation is now increasingly complex – not only are
attention spans shortening (42 seconds of ‘concentration’ in the 60s to
5 seconds or less today), but different generations and cultures treat
sharing, acting on and creating information differently.
Jeremy gave a great example during the session: despite all the fuss over
digital information being ‘available forever’, a tweet has approximately 7
minutes of ‘half life’ (relevance), a Facebook post may be 20 mins, email/
web a week or more, and print much longer of course.
The change of timescales with social media is a challenge, but perhaps
even more important is the nature of the devices and situations when
people ‘take part’.
As people react more and more in short ‘snatches of time’ on mobile
devices where they are, reputation will be created by the quality of these
small interactions, and the ability of brands to draw customers in.
Obviously both huge problems and huge
potential rewards emerge from this new
world, for example Coca Cola crowd
sourcing their corporate content, focussing
on consumer ‘stories’. The challenge
of local vs global relevance, impact vs
personalisation all need to be customised
for each company.
… but long-term, strategic challenges.
Ironically, given this difficulty, a consistent and strategic approach to
brand reputation management, as aligned with company values, will
make responding correctly and appropriately much easier – you know
what matters and why.
If you know why people love your brand, it’s much easier to do the right
things, in the right forums and in the right timescales.
Businesses should also think about the impact of current activities in
the long term – as Surinder pointed out, the excitement generated by a
novel product may overshadow societal changes that will be perceived
as ‘evil’ years later, and create a reputation backlash. A good example
is the change in dietary habits (and the public health consequences)
caused by the apparition of fast food chains in emerging markets.
All in the same industry bag?
There is codependency between the peers of each industry when
it comes to reputation – when one scandal explodes for one bank,
the perception that the public will have of all banks is affected.
Any metrics used to assess brand performance should ensure
that targets are set realistically with regards to what can be
expected within a specific industry context.
Culture, language and interpretation
To look at branding as a purely internal business function is
missing the point – especially with so much social and digital
activity ‘out there’, beyond the direct control of the company.
The definition of ‘reputation’ and the objectives that a business
sets itself in that domain are likely to change dramatically as the
organisation moves from local to global markets (or the other
way around).
Add to the mix the moral and cultural issues of privacy, meaning
(and misunderstanding), and the shifting sands of different digital
platforms – it’s not surprising that brands find it difficult to create
engagement and affinity with their markets.
Your interpretation of sentiment and the words that people
use when they talk about you should always be explored in the
context of a culture and a language.
Although software is becoming increasingly ‘intelligent’ at
interpreting the qualitative information out there, the time has
not come yet where we do not need humans to interpret the
results.
Not everyone is ‘online’ or ‘social’ (yet)
It is crucial not to base reputation metrics solely on social buzz
– always consider the operating context of a business and the
habits of its markets before selecting metrics.
Traditional marketing an PR still have a significant role to play.
Culture changes slowly, so PR activities that can be amplified
on social channels can still be valuable and may have more
credibility with some audiences.
Know Your World
3 4
A reputation is like trust: it takes years to build it,
and seconds to destroy it.
Banks will probably never be loved, and
some countries will never rate you 10/10.

7. HARD TO
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Understand the Psychology Behind It All
Customers don’t think about branding that much, but when they do it
is often a short cut in their decision making process.
There is increasing evidence that advertising and promotional
activities do not have the impact that was traditionally assumed.
Standing out and being remembered is far more important than
creating a unique hook or even product.
Brand strategy and reputation
management therefore have to take
into account that presence (being
actively visible in the right channels) is
just as important as impact (standing
out and being different). Think of
measuring your business’s ‘presence’ –
how much of it is in the right ‘place’?
In what new places should you be?
Reputation management strategies should address two aspects:
• The proactive, day-to-day improvement and maintenance of
reputation: making sure that business activities are selected and
prioritised in a way that will help reach brand vision and reputational
objectives.
• The management of crises: being able to react when a crisis occurs,
which starts with understanding what the risks are, and where they
originate.
Think of:
• Internal risks, for example product/quality failures, information
leakages, etc.
• External risks, such as attention from the media/public.
Often crises originate when internal and external risks combine –
for example, internally an employee is doing something that goes
completely against the values you advertise, and externally a member of
the public becomes aware of the situation and publicises their reaction.
Two important risks mentioned at the roundtable are worth
mentioning in particular:
• Internal politics. These can affect alignment and focus, because
separate departments often are used to measuring reputation with
certain metrics which they are reluctant to question. Alignment
behind a common set of brand objectives is crucial to address this.
• Resources (people and technology) shortages. The larger the
organisation, the greater the resource requirements to monitor and
manage reputation.
Measurements can help communicate how far a business is from its
goals, and how well or badly it is being impacted by a reputation
improvement or crisis.
The central understanding of the brand as the core of ‘who we are’ and
driver from the top has a crucial impact in planning different activities
across different marketing channels and company activities (e.g. sales
training).
To empower individuals and teams and move away from silos, give them
permission to innovate within clear boundaries, and make sure they
know when they are making a positive impact on reputation.
Have a Plan
Align activities to your definition of reputation
& clear set of objectives.
Social media has shown that customers value
engagement as much as product or service
65
A strong reputation
suggests that the
products and services
being offered by the
firm are of higher
quality and that the firm
is responsible and will
treat its customers well.

8. 1514 1514
Strategy
Identity
Jeremy gave the example of Vodafone, who place social media
communication at the centre of their marketing and customer facing
activities, meaning that the conversation is not isolated amongst specific
groups or specialists.
Ingredients for successful reputation
management planning...
...easy, right?
It is no coincidence if this section comes after six others – the
prerequisites matter a lot more than the metrics you choose. A
sophisticated indicator will hardly be of any use if no one in your
organisation feels it adds value, understand what it measures or trusts
the results.
A few things to consider when measuring reputation and brand
performance:
• You can’t understand performance if you don’t have targets to
which you can compare your actuals. A number alone doesn’t tell
you anything useful unless you compare it to something else.
• Have as few metrics as you can. The minimum number is only one.
The more metrics you use, the less attention they will get and the
more confused people will get about performance.
• Don’t confuse reputation with customer satisfaction. Your
reputation is of course impacted by your customers’ experience,
but it is ‘lived’ by everyone else as well. What ‘everyone’ means also
differs whether your are B2C or B2B.
• Think beyond off-the-shelf and externally supplied measures.
Sometimes analysing your own surveys / qualitative data and
creating a simple index metric based on those will ‘talk’ a lot more
than, say, sentiment analysis.
• Consider ‘indirect’ measures: for example, healthy retention, sales
and referral numbers may be excellent (and sufficient) reputation
indicators.
Measure!
Pick a few metrics, set targets, and go.
7
Strong buy-in and sponsorship from the top
Brand visions and objectives
Small selection of metrics to communicate reputation
performance clearly and concisely, against objectives
A clear set of boundaries within which people are empowered to
innovate and tackle immediate risks — if I know that the customer
at the other end of the line is unhappy enough to spread the
word, what can I personally do now to resolve their problem?
Initial risk assessment – where are the internal and external risks?
Mechanisms to monitor risks regularly – think of ways everyone
can raise a risk rather than limiting the discussion to a committee
Internal communcations plan (get the objectives understood, tell
people what to do if a crisis occurs)
3
3
3
3
3
3
3

9. HARD TO
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HARD TO
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Dashboard Notes:
GEOGRAPHIC /
BUSINESS UNIT
PERFORMANCE
PROFIT PROCESS
ENVIRONMENT
+20%
share value
+15%
brand valueCUST. SATISFTN
HRREPUTATION
HISTORICAL
& FUTURE
PERFORMANCE
Strategy
Values/Culture
Reputation
Identity
Strategic
Brand
Perspective
Business Performance
Dashboard
When we asked our roundtable panel which elements of our proposed
performance management model was the most important driver of
reputation, most of them said ‘the Product’.
So, for all the good work you are doing to manage your reputation, don’t
forget to ensure that:
• Your products are of excellent quality
• Your processes are set to deliver this level of quality
• Your people and technology resources are geared to deliver as well
It is difficult to sum up such a complex and wide ranging debate, but in
broad terms the priorities for businesses aiming to manage, measure and
improve their reputation for the benefit of the business as a whole seem
to focus on three issues which determine success: how credible to senior
management and the board is brand reputation as a key business driver;
how well integrated (and appreciated) are the issues impacting brand
reputation across every part of the business; and lastly how effective and
responsive the organisation is in engaging with their reputation as seen by
the wider public.
These factors do not simply lie at the door of the marketing department, in
fact to make your reputation a true asset, product development, training,
operations and other departments have to understand and participate in
the creation and improvement of the company’s reputation. Great products
or services are critical, but if training doesn’t capitalise on these, marketing
doesn’t communicate them effectively, or the accounts department doesn’t
understand its role in the reputation of the business as a whole, this will not
be reflected in the bottom line. Above all, effective use of brand reputation
depends upon leadership across the organisation.
This is just a start in an investigation into these ‘hard to measure’ areas of
business — there are still some challenging questions each business must
answer:
• Who can be affected by reputation changes? What matters to these
audiences? What metrics will they listen to?
• Why is reputation important? Why measure it?
• What metrics can we use? Which one is most useful? The key ones we
talked about in our roundtable today (sentiment, brand value), but
what else?
• How do we set measurable reputation objectives, and how do we set
the right targets?
• How do we adapt our targets to the cultural and industry context in
which we operate?
• How can we make sure the sentiment or feedback we capture is honest?
Watch this space for more investigations in these areas – or get in touch if
you would be interested in developing solutions to these problems.
Illustration of dashboard
featuring reputation
as a key measurement,
alongside more
traditional metrics
Deliver Conclusion
Ultimately if your product isn’t what you say it is,
“you’ll get found out”.
Integration, Communication, Credibility
8
What to Measure:
Whether or not you have
a reputation. You may
think you do, but have you
researched and tested this
beyond your immediate
customer/client base?
Whether you are
reknowned for what you
stand for. Do you stand
out in what you deliver
and how you relate to your
customers?
How good/bad your
reputation is. Positive,
negative or neutral
(perhaps the worst?)
Levels of activity per
channel – is the media
mix appropriate for
your business, and are
you focussing the most
resources on the most
important ones?
Areas not currently
measured. Be aware
that your reputation is a
moving target. As your
market develops, media
channels change and
combine (the importance
of the ‘second screen’
activity of audiences is a
good example of this) and
issues beyond your control
change perceptions. You
need to be aware of new
opportunities as they arise.

10. Can you help us
measure the hard to
measure?
Do you have an
innovative solution to
suggest?
Have you managed to
answer some of these
questions within your
business?
Do you have best-
practice case studies
which could help?
If any of these apply, we’d love to hear
from you, either via our web site (launch
date late December 2012) or directly at
enquiries@hardtomeasure.com
HARD TO
MEASURE
www.hardtomeasure.com
enquiries@hardtomeasure.com
Please use twitter hashtag
#hardtomeasure
James Bridgman
james.b@silverleaf.co
+44 (0)20 72263749
+44 (0)7976 891911
www.silverleaf.co
www.brandoptimise.com
@creativexplorer
Karen Topp
karen@karentopp.com
+44 (0)7966 598 758
www.karentopp.com
@karenclondon