Why a strategic communications plan?

A strategic communications plan strives to fine-tune your organization’s way of reaching out and interacting with key stakeholders, and offers ways to achieve specific, measurable objectives. It is an investment that should pay dividends not just in the short-run, but also over the longer term.

How you communicate with your audience defines the way they will see you, and how they will respond to what you have to say. But communicating effectively requires buy-in at all levels of an organization. More than that, your message can only resonate by first ensuring that you have a well thought-out plan that clearly identifies:

• who you are and where you want to go;
• who you need to reach (i.e., your audience);
• what you want to say to them;
• how you want your audience to respond

It's often tempting to view strategic communications planning as an activity that—while necessary—has more to do with staying the course than of being a tool that can bring about change—in this case, to elevate stakeholder awareness. And yet it is the latter of these attributes that can help bring about meaningful change.

Remember what baseball hall-of-famer, Babe Ruth, once said:
“Yesterday’s home runs won't win today’s games.”

That’s the challenge this strategic communications plan seeks to address.

(SNIP)