When it comes to customer experience, communication and engagement are two factors that heavily influence overall success. It’s important to keep this in mind so your campaigns don’t fall flat. For example, implementing a new business technology, like a customer engagement platform, can be a complex process that affects staff and customers. But a well-designed communication campaign that includes effective customer engagement and organizational change management activities can help the implementation go smoothly.
Developing a successful communication campaign takes time, planning, and strategy But with the right approach, you can create campaigns that effectively reach your target audience and achieve your organization’s goals
In this comprehensive guide, we’ll walk through the key steps for developing impactful communication campaigns, from initial research and planning to execution and measurement. Whether you’re looking to promote a new product, raise awareness for a cause, or boost engagement, these best practices will set you on the path to success.
Step 1: Conduct Research and Audit Your Current Approach
Before developing a communication campaign, it’s important to start with thorough research This includes
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Audience research: Gather demographics, interests, media habits, and more for your target audience personas. Surveys, interviews, and focus groups can provide valuable insights.
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Competitor analysis: Study what communication campaigns your competitors have done and what resonated. Look for gaps and opportunities.
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Campaign audit: Review your past campaign performance. What worked well and what didn’t? Incorporate lessons learned.
Additionally, audit your current communication channels and tactics. How are you reaching your audience now? Are there underutilized channels or new technologies you could leverage in a campaign? Taking stock will inform strategic decisions as you plan your next moves.
Step 2: Develop a Strategy
With research done, it’s time to develop a strategy for your communication campaign. Key elements include:
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Campaign objectives: What are the specific, measurable goals you want to achieve? Example objectives could be raising brand awareness by 15%, driving 500 contest entries, or boosting social media engagement by 30%.
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Target audience: Who exactly are you trying to reach? Define their demographics, interests, needs, and media habits. Get as specific as possible.
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Key messages: What are the one to three core messages you need to communicate? All content and assets should tie back to and reinforce these key points.
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Channels and tactics: Given your audience and objectives, which communication channels and marketing tactics make the most sense? Prioritize where your audience is most active and responsive.
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Timeline: Plot out a detailed schedule for your campaign, from prep work to launch to measurement. Factor in design, approvals, production timelines.
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Budget: Gauge costs for the tactics you’ll implement and allocate budget accordingly. Maintain room for flexibility.
Documenting your strategy gives everyone clarity on the plan to execute a cohesive, impactful campaign.
Step 3: Determine How to Reach Your Audience
Once you’ve defined your target audience and campaign objectives, the next step is determining how and where you’ll reach them.
Start by listing the communication channels and tactics you’re considering:
- Owned media: Website, blog, social platforms, email, SMS/text messaging, mobile app
- Earned media: PR, influencer marketing, reviews
- Paid media: PPC ads, social media ads, banner ads, paid partnerships
- Events: Webinars, conferences, pop-up experiences
- Print: Direct mail, brochures, signage
Then, analyze where your audience spends their time and how receptive they are to brand messaging in each channel. Prioritize the tactics that allow you to:
- Reach a large percentage of your audience
- Engage them frequently with relevant content
- Track clear ROI and impact
A multi-channel approach is best, but focus most of your effort on the high-value channels so you don’t spread yourself too thin.
Step 4: Identify a Spokesperson
Appointing a key spokesperson for your communication campaign can boost credibility and give it a human voice.
Look for someone who:
- Has in-depth knowledge on the topic
- Can represent your brand values and positioning
- Has experience speaking publicly and handling media interviews
- Can relay messages clearly and compellingly
This may be a founder, executive, employee, or influencer brand ambassador.
Brief the spokesperson thoroughly on the campaign and its objectives, core messages, audience, and tone. Make sure they’re fully aligned to speak knowledgably.
Having an articulate, strategic spokesperson as the public face of your campaign lends it authentic impact.
Step 5: Set a Budget
With your strategy mapped out, you can calculate costs for the campaign tactics and set an overall budget.
Factor in expenses like:
- Media buying for ads
- Fees for PR or marketing agencies
- Website and landing page development
- Production of videos, podcasts, or other assets
- Design, writing, and editing
- Printing direct mail pieces or collateral
- Event venues and supplies
- Software, tools, or analytics
- Photoshoots or talent
- Paid partnerships and influencer marketing
Build in a buffer for any unexpected costs. You can adapt your tactics if needed to stay on budget.
Getting finance approval for the budget upfront ensures you have the resources to execute your plan fully. Track spending closely as you go.
Step 6: Consider Potential Obstacles and Establish Evaluation Plan
With a firm strategy in place, think ahead to what could go wrong and have contingency plans ready. This may include:
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Low engagement: Brainstorm back-up content formats or partnerships if traction lags.
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Negative PR: Prep spokespeople to handle media inquiries and negative feedback professionally.
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Production delays: Give ample lead time and have back-up options for visuals, videos, etc.
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Budget overages: Optimize campaigns as you go, pause lower-performing initiatives if needed.
Also crucial is establishing metrics and setting up tracking to evaluate performance. Identify benchmarks and goals for:
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Reach: Impressions, circulation, page views, click-through rate on ads, etc.
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Engagement: Social interactions, time on site/content, contest entries, event attendance.
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Conversions: Sales, sign-ups, downloads, use of promo code.
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Sentiment: Positive/negative comments and feedback.
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ROI: Impact on business KPIs like revenue and customer acquisition.
Closely monitoring results allows you to optimize and adapt your approach to maximize impact.
7 Tips for Creating Compelling Communication Campaigns
Beyond the steps above, here are some key tips for developing stand-out communication campaigns:
1. Dig Deep Into Your Audience
Micro-targeting your messaging to resonate with a specific audience is critical. Really understand their pain points and desires.
2. Lead With Value
Rather than a sales pitch, offer something useful or entertaining upfront before delivering your brand message. Surprise and delight them.
3. Get Creative
Think beyond basic ads and posts. Surprise your audience with fresh formats, partnerships, experiences, and more.
4. Mix Emotional and Rational Appeals
People are moved by stories and inspired to take action. Balance emotion with compelling facts and logic.
5. Make it Visual
Videos, interactive content, infographics, and more creative visuals attract more attention and response.
6. Optimize for Mobile
Design all assets and experiences with mobile devices in mind. Most engagement happens here.
7. Promote Far and Wide
Share your content across every channel possible. Expand reach through paid amplification and strategic partnerships. Cast a wide net.
By following the steps outlined in this guide, you can develop strategic, high-impact communication campaigns that deliver results. Begin with thorough research and planning. Identify your audience, core messages, budget, and channels. Create compelling assets tailored to your goals. Promote them widely through both owned and paid media for maximum reach. Track progress closely and optimize as you go.
Communication campaigns offer immense opportunities to connect with your audience in a crowded marketplace. Take the time to craft a thoughtful strategy and creative approach. With sound execution, your campaigns will educate, engage, and convert your audience for continued success.
Successful strategies for technology implementation communications
Watch our latest webinar, available on-demand, to learn how to integrate organizational change management to ensure a successful communications campaign for technology implementations.
Utilities often underestimate the importance of stakeholder communication and education, so we’ve pulled together five tips to help your team implement a successful communication strategy that will support a variety of activities and programs that may be on your horizon.
Before we dive into our tips, it’s important to establish the key components of a thorough campaign strategy. While some of the elements can change depending on the project, we recommend taking the following steps to create a comprehensive strategy:
- Outline goals, risks, and benefits
- Facilitate the development of the overall branding
- Identify key messages, stakeholders, and communication channels
- Establish the means to measure the success of the campaign
- Develop a schedule to serve as the living guide for project deliverables
Keep customers informed about new technologies that affect them
Let’s stick with our new business technology implementation example. If your utility is upgrading its customer information system (CIS) or rolling out advanced metering infrastructure (AMI), your customers (and your staff) will need to be engaged and prepared. There are many ways to keep customers in the loop.
To reach your entire customer base, we recommend using multiple channels, including your website, social media, mailed notices, door hangers, brochures, press releases, and community events.
To reach your entire customer base, we recommend using multiple channels, including your website, social media, mailed notices, door hangers, brochures, press releases, and community events. Spread the news—and critical information—far and wide to prevent confusion, disruption, and stress.
We covered these strategies and more in our recent webinar Successful strategies for technology implementation communications, now available to watch on demand.
Developing a Strategic Communications Campaign
How do I develop a communication campaign?
Here’s a step-by-step guide for developing a communication campaign: 1. Conduct research and audit your current approach Before you develop your campaign, it may be helpful to conduct some research and audit your organization’s current approach.
What makes a good internal communications campaign?
Through a blend of strategy and technology, the best internal communications campaigns can command attention and drive employees to take relevant actions. Here are ten simple steps to developing and deploying a winning internal communications campaign. 1. Set a clear objective for your internal communications campaign
How to create a successful marketing campaign?
The key to successful communication is using various marketing channels. For communication with team members, a secured messaging app works best. For communication with customers, social media and newsletters are the best media. The template fills the relevant gaps in the marketing campaigns with information on various medium types. Image Source
How do I create a winning internal communications campaign?
Here are ten simple steps to developing and deploying a winning internal communications campaign. 1. Set a clear objective for your internal communications campaign A successful internal communications campaign has a clear goal. Before you jump into creating campaign materials, set out precisely what you’re trying to achieve.
