Guide

Content Part I. About Communication plan I. What is communication plan II. Useful tips to prepare Part II. How to create communication plan Step 1. Analyse current state Step 2. Development of strategy Determine goal Identify target audiences Develop message Determine channels of communications Choose tools and tactics Timing and Calendar Step 3. Implementation of strategy Step 4. Evaluation (impact assessment) 2 Any public relations campaign should start with a plan. The plan can be dynamic and change as the situation changes, but if a good communications plan is in place before the campaign is launched, everyone involved will be better prepared to roll with the punches. If our organization has something to say, we need a communications plan. It’s imperative to have a clear, concise and consistent message when we are communicating with the society. In order to achieve this goal, we will need to outline our plan of attack. A Communications Plan describes how you intend to communicate the right messages to the right people at the right time. Within a Communication Plan, the communication goals, stakeholders and strategies, activities and timeframes are described. A Communication Plan helps you keep everyone informed so that you can communicate a consistent message to your target audience. Why do we need to create Communications plan? • To raise visibility of AIESEC and increase awareness about it • To create right understanding of AIESEC • To communicate our success that may help us in our search for future members and partners All of these are good reasons to sit down and plan what we are going to say, whom to say it to and how we are going to take action. When do we need to create Communication plan? Such plan should be created on the basis of your general LC plan and should be reviewed regularly together with reviewing of your LC plan. Before you start developing a communications plan consider the following points: Keep it simple. Your communications plan doesn’t need to be pages long – just clearly presented and easy to understand. Make it focused. Don’t try to do everything, be realistic about what’s achievable. Know as much as you can about your target audiences before you begin. Review. Look at similar communication activities within the AIESEC network (inside and outside Ukraine) – what can you use or repeat? What worked well and what could be improved? Hold a brainstorming session. Talk with colleagues to trawl for fresh ideas and approaches. Think outside the box. Remember that external factors may have a bearing or influence on your plan e.g. term times, seasonal events or legal factors. Be prepared to be flexible. Update your plan as you go along, making the most of experience and opportunities as they arise. Keep your eyes open. Look for opportunities for working with external organisations or partners who may be targeting the same groups as you. Feedback. Ask your colleagues for feedback on your plan – they may have useful suggestions to make. Conduct a SWOT analysis to understand which external factors might impact on your communications activities.Part I. About Communications Plan I. What is communications plan II. Useful tips to prepare 3 Your communication plan will allow you to define your goals and the target audiences that you want to reach. You will also have to plan program promotion activities which be planned in a period over a certain period of time and for each important step. Generally communication plan have the next structure: Analysis of current situation -What is the strength, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of your environment (internal and external)? Goal -What is the overarching goal for communication? Objectives -The specific and measurable objectives all build towards your goal Target audience -Who do you need to engage with to achieve your objectives? Messages -What are you trying to get people to think, feel or do Channels, tools, tactics -Which are the most effective ways to reach your audience (Channel: medium of communication; Tactic and tool: the manner in which you use the medium Timing -Set a realistic timeline for implementation, review and evaluation, all your activities Implementation -What combination of activities will work through the channels you have chosen? We created special template called Comm_plan_template.xls for you to make your plan easier and quickly. Please, read this guide very carefully to fill in provided template. Open Comm_plan_template.xls, page 1. Analysis On this very first step you're going to answer the main question: where are you (your organization) now? To answer this question you need to collect and organize information about your organization (internal environment) and industry (external environment). Such scan of environment is an important part of strategic planning process. Part II. How to create Communication Plan Step 1. Analyze current state Analysis of current situation Goal and Objectives Target audiences Develop messages Selection of Communication channels Selection of tactics and tools Timing and Implemen-tation of plan Evaluation 4 Environmental factors internal to the organization usually can be classified as strengths (S) or weaknesses (W), and those external to the firm can be classified as opportunities (O) or threats (T). Such an analysis is called as a SWOT analysis. Such analysis will help you understand your industry and your organization's place within it. Also SWOT analysis provides information that is helpful in matching the firm's resources and capabilities to the competitive environment in which it operates. The following diagram shows how a SWOT analysis fits into an environmental scan: Strengths – organization's strengths are its resources and capabilities that can be used as a basis for developing a competitive advantage Weaknesses -The absence of certain strengths may be viewed as a weakness. Opportunities -The external environmental analysis may reveal certain new opportunities for profit and growth. Threats -Changes in the external environmental also may present threats to the firm. When you analyse your opportunities and threats a lot of attention should be paid to your competitors. According to AIESEC Brand Experience: Our competitors are other organizations that offer similar experiences to our target audiences as we do. These include organizations offering: Work abroad opportunities, Volunteer abroad opportunities, Cultural experiences, Skills development, Networks. So in the Comm_plan_template.xls firstly you should fill in the table called "Competitors analysis" to understand better your competitors, their profile, experience that they offer, how do they differentiate from AIESEC, etc. The table looks like this: The next step is to fill the SWOT Matrix where you're going to put all information gathered during SWOT analysis. SWOT matrix 5 An organization should not necessarily pursue the more profitable opportunities. Rather, it may have a better chance at developing a competitive advantage by identifying a fit between the strengths and upcoming opportunities. In some cases, it can overcome a weakness in order to prepare itself to pursue a compelling opportunity. To develop strategies that take into account the SWOT profile, a matrix of these factors can be constructed. In Comm_plan_template.xls you will find the next The SWOT matrix shown below: S-O strategies pursue opportunities that are a good fit to the company's strengths. W-O strategies overcome weaknesses to pursue opportunities. S-T strategies identify ways that the organization can use its strengths to reduce its vulnerability to external threats. W-T strategies establish a defensive plan to prevent the firm's weaknesses from making it highly susceptible to external threats. Open Comm_plan_template.xls, page 2. Strategy Here you plan how you want to develop and maintain your longer-term relationships with your all your main audiences. The strategy in AIESEC includes Communication Plans for internal and external audiences. The template for strategy development you can find in document Comm_plan_template.xls, page "Step 2-6 (Strategy)" and it looks like this: Let's see how to fill in this template, be careful while reading next pages  Further you will build your communication strategy. Use worksheets when it's needed (refer to Appendix). They contain guiding questions that will help you. Step 2. Development of Strategy 6 It’s very important to look at the overall goal of your communications plan. Of course, you may say to yourself, “I want a plan that can do everything.” That probably won’t be a very effective plan. We need to think, what we must to say to our audience to achieve this goal. To initiate a successful and effective communications effort, start with an assessment of your current organizational goals. Examine what your organization stands for—its mission, values and beliefs. Look closely at who your organization is serving. This process will help narrow and sharpen the focus for your communication initiative(s). Examples of a strategic goal in communications area may be (according to AIESEC 2010 statement): “Our contribution makes us the first choice amongst young people and organizations for activating leadership. ” Remember also about SMART model when create your goal: S – specific, M – measurable, A – achievable, R – realistic, T – timing. Please, use Worksheet 1 to determine the goal for your communication. The success of any communications activity is based on knowing whom you are speaking to. Once you have identified your target audience(s), you need to find out as much as possible about them to ensure you are using the most effective routes to communicate with them. According to Brand Experience our target audiences are: Members Enablers (TN takers, mentors and learning/content partners), and Supporters (financial and in-kind partners, Board of Advisors) If to specify them more and take into consideration that we can communicate to internal and external audiences we can identify the next audiences (as you see in the picture). We also identified media as our target audience. From one side, media helps us to communicate with other stakeholders and deliver our messages, but from another side we should influence on them too if want to increase their awareness about AIESEC, engage into our activities, establish high-quality media relations and make more media partnerships. Please, use Worksheet 2 and 3 to find out target audiences you want to influence, make their portrait and prioritise your work with those target audiences. I. Determine the goal II. Identify target audiences 7 Key messages are the concepts that we want our audiences to remember from a communication campaign. These messages will be delivered through all of the communication materials and activities. Your messages are closely tied to your goal and objectives. They deliver important information about the issue and compel the targeted audience to think, feel, or act. They can: Show the importance, urgency, or magnitude of the issue Show the relevance of the issue Put a “face” on the issue Be tied to specific audience values, beliefs, or interests of the audience Reflect an understanding of what would motivate the audience to think, feel, or act Be culturally relevant and sensitive Be Memorable As you know, according to Brand Experience we have 4 main benefits that our target audiences experience when they interact with AIESEC. These are: Societal impact, Personal and professional development, International experience, Global network Also we have our Essence (Activating Leadership) and Differentiator (Youth driven impact experience). Don’t forget about these benefits, essence and differentiator! Use them to create your messages. But be creative, don't use them directly. Try to say this to your audience using something interesting and understandable for audience. Please, use Worksheet 4 to develop your message The messages you develop by using the worksheet 4 can be used in many ways: First, they are a set of statements that you and your team agree upon as conveying the key information for your initiative. They will not include all the detail and supporting ideas and data that you may use in printed materials or other forms of communication. The messages you develop in the worksheets can become the underlying themes for your materials and activities. You may develop slogans based on them. You may develop sets of talking points that members of your team will use in making presentations. And they easily become the basis for radio and print ads, the genesis for posters, and may suggest topics for fact sheets, drop-in articles, and even letters to the editor or newspaper editorials. Communications channels carry the messages to the target audiences. Channels take many forms. These choices will depend, of course, on your target audience. You will choose one or more different ways of communication with an order of importance. III. Develop message IV. Determine channels of communication MESSAGE 8 On campus promotion – includes all activities you can use in university campuses Off campus promotion -This refers to the promotional campaign undertaken by AIESEC outside of university campuses. We can divide it on: non-media advertisement (indoor and outdoor ads), such as: posters, flyers, city lights, banners, bill boards, etc. TV (programmes and advertisements) Printed press (articles and advertisements) radio (programmes and advertisements) Internet -including your LC website, myaiesec.net, web 2.0 (articles and advertisements) Answering some key questions will help you in identifying the most effective channels for reaching your audiences. Please, use Worksheet 5 to identify your channels of communication. What are the activities, events, and/or materials—to be used in your selected channels—that will most effectively carry your message to the intended audiences? In choosing these, you should consider: Appropriateness to audience, goal, and message Relevance to desired outcomes Timing Costs/Resources Climate of community toward the issue/activity Cultural appropriateness (including language) Environment—geographic considerations Open Comm_plan_template.xls, page 3. Calendar You have the next table on page 3 of your Comm_plan_template.xls. This page is already filled in on this picture. So what should you do to fill in this table? On the basis of your Communication strategy that you already created (you defined target audiences, messages, channels of communications, tactics and their frequency) you just need to put on time frames all initiatives, projects and events you're going to make through the year for each target audience. If it's hard for you plan the whole year activities, try to plan quarter by quarter. V. Choose tools and tactics VI. Timing and calendar 9 Open Comm_plan_template.xls, page 4. Project 1_Name Here you plan your communication around a particular topic, campaign event that is currently important to you. This could for example be the promotion of a conference, some external or internal event, and initiative. Such short-term planning will be most effective if you can integrate it into the long-term relationships that you established with your communication strategy before, building on the mutual trust and understanding developed and using the well-established channels to reach them. To implement your strategy use the next table (there is example of already filled in template) Make such plan for each initiative, event or campaign. Just create new page in your xls template, copy and paste this template. Each activity should be evaluated to check if the defined goals have been achieved. How to measure your success? For this you already set your goals and numeric measurements. Track your plan regularly and on-going (not only when your initiative finished) and if needed you can review your plan (add or delete something, even initiatives or activities) For your evaluation and mid-course correction you need to: • Specify times to take stock of progress in completing communications plan. • Determine strengths and weaknesses. • Identify obstacles. • Create and implement new approaches for success. • Consult if needed with your colleagues. Step 3. Implementation of strategy Step 4. Evaluation (impact assessment)