How to make a communication strategy for your company.
Do you need a strategy for your communication, social media, ads etc? Today it’s easy to get overwhelmed by all the different channels in the social media jungle. Which one should you use? How much time do you need to spend on content, how do you reach the right people? These are questions all companies need to answer.
No matter if you are the CEO, CMO or an employee working with marketing you might need to create a marketing- social media or communication strategy.
To get you started I have created a list of questions that you can answer. These questions can be used as headings in your plan. I am also sharing a few downloadable guides that you might find useful. (All of them are free.)
I hope this helps you on your journey through the jungle that is marketing strategy today. If you need anything else, just let me know.
- Does it feel confusing? Book an hour with me here and we’ll talk.
Answer these questions to get a head start on a communication strategy:
- Download this list as a .docx here.
Our mission is:
Our vision is:
Our core words are:
This can be words like trustworthy, edgy, supportive etc. To find them you can think about this question: If your company/brand was a person how would they be? Would they for example speak to you like a friend? That effects the tone of voice you want to use.
Our target groups are:
What are their needs:
How do we meet their needs:
Personas: These can be used for making the actual target groups on Facebook ads manager if you are looking to do that. If you don’t know your target groups, you need to get to know them. Here is a free template that you can use to fill in your personas.
What channels do we use/need to use to reach our target groups?
Don’t forget things like homepage and newsletters. Here one can also consider a Facebook-group as a channel if one wants to build a community. If you want/need to take inventory of your channels, here is a free template to help you get started.
Which channel do you use to reach what target group or persona?
Specific instructions for each channel can be added in separate documents.
Frequency
How often do you need to post in each channel and when?
Graphic profile
Colors, fonts, logo. You can also ad tonality and picture style. Here you need to go back to your core words. These words need to be felt through your aesthetic.
Content:
There can be different kinds of content, like:
Brand building content that strengthens your brand. (Info about you, the people behind the brand, behind the scenes etc.)
Fact based knowledge. (Could be info or quotes/tips.)
Entertainment. (Easy and fun tips or clips.)
Lifting others. (Reposting other peoples content and giving them cred. Or it can be UGC -User generated content, where your users tag you and you lift them in your channels by reposting.)
Reactive content. (This is you reacting to something that just happened in the world. It has to be relevant and have the feeling of “right now”.)
Call to action. (This is a post you don’t use that often. But it is your way of selling.) I usually say you can do 80% posts that give value and then 20% of the time you can ask for something in return.)
Go Live! Live content is great on most platforms. (Go live when you have an event, interview an interesting person or anything else that you feel is interesting to your followers.)
And don’t forget about things like…
Digital account security:
Use 2 factor authentication and keep your passwords safe. On Linkedin always have two administrators, if there is one and they quit they can shut down your account or you might not be able to access it. The same goes for Facebook. Don’t have too many admins, that is also a security risk. Also, make sure your company owns your Facebook page and ad account so that you are not giving that power away to an ad agency or independent consultant.
Statistics and how you measure your results.
Choose some KPI s (measuring points), that you use to see if you are successful or not. You can measure things like followers, engagement, frequency, return of investment, cost per click etc. These will depend on if you do paid ads or just work organically.
Your digital cycle:
Last but not least: Think about your different channels as a live ecosystem where the different organisms are linked to each other. That is, a person who gets to know you through instagram can also be sent to Linkedin and the other way around. They kind of feed each other. It is also possible that you will communicate with one target group through one channel and another in a different one depending on where your different target groups spend their time.
Anchor the strategy within the organisation.
A strategy is only useful if it is actually anchored within the organisation and used on a regular basis. make sure to invite the important players to take part in the process and the result. The strategy might also need to be evaluated after some time so that you can make necessary tweaks.
Creating a marketing strategy can be made simple or more complicated depending on what your company needs. I hope these questions help you get started.