Nancy Schwartz & Company offers high-impact marketing and communications

Marketing and Communications Audit 101

Challenge:
You have a marketing and communications strategy and are implementing varied tactics to meet your goals. But you're not convinced you can't do better. Are you focusing on the right messages? Is your graphic approach consistent with your work and your audiences? Are your competitors simply saying it better?

Solution:
A full-scale audit. We work with you as outlined below to examine what you are doing (and what your competitors and partners are doing) to pinpoint what's working and what's not. We'll use this understanding to help you to reframe your marketing and communications program around messages that do resonate with your core audiences. And we'll continue to guide you in leveraging this information to revise your strategies and tactics to work better than ever before.

Situation Analysis
1.   Work with staff to identify goals and target audiences, barriers, and opportunities
Research
2.   Conduct internal research which may include:

  • Interviews with staff, across functions and perspectives
  • Assessment of existing name and tagline, marketing and advertising materials, and Internet strategy. (It's critical to evaluate both the substance and the style of these items. Our findings will include an assessment of the messages that do come through strongly.)
3.   Conduct research of external audiences

  • Interviews with and surveys of external stakeholders
  • Review of existing research (focus groups, surveys, etc.)
4.   Review partner and competitive materials and messages
Analysis and Interpretation
5.   Analyze and interpret findings
Recommendations
6.   Develop or refine your brand (a positioning statement, key messages, and tone and style guidelines)
7.   Design an action plan to adapt name, tagline, existing materials, and Web presence to conform with this brand
8.   Identify new or revised strategies to meet stated goals.
Then it's on to implementation! An audit is an investment well worth it.


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© 2002 - Nancy E. Schwartz. All rights reserved.

About the Author
Nancy E. Schwartz helps nonprofits succeed through effective marketing and communications. As President of Nancy Schwartz & Company (www.nancyschwartz.com), Nancy and her team provide marketing planning and implementation services to organizations as varied as the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Center for Asian American Media, and Wake County (NC) Health Services.

Subscribe to her free Getting Attention e-update (http://www.nancyschwartz.com/getting_attention.html) and read her blog at http://www.gettingattention.org for more insights, ideas and great tips on attracting the attention your organization deserves.

NOTE: You're welcome to "reprint" this article online as long as it remains complete and unaltered (including the copyright and "about the author" info at the end), and you send a copy of your reprint.


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