CHICAGO — Cision, the marketing tech provider, is rolling out a new tool that aims to help brands assess the impact of earned media and marketing initiatives including PR – and use that data to more astutely invest in media.

The new tool, called Cision Impact, measures earned media using the same ad-tech data and measurement technology currently used to assess campaigns across owned and paid media, the company said.

Impact is equipped to measure content’s reach, audience engagement and demographics, and track related activity such as sales, Cision said. It also provides custom reports to help marketers better target audiences and the like.

CEO Kevin Akeroyd said Impact provides marketers the means to make more informed, holistic decisions on media investment – something that has been hindered by the inability to accurately measure earned media’s impact on revenue.

“Consumers trust earned media more than owned media/branded sites and paid media, yet brands spend far more money on paid and owned media campaigns because they have not been able to attribute business value to earned media programs,” he said.

“This gives brands the ability to accurately attribute the bottom-line value of earned media investments for the first time,” he said.