Posts Tagged ‘objectives’

Objectives First

09.03.04

A while back I wrote a series of posts on communications planning. One of the most popular posts within that series, which still gets a few hundred views per week, was on one on setting communications objectives. As I said at the time:

“As the old saying goes, you need to know where you’re going before you can know how to get there.”

Fast forward to this week, when Skittles re-launched their website with a completely new structure drawn almost entirely from other social media sites:

Naturally the bloggerati took notice, and began passing judgement on the website. The topic quickly shot to the list of top “trending” words on Twitter. While I was bemused that Skittles didn’t seem to be engaging on Twitter despite using the service on its site (Twitter.com/skittles is currently a locked personal account with very little activity), aside from that I tried to refrain from commenting on the effort itself.

Why?

Because we don’t know their objectives. All of the people ripping into this site are doing so with no clue what Skittles was trying to achieve.

  • Is it a short-term effort to kick-start buzz and discussion online?
  • Is it an attempt to position a 35 year-old brand as youthful?
  • Is it to simply raise awareness of the product?
  • Is it a genuine attempt to embrace social media?

We just don’t know.

While I’ve fallen into the trap of evaluating communications efforts in the past without knowing all of the information, this time I’m holding off.

To everyone else out there, who seem to know for sure that the site is a huge success/failure, I say:

“Do you have any idea what equals success in this project for the Skittles brand?”

Posted in: case studies, communications planning

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3 Steps To Better Objectives

09.02.09

What's your target? “Increase sales” isn’t a good objective.

Neither is “increase web traffic,” or “increase awareness,” or “more customers.”

Why?

Because you have no way of measuring success. If you can’t measure success, then what use is your goal?

I have to bite back a visceral reaction whenever I see vague goals in a communications plan. They’re toothless, they’re meaningless and they turn what could be a selling point for us (compelling objectives) into a waste of space. Sure, they provide a vague focus for work, but there’s no spine to them.

Let’s say your initiative – your communications; your ad campaign; your promotion – resulted in one additional customer. Is that success? Maybe if you’re Boeing or Bombardier, where one additional customer means multi-million dollar deals. If you’re McDonalds or Lays then perhaps not.

While the the kumbaya/let’s-all-get-along discussion inside the blogosphere might find that kind of objective acceptable, if you’re competing in real life with marketing/advertising agencies and other corporate departments for limited dollars, you need to be more specific and you need to talk outcomes, not outputs.

Creating better objectives

A credible goal needs to have three components:

  1. Change – What will you improve?
  2. Quantifier – How much will it improve?
  3. Deadline – When will you do it by?

A call to action

Corporate folks

If your agency walks in and says their goal is to increase your sales for next year, ask them by how much and by when.

If they say they’re going to improve your reputation online, ask them how they plan to measure that.

Let’s face it, times are tough. You need to know that you’re spending your dollars in the right areas.

Hold your agency to account.

Agency folks

Pre-empt this discussion. Walk into the room with your goals fleshed-out.

As anyone in PR knows, the end-goal effects can be hard to quantify so don’t shoot yourself in the foot and aspire to something you’ll end up not being able to prove. Use proxies.

You may not be able to directly prove sales, but you can certainly find a way to draw a line between things you can affect and the big-picture end-goal.

For example, instead of “improve your online reputation,” try something like:

Goal: Improve [brand X]‘s online reputation by:

  • Increasing the proportion of positive online comments about the company, compared to negative and neutral comments, by 10 per cent over the next six months;
  • Increasing the volume of mentions of [your brand] online by 15 per cent by March 2010;
  • …

Yes, external influences occur. Yes, they’re unpredictable. Just be ready to discuss those when you review your program after the deadline. Don’t let them prevent you from setting useful objectives at the outset.

What do you think?

Posted in: pr, public relations, strategy

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"We Should Do Something In Social Media"

09.01.08

Every so often a client (or potential client) will come to us and say something like,

"We think we should be doing something in social media."

Whether it’s social media monitoring, a podcast series, blogger relations, community building or a fully-integrated campaign, they’ve heard that social media is the thing to do and they want to be seen to do it.

"It would be good for people to see us using social media."

That’s quite possibly true, but by itself it’s not a reason to invest in social media. As I said recently, social media outreach won’t work for everyone.

These companies may have the budget and the will, but likely not the knowledge of how to approach their public relations (and any associated social media tactics). That’s fine – that’s what agencies like ours (and others) are there for – we’re paid to have that knowledge, and we can help companies to plot the right course through social media.

Here are a few questions companies might want to consider before deciding that the time is right:

  • What are their business objectives?
  • What are their communications objectives?
  • Which social media tactics will help them to meet those objectives?
  • Are they ready for an ongoing commitment to social media tools?
  • Are they ready to speak with the voice of people, rather than that of a faceless company?
  • Might social media fit better into a corporate plan rather than an initiative-specific plan?

The answers to any one of these questions could completely re-shape any pre-defined ideas for that company’s social media plans. They could even scupper them completely.

I know this list of questions is far from complete. What would you add to it?

Posted in: public relations, social media

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How To Write A Good Communications Plan – Part 5 – Objectives

08.05.19

This is the fifth in a series of posts exploring how to create a good communications plan. The last post covered how to examine your stakeholders; this time we’re moving from analysis to planning, looking at your objectives.

Objectives

Photo of a target As the old saying goes, you need to know where you’re going before you can know how to get there.

Likewise, before you can plan out your strategy… before you even start to think about your media products or event… you need to nail down your objectives.

What Are You Trying To Do?

This section is where you lay out what you’re trying to achieve with this communications plan. Are you trying to educate your customers? Are you trying to build support or create demand? Do you want to get people to do something differently? Maybe you’re trying to defuse a situation. Whatever you want to do, this is where you define it.

Defining Your Objectives

To fall back on an old mantra from business school, your objectives need to be:

  • Specific
  • Measurable
  • Achievable
  • Realistic
  • Time-focused

In practice, I subscribe to the Manager Tools idea that if you hit two parts of a ‘SMART’ objective – the ‘M’ and the ‘T’ – you’re almost guaranteed to hit the others. Make sure your objectives are measurable and time-focused. The specific, achievable and realistic characteristics will emerge from there.

Vague objectives are a common pitfall. Ensure you can measure them and you will be forced to be “specific.” As for “achievable” and “realistic,” if your objectives don’t meet those two criteria you don’t deserve to be writing plans for anything.

Business Objectives Don’t Equal Communications Objectives

One of the hardest parts of this to get your head around is the difference between business objectives and communications objectives. It’s important not to confuse the two. Remember – you can’t take responsibility for the entire success or failure of the program.

In my view, it helps to include the business objectives for the initiative in your comm plan in addition to the communications objectives. Doing this helps you to make sure your plan supports the overall business goals rather than working on its own.

Use Your Analysis

The last three posts in this series were all about analysis. Don’t let this go to waste. Look at your anticipated stakeholder reactions. Consider previous media coverage. Base your objectives in reality.

What’s The Lasting Impression?

If there was one thing you want people to remember about this initiative, what would it be? This doesn’t have to be written like a key message, but it should capture the essence of what you’re doing.

I first encountered the ‘lasting impression’ idea in comm plans a couple of years ago. I like it. It forces you to boil down what you’re doing to one or two sentences that the ‘average’ person could understand. It’s a great way to let the plan’s reader know, in simple terms, what’s going on.

That’s an important thing to remember throughout your plan. You’re writing this to help you plan an appropriate approach to this communications activity but you’re also writing it to help others understand (and approve of) what you’re planning. Bear that in mind throughout your plan.

The “Communications Plan” Series

This is the fifth in a series of posts on communications planning. To read more of the series, check out a summary of the posts so far or pick from the previous posts:

Posted in: 101, communications planning

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