Demonstrating Communication Success: Output vs. Outcome—The Daimler Truck Model

Highlighting the Value Contribution of Communication

Clicks, reach, and impressions are easy to report—but do they really convince management? How can you determine whether you’re reaching the right target audiences, whether your core messages are getting through, and whether your communication efforts are actually contributing to your company’s goals? In the webinar “Effectively Demonstrating Communication Success—Using Daimler Truck as an Example,” Dorothee Krabler shows how communication management can be aligned more consistently and why the crucial step lies not in more data, but in the right metrics.

Dorothee Krabler

AG CommTech: Dorothee, communications departments today have more data than ever before. Why is it still challenging to demonstrate their contribution to the company’s success and to measure communications consistently?

Dorothee Krabler: Because much of this data merely shows what we’ve done, but not what impact we’ve achieved. We measure impressions, reach, clicks, or downloads and can say very precisely how our channels are performing. But what these numbers often fail to answer is the crucial question: Did our communication actually support our strategic goals? Did we reinforce our core messages? Has the perception of our company changed? That’s exactly where the difference between output and outcome—and ultimately, actual impact—begins.

AG CommTech: You mention a “KPI trap.” What do you mean by that?

Dorothee Krabler: Many communications departments – ours included – have long focused on readily available metrics. This initially provides a sense of security because everything can be measured. But reach alone doesn’t equate to impact. A successful LinkedIn post initially only tells us that many people saw it. It says nothing about its contribution, whether trust was built and our reputation strengthened, or whether we supported our corporate strategy. The crucial question today is no longer: How much communication did we do? But rather: Did we place the relevant topics on the right channels, and what difference did we make for the company?

AG CommTech: Why is this topic becoming so important right now?

Dorothee Krabler: Because we use a wide variety of channels today, and at the same time, there’s growing pressure to provide clear, verifiable evidence of communication’s value contribution. Communication is quickly perceived as a cost factor, especially when companies are under economic pressure. That’s why we need to be able to demonstrate much more clearly that communication makes a measurable contribution to the company’s success. It’s no longer enough to show that campaigns were visible. We need to be able to show what value they created and how they contribute to strategic corporate goals.

AG CommTech: How have you integrated these requirements into your communications work?

Dorothee Krabler: Today, we view communication measurement on multiple levels. Traditional channel performance remains important. Of course, we want to know how individual platforms are performing or what reach we’re achieving. But that’s just the foundation.

The second level focuses on our topics. We analyze which content actually generates attention and whether it supports our strategic priorities. In doing so, we also compare ourselves to the competition. For example, we’re interested in what share Daimler Truck has in a relevant topic—I like to refer to this as “our piece of the pie.”

The third level is reputation. Here, we examine trust, brand perception, and employer attractiveness, and track how these metrics evolve. The fourth level focuses on the actual contribution to the company’s success—for example, in recruiting, customer preference, or the trust of relevant stakeholders. This is precisely where the greatest value is created, but at the same time, this level is also the most challenging.

AG CommTech: Were there any insights that were particularly revealing for you?

Dorothee Krabler: Absolutely. What we found particularly interesting was comparing our content mix with the actual media response. We found that some topics, which we give a lot of attention to internally, generate comparatively little response externally. At the same time, there are topics that, despite making up a very small portion of our content mix, have had a significantly greater impact and thus offer potential.

It is precisely this transparency that is changing the conversation within the team. Suddenly, we’re no longer talking about how many posts we’ve produced, but about which topics are truly making an impact. This helps us make our content planning much more targeted and allocate resources where they generate the greatest strategic value. The key insight is this: It’s not the volume of content that determines success, but the relevance of the topics.

AG CommTech: What conclusions can be drawn from this regarding how the work is carried out?

Dorothee Krabler: First of all, it’s important to formulate your own goals precisely. That sounds obvious, but in practice it often isn’t. A communication goal shouldn’t simply be: “We want more reach on Instagram.” That is not a strategic goal. Instead, we need to define which perception we want to change. An example would be: We want to position Daimler Truck more strongly as a technology leader in the field of e-mobility. Only once this goal has been clearly defined can we derive appropriate measures and the right metrics.

Integrated content planning is just as important. Communication should no longer be approached on a channel-by-channel basis; instead, it must be consistently aligned with strategic themes. Only then does the question arise as to which channels can make the greatest contribution.

AG CommTech: That sounds like a fundamental shift in perspective.

Dorothee Krabler: That’s exactly the point. Many organizations often manage their communications solely through individual channels. It’s more sustainable and impact-oriented to manage communications based on strategic themes. Then it’s no longer a question of whether LinkedIn or traditional media works better, but rather which channel best supports the respective strategic goal.

At the same time, we must make consistent use of the data. A dashboard alone doesn’t change anything. If reports are presented but no decisions result from them, impact measurement remains a mere documentation exercise. The real added value only emerges when we use the insights to derive concrete actions for topic planning, prioritization, and resource allocation.

AG CommTech: What are the biggest challenges today?

Dorothee Krabler: Clearly, it’s linking communication and business data. This can only be achieved in collaboration with other departments. To do so, communication must be integrated much more deeply into the company-wide data landscape.

AG CommTech: You’ve already looked ahead at the end of our conversation. Where is communications controlling headed?

Dorothee Krabler: I believe we are currently at a turning point. We are coming from a world of media intelligence, where we primarily analyzed what had happened. Today, we are moving toward reputation intelligence and gaining an ever-better understanding of which factors actually influence our reputation and perception.

The next step is Predictive Communication Intelligence. In the future, we will not only be able to evaluate communication retrospectively, but also plan its impact proactively. Artificial intelligence opens up enormous possibilities in this area. It can analyze large amounts of data nearly in real time, identify trends early on, provide warning signals, and simulate scenarios. This will help communications departments make decisions more quickly, with greater insight, and in a more proactive manner.

At the same time, we must break down data silos and establish communication analytics as an integral part of our processes so that communication decisions can be made on a more data-driven basis.

In my view, this is precisely where the future lies: Communication will not be measured by what it publishes, but by the contribution it makes to reputation, trust, and corporate success. The better we can demonstrate this contribution, the more communication will be perceived as a strategic partner within the company.