Measuring Public Relations Effectiveness for the Dole Food Company and the Society for Nutrition Education

I also chose to analyze an article by Dr. Walter Lindenmann, a case study called "Measuring Public Relations Effectiveness For The Dole Food Company and the Society for Nutrition Education." The main reason I chose to analyze this article was because it focuses specifically on one measurement study and tells exactly how it was conducted.

Dr. LindenmannÐ''s study was to determine the effectiveness of a program conducted by the Dole Food Company. The Dole food Company's program involved creating a CD-ROM in conjunction with the Society for Nutrition Education that would educate third grade students and their teachers of the importance proper nutrition. The CD-ROM was to inform them about how they needed to eat five servings of fruits and vegetables a day to maintain a healthy nutrition. Dole chose to test their CD_ROM in 178 classes in 65 schools across 5 different states before they took the program nationwide. Dole used Dr. Lindenmann and the office Ketchum Public Relations to conduct the study on the effectiveness of the CD_ROM in their test program.

Dr. Lindenmann explained that they used a three-phased research design to conduct their study. They started off by sending out questioners that were distributed to about 1000 students and 40 teachers. The questioners were used to measure the awareness and attitudes of the classes before they were introduced to the CD-ROM. This was used to establish a base line to compare the results of the study against in the report. They then conducted a qualitative telephone poll with one forth of the teachers after the introduction of the program at about the mid point of it. The poll was used to track the teacher's views and concerns regarding the CD-ROM. The third phase the research team conducted mirrored the first phase. The team distributed questioners four months after the programs completion in order to measure awareness and behavior change as result of the CD-ROM.

Results of the measurement test found the program to be beneficial. Before introduced to the CD-ROM students were only able to answer five out of eighteen questions on the questioner correctly, four months after the program students were able to answer eleven of the eighteen questions correctly. The proportion of student that were able to answer seventeen of the eighteen questions correctly also went up.

The study also found that students were talking more with there families