Influence 100: In-House PR Budgets Up From 2023 Low-Point

(MENAFN- PRovoke) LONDON - A new survey of the Influence 100, PRovoke Media's annual list of the world's most powerful brand and corporate communicators, reveals that total PR budgets are on the rise, despite the continuing permacrisis and widespread reports of slashed budgets across the global industry.

This year, our Influence 100 cohort control a spend of just shy of $4 billion, an increase of around 8% compared to last year's figure of $3.7 billion. This figure is conservative, as it was calculated using the lower end of each bracket. If the midpoint is taken, last year's total budget for the Influence 100 would have been $5.2 billion, and this year's budget would be $5.5 billion – a rise of 11%.

The rise is partly down to more of our Influence 100 managing top-end budgets. Last year the number who managed budgets of more than $100m, for instance, was 17% (compared to 27% in 2021), while this year it's up to 20%. The proportion of the cohort managing between $75 and $100m also rose from 10% last year to 13%, although the next budget bracket, $50-$75m, saw a drop from 13% to 9%.

Our research into the
Influence 100's budgets, teams and agency relationships
found that those managing budgets of between $25m and $50m dropped from 10% to 7%. At the lower end, those managing a PR and communications budget of $10m-$25m was down from 30% to 22%. The percentage handling budgets under $5m was up a little from 13% to 15%, and those managing $5-$10m was also at 15%, up from 7% last year.

Overall, of the respondents who revealed changes from last year, about an equal proportion said their budget had either remained flat or increased this year, by anything from 2% to 20%. A handful said budgets were down, mostly by 10% or less, although a couple said their budgets were down by 15% or as much as 30%.

Mirroring this, and despite the continued downturn in agency fortunes, our in-house leaders say their PR agency spend is looking more healthy than last year, when only 17% said they were spending more than $20 million a year on agencies; this year it's back up to 25%.

A further 16% are spending between $10 million and $20 million, compared to 20% last year. At the smaller end, only 12% of respondents are spending less than $1 million this year, significantly lower than 28% last year, when lower-end budgets were most prominent. Those with a spend of $1 million to $2 million doubled from 7% to 15%.

However, this year the biggest slice of the pie was those spending between $5m and $10m, who jumped from 10% of respondents for the past two years to 21%. Also in the middle of the table, 12% of our influencers are spending between $2 million and $5 million on agencies, down from 17% last year.

There are a few clear spending priorities ahead for our Influence 100. Corporate reputation remains the top budget priority, down two per cent from last year to 66%, while in joint second place are content development and marketing (up 4 points to 54%) and paid and organic social media, up 7 points to 54% saying it's a priority: closer to the 60% we saw in 2021.

The biggest drop this year is executive positioning and thought leadership, down 23 points to 36% of our cohort saying it's a top priority, while employee engagement/change management is also down seven points to 46% – although this is still the fourth biggest priority – and measurement and evaluation is also down by the same amount, to 34%.

Perhaps the most notable spending priority is a new category we introduced this year: technology, innovation and AI, which goes straight in at 31%, at the same level as measurement and evaluation.

Data and analytics has dropped two points to 36% seeing it as a priority, while media relations has dropped down to 34% from 41% last year. Focus on corporate social responsibility/ESG has risen a little this year, to 34%.

The Influence 100 survey also had some interesting findings around clients' satisfaction with their agencies, and which services this year's cohort will be making an effort to bring in-house.

When we asked our Influence 100 how satisfied they are with their PR agency partners, the proportion that said they were“very satisfied” – which has been on a downward trajectory since the pandemic – has now dropped to less than a third of clients: from 45% in 2021 to 37% in 2022, to 33% last year to just shy of 29% this year.

This ongoing decline in client delight with their PR agencies may well be a contributor to some significant changes in the communications services our Influence 100 said they would be making an effort to bring in-house.

Top of the list this year is media relations – rather concerningly, since this is still the bread-and-butter of agency land – with a sharp jump from less than a quarter of respondents last year (24%) saying they may bring this in-house to 38%.

Last year, the only service area that more than 30% of clients said they would be looking at insourcing was content production, at 42%. This year, this figure has dropped to 36%, but as well as media relations there's another key area that communications leaders are anticipating bringing in house: data, analytics, measurement and evaluation.

Last year, 21% said they may bring data & analytics in-house, and 15% said the same of measurement & evaluation – so 36% for these combined areas of insight. In sharp contrast, this year 31% are looking to bring data & analytics in-house (10 points up) and a further 29% said the same of measurement & evaluation (14 points up) – combined, that's 60% of the Influence 100 who are intending on handling these areas in-house in the future, rather than via their PR agencies.

In-depth research into how the Influence 100 manages its teams, budgets and agencies
can be found here , including reporting lines, team size, where PR spend is likely to be directed in the year ahead, relationships with agencies, and pitch processes - including the growing role of procurement in making agency hiring decisions.

The full Influence 100 listing and the research results revealed so far can be found here including profiles of each executive, plus insights on their demographics .

In the coming days we will also release the results of our research into the future challenges for the CCO and CMO roles, attitudes to diversity, AI and ESG, the Influence 100's views of the best and worst corporate and political communicators and the agencies they most admire, plus the Crossover Stars list of those who have crossed from the comms world into CEO roles, and the Rising Stars list of future CCOs and CMOs nominated by this year's cohort.

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