Breaking Up with AVE: The Toxic Relationship PR Refuses to End

AVE (Advertising Value Equivalency) has been murdered countless times, but like a stubborn witch, it keeps rising from the dead. For those of us who are staunch opponents, AVE is the “zombie metric” that refuses to go away. It is a concept that has, unfortunately, become entrenched in the PR industry’s DNA, despite being discredited time and time again. And honestly, it is hard to fathom how, in this age of more sophisticated, objective measurement, AVE is still clinging to life.

The issue with AVE is not just its inaccuracy, but the way it distorts the true value of PR. Many PR professionals still mistakenly use it to quantify success. To say that AVE is an accurate reflection of PR value is like saying a mirror shows the full depth of a person’s soul. It is only a shallow reflection. By equating media coverage directly to advertising costs, AVE ignores the nuanced contributions PR makes, such as reputation management, trust-building, and long-term brand loyalty.

But even more concerning is the industry’s seeming resistance to move past this metric. AVE is like a toxic relationship that PR professionals refuse to break up with. Despite the signs, the love for it persists, and it continues to hinder real progress. It is a relationship built on vanity, where the client is sold a false sense of security. The truth? Clients don’t ask for AVE most of the time; it is some PR professionals who perpetuate it because they don’t know any better, or they don’t want to put in the work to measure properly.

Here is the painful truth: AVE is misleading, and it doesn’t provide any meaningful insights into the effectiveness of a campaign. Using AVE as a PR measurement is like trying to measure a story’s impact with a stopwatch. It just doesn’t capture the full picture. It is a metric that relies on simple, superficial comparisons — how much did this coverage cost in advertising? It doesn’t account for how the message was received, whether it built relationships, or if it changed perceptions.

We need to face the fact that AVE’s continued use in the PR world is damaging. It confuses clients, misguides PR professionals, and sets us back in the work we have done to create better, more objective measurement standards. AVEs don’t measure PR’s true worth; they measure a distorted, one-dimensional view of media coverage, and that’s the problem. We have been sold a narrative for years that doesn’t reflect the reality of PR’s impact, and yet AVE keeps getting trotted out as a valid metric.

Now, let us be clear. This isn’t just about deleting AVE from our language. This is about being transparent, objective, and proving PR value in a way that stands up to real scrutiny. It is about moving beyond vanity metrics, beyond false claims of ROI where none exist. We need to pledge to measure PR based on its actual objectives and outcomes, not the cost of media coverage.

As much as we want to eradicate AVE from PR measurement, there is still a lot of resistance, and it is deeply rooted. It is not about erasing AVE; it is about replacing it with something that has substance, depth, and real-world application. We can’t afford to keep using it just because it makes the client feel good or because it is comfortable. Comfort is the enemy of growth, and growth is exactly what PR needs.

The real challenge is how we educate both PR professionals and clients about the true value of measurement. We need to educate on why AVE is flawed and how we can use better metrics that align with PR’s true objectives. It is about measuring Return on Objective (ROO) rather than forcing the campaign to fit into a financial ROI box when it was never designed to deliver financial outcomes.

In the end, we have to face the uncomfortable truth: AVE is a vanity metric, and if we keep allowing it, we will continue to distort the value of PR. We can no longer afford to justify the use of AVE for the sake of convenience. As an industry, we must move forward with more intelligent, objective metrics that reflect the real work we do in PR.

So let me be clear: This isn’t about adding another voice to the loud call for AVE’s demise. It is about proving PR’s value transparently and ethically, without bias, without misleading anyone. Let us stop pretending that AVE is the answer. Let us stop using it to justify PR’s value and start embracing metrics that speak to the actual impact of PR — the long-term, relationship-building, reputation-enhancing work that we do every day.

If you have never read “22 Reasons to Say No to AVEs” by Richard Bagnall, Hon FCIPR, FPRCA, FAMEC , I highly recommend it https://dailyrecordng.com/breaking-up-with-ave-the-toxic-relationship-pr-refuses-to-end/. It’s an essential read for anyone serious about understanding the flaws in AVE and moving beyond these outdated metrics.

Yours Truly, AVE Tormentor