Planning your comms

Why do I need a communications plan and where on earth do I start?

If you’re wondering whether you need a comms plan, what the benefit is to you and your organisation, and where and how to get started, this is for you.

The benefit of having a comms plan

Having a plan benefits both you and your organisation.  It helps your organisation achieve its objectives and purpose and get messages to those it wants to reach, helps you spend time wisely, and helps you feel you have control over your work.

Barriers to creating a plan

Is this you? – you know the organisation has a comms plan or strategy somewhere, it’s probably hidden away in the depths of an electronic file.

There must be one as you’ve heard it mentioned but you don’t know where to search for it, and even if you did, you’re not sure you want to as you might have to start using it and you’re sure it’s far too long and complicated.

You could create a new plan, but you just don’t know where to start.

Internal communications and working collaboratively as a team

What do we mean by internal communications? Why they are important and how do they relate to a comms plan?

Most people when thinking about their comms, are talking about the output – i.e. what they share externally with audiences, stakeholders, beneficiaries, or service users.

But if you work as part of a team, internal communications influence external messages and impact everything your organisation does.

Internal communications make sure that the whole team is informed and engaged, and that information is easy to access. It’s making sure that everyone in the team knows what’s going on. It’s a good place to start when beginning to think about a plan.

With remote, flexible and hybrid working the norm for many of us these days, having efficient internal communications is more important than ever.

Gone are the days when a team gathered around the office coffee machine before starting work in the morning for a quick briefing about what’s going on that day and what people are working on, or the chat that might happen around the photocopier, or while eating lunch.

Remote working can leave people feeling disconnected from their team, and that they are working in silos. More thought may need to go into how you will share information as a team, and how you will have opportunities to meet up and chat.

Comms is a whole team responsibility. Your team wants to achieve a common goal, whether that’s to support vulnerable people, provide a service, or provide a welcoming and practical community building. Working collaboratively, exchanging information and discussing topics together helps achieve that goal.

If the whole team are clear about what message they want shared, and what action they want people to take, that can feed into your plan it will allow you to get the best results with efficient comms.

In October 2022, The Co-op Foundation launched a new organisational strategy called Building Communities of the Future Together.

Creating the strategy in that way, got them thinking about whether they could use that approach to create a comms strategy as a whole team, collaboratively. Read the CharityComms story to see how they got on and what they learned in the process.

How to create a plan that meets the organisation’s needs

The ‘right way’ to create a plan is often what causes the most concern and stops people from starting in the first place.

The answer is – there is no ‘right way’ to do it. It’s whatever suits you and your organisation, to achieve the organisation’s objectives and purpose.

What is a comms plan anyway?

There are differing views on strategies and plans. We are using the word plan in this article rather than strategy. Strategy can be a scary word – googling it brings up all sorts of complicated meanings but basically, it means:

“Are we doing the right things for our organisation?”

For our organisation are the important words – what is right for one organisation may not be right for another.

A plan does not have to be an all-singing, all-dancing document with colour codes, built-in calendars and charts. It can be a one-page Word document or a list.

There is no point in spending hours and hours creating a wonderful plan, which looks beautiful if you’re not going to have time or capacity to achieve any of the goals, or if the goals do not match what your organisation is trying to do.

Before you start ask yourself and your team these three questions:

What?

• What are you trying to do with your communications? Think about what your organisation wants to achieve.
• What are your goals? Are you wanting to raise awareness of your charity? Raise funds? Promote an event or classes. Encourage people in need to reach out for help.

Who?

• Who are you trying to reach?
• Who is your audience?
• Who is the message aimed at?

You may have different audiences for different things – for example, if you’re trying to raise funds, your message may need to be sent to different people to messages promoting your services (although don’t assume that people are not interested in fundraising, as sometimes it’s the people that have benefitted from your services who may decide to undertake fundraising challenges or run independent fundraising efforts).

How?

How are you going to get your messages across? Most comms are digital these days but don’t discount using printed hard copies if you have a venue, or if you’re holding an event. People may like to pick up a leaflet, rather than remembering to look at your website when they get home.

Think about how you like to receive information yourself. Ask your audience how they prefer to receive information. Look at your analytics to see if people are reading your newsletters, and social media posts.

Making a Start

Make a start. Get your ideas down. It doesn’t have to be perfect!

You could: Create a table in Excel, or Word, or a simple list in a Word document. Start with headings and go from there.

You’re unlikely to get the plan created in one sitting but that’s fine. Even if these initial attempts just help with your thought processes it’s achieved something.

How to use the plan and prioritise your comms

Once you’ve got your main plan in place, this can be used to create a more detailed operational, day-to-day plan so that you know what to publish and when.

Think about what campaigns or events are coming up in the next six months to a year. Add these to a list and jot down what type of comms you could do for each item.

This is where working with your team comes in. If you can share a live document that everyone can edit, ask your colleagues to add things so that you always have notice, this also allows them to see what your other commitments are.

There may be unexpected or urgent messages to share at times, so some flexibility is needed, but having a written plan enables you to have some control over what work you need to do and helps stop a feeling of overwhelm.

Your plan can be a good tool to see what you have achieved. If you’re having one of those times where you feel you’re not achieving enough, you can be reassured by looking at your plan and seeing the work you have done.

The plan can be adapted for evaluation and reporting too, by adding a column to record newsletter open rates, social media engagement etc.

Reviewing your plan

Now that you’ve got this far, try not to think of your plan as a finished document to tick off your list and file away. Work towards it being a live, working document that will be ever-changing as the work of your organisation evolves.

It’s a good idea to review the document annually to check it is still fit for purpose, but while in use it requires ongoing flexibility to allow for the unexpected, but with enough structure to make your work easier, and more effective. If it achieves that, it’s working well.