Developing a Strategic Communications Plan

Overview

This session will cover how to:

• Outline team functions and chain of command• Identify key stakeholders• Create materials that support the trial• Monitor and evaluate trial communications

Developing Your Strategic Communications Plan

A good plan will contain:

• Strategies for communicating with internal stakeholders

• Strategies for communicating with external stakeholders

• Flexibility to adapt to emerging issues or events

Introducing your Plan

• To begin, describe your topic in one or two paragraphs.

• Explain why your research is important and why it is occurring in a particular community.

• Summarize background information on purpose, methods and context.

• Identify your study’s communication-related vulnerabilities and strengths.

• Detail your vision and objectives for the trial.

Goals and Objectives

• The goal of the communications plan is your vision for what you want to accomplish.

• Your objectives are the steps that must be taken to achieve those goals.

• To develop communication objectives, identify key policy issues, constraints and problems for which communication can serve as part of the solution.

The Communications Team

• List your team members and their roles. Also list multiple ways to contact them.

Identifying your Key Stakeholders

Who needs to know about your trial?

• List each name.

• Include internal audiences, such as colleagues in your organization or officials at the trial sponsor.

• Segment: organize your stakeholders into audience groups.

Audience Segmentation

Audiences for HIV prevention trial, for example, could be segmented as follows:

• Policymakers and national opinion leaders

• Sophisticated lay audiences

• Scientific audiences

• Community members

Understanding Your Stakeholders

• Create a table that explains what you know about your stakeholders.

– Design one table for each trial at your site.

• Understand the potential influence of key stakeholders as opinion leaders and communicators .

• Develop detailed contact lists to communicate with stakeholders.

– Organize your list, and update it regularly.

Ongoing Communications

“It’s helpful to separate out in a communications plan, first the content of what you need to communicate; secondly, the strategy for how you will communicate your message; third, how to adapt the factual information to different audiences; and fourth being sure to have the right messengers for each audience.”

– Manju Chatani-Gada, MPH, Senior Program Manager, AVAC: Global Advocacy for HIV Prevention

Communication Channels and Activities Plan

• Use your environmental scan to guide communications.– Ask stakeholders how they would like to be kept informed.– Provide regular updates rather than one-time

announcements.

• Develop an action plan of activities, messages and timing for each target audience.

• Consider a staged strategy, mapping out whom you will approach first and the order of subsequent contacts.

Plan for Key Milestones

• Plot the trial milestones on a timeline.

Crisis Communications

• Summarize your strategy for managing controversy in your communications plan.

• Be prepared to respond quickly to misinformation or unexpected events that could jeopardize your trial.

• Anticipate and prevent potential crises.

Dissemination Plan

• Summarize your plan for sharing results.

• Later you will need to develop a more detailed dissemination plan.

• Outlining the basic dissemination plan early allows you to budget for essential activities.

• As the trial progresses, this plan will evolve.

Support Materials

List the internal and external documents you will develop to support the trial.

• External documents– One-page backgrounder. “Who? What? When? Where?

Why?” Non-technical– External Q&A. Succinct. Non-technical. One-paragraph

answers

Continued on next slide.

Support Materials

• Internal documents– Talking points and key

messages– Internal Q&A– Holding statement– Spokesperson bios

Preparing for Dissemination

• Know your target audience’s capacity for technology.– Do they have reliable Internet?

• Pre-test your materials for language, content and format. Does your message connect with your audience?

Monitoring and Evaluation

• Briefly describe how you will track stakeholder perceptions of your trial, relevant media coverage and the utility of your approach.

– Set up a mechanism for staff to report rumors or concerns from participants and community members.

– Establish a procedure for monitoring media coverage at each site.

Summary

• Develop your communications plan early, and consult it often. It is a living document.

• Include strategy, activities and approaches for communicating with stakeholders, both internal and external.

• Summarize brief plans for dealing with controversy, disseminating results, and monitoring and evaluation.

For More Information

• publications@fhi360.org