How to build an effective communications strategy for your company

As a business leader, you’re dedicated to delivering a high-quality product or service.

But building a business that’s profitable over the long-term isn’t just about the doing… you also need to communicate about what you’re doing, and why.

Content creation, social media, press relations, event planning, advertising campaigns… there are so many communications options at your disposal. Naturally, it’s tempting to embrace all these channels to maximize your visibility. But in reality, you risk spreading yourself too thin, using up considerable energy and resources for an outcome that won’t meet your expectations.

Communicating actively is great. Communicating smartly - while leveraging a solid strategy - is even better.

But how do you establish a communications strategy that actually pays off? How do you define your key messaging and choose the right channels? What metrics should you monitor to evaluate your strategy’s performance?

Together, let’s go through the process of building an effective strategy, step by step.

First things first, you’ll need to define clear objectives in order to build an effective communications strategy.

By setting goals, you’ll be able to create a tailored and concrete action plan that includes:

• Leveraging the right communications channels (for each objective there’ll be specific media that work best).
• Evaluating the performance of your strategy by tracking the right metrics.

What objective should you choose? The goal of your overall communications strategy is closely linked to your marketing objectives and conversion funnel.

Simply put, the conversion funnel is the ideal ‘buyer’s journey’ of your potential customers.

This journey is often visualized through the TOFU/MOFU/BOFU format. As an entrepreneur, you may already familiar with this marketing jargon. But it’s worth taking a moment to go over these terms, and see how they fit in with your marketing strategy.

• TOFU is an acronym that stands for “top of the funnel.” Here, your future customer is at the beginning of their thought process. They have a problem but don’t know how to resolve it, so they’re looking for information. Your objective is to help them discover your business and visit your website, for example. From being a stranger, they now become a visitor.
• MOFU means “middle of the funnel.” At this stage, your future customer starts showing interest in your company. They begin performing actions to reflect that interest (subscribing to your newsletter, downloading a white paper, signing up for a free trial...). Here, your objective is to instil a positive feeling about your offer and to make your brand image shine. If successful, your visitor becomes a potential customer - also known as a lead or prospect.
• BOFU means “bottom of the funnel.” Your future customer is now very interested in your business. They may have already compared your product or service with your competitors' offers, and they're close to taking action. You have a conversion objective, so you convince them to perform that action (which is, in most cases, a purchase). You’ve now converted them from a lead to a customer.

Now that you have an idea of what objectives you can build your communications strategy around, it’s time to clarify your own.

Here, it might be tempting to simply say "I want my business to be more visible" or "I want to improve my brand's image." However, precision is key.

Keep in mind that your objectives are like a compass - they’ll help you steer your marketing strategy in the right direction. The more precise your goal is, the more aligned - and therefore effective - your actions will be.

The SMART method is a tried-and-true technique to help you define your goals:

S: Specific M: Measurable A: Achievable R: Relevant T: Time-Bound

By following this method, "I want my business to be more visible" could become "I want my website to receive 5,000 visitors per month by December 2023."

You probably already identified your target audience when you created your business plan. This research ensures that your offer meets a demand - confirming your market fit and allowing you to proceed with confidence.

But it's also very useful in the context of your communications strategy, on two fronts especially.

On one hand, taking the time to really understand your target audience’s needs and expectations will help you to refine your messaging. With the right messaging in place, your communications actions will land with greater impact. You’ll also have all the material you need to create content that resonates with your target audience and grabs their attention.

To formulate the right messaging, it’s a good idea to conduct interviews with your target audience and ask them about their needs. This way, you’ll get your hands on qualitative data to help you fine-tune your key messages.

On the other hand, a solid understanding of your target audience also gives you a better idea of their habits and preferences - especially in terms of content consumption. You’ll then be able to choose the right communications channels to reach them.

Customer personas are your best friends when it comes to crafting your key messages.

But what's a key message? And what's it used for?

In general, it’s the information you convey in your different communications actions to summarize your value proposition.

In other words, ask yourself what you want people to remember about your offer. What are the main benefits of your products (or services)? And how do you stand apart from your competitors?

It can be tempting to pitch all the benefits, all at once. We get it. As an entrepreneur, you've developed an offer you're proud of and you’re sure it could solve many of your target audience's problems.

But in order to hold their attention, try to keep your message as simple and concise as possible.

It must also be clear, comprehensible, and consistent across all platforms. To get the ball rolling, try jotting down a list of core keywords that you’ll be using in future communications actions.

Having trouble selecting your arguments? Feel like your message is still unclear? Steve Blank, a specialist in lean management, suggests the following exercise to help you clarify your value proposition.

Using the material you gathered from your interviews, draft your messages by completing the following formula:

We help (target customer) with (need/problem) by providing (feature/benefit of your product)

This simple formula will help guide your future communications by ensuring your key message remains clear and concise.

Great communication is the art of mastering both content and form.

The form of your message is very important - it helps you differentiate from other brands that are competing for consumers’ attention. But how do you establish your communications style?

It's all about finding a voice and a visual identity that reflect your brand, your mission, and what you stand for. These storytelling elements will help you build a compelling narrative around your company.

Most SMEs will focus their efforts on developing a visual identity, including a logo and a style guide.

This is important, but don't overlook your brand voice - the way you communicate with your audience. Your voice can be formal, educational, reassuring, casual, bold, funny, enthusiastic, empathetic, innovative, authoritative... It's up to you to choose the most relevant style, in line with your product and target audience.

An editorial style guide will help you establish your communications approach and brand voice. This kind of document usually summarizes:

• Your key messages and company values.
• The lexical field for talking about your product.
• Some concrete rules concerning your writing style, such as using emojis, exclamation marks, contractions, etc.

An editorial style guide is essential for every company. Not only does it help your brand's personality shine through, but it also ensures your communication is consistent across all channels.

As discussed, choosing the right communications channels depends on your objectives and your customer persona.

It's worth concentrating your efforts on the channels that are most in line with your objectives.

Are you trying to boost your company's visibility? Consider these communications formats:

• Content creation (blog posts, guides, social media, podcasts, etc.)
• Influencer marketing.
• Events.
• Press relations.

Do you want to promote your brand image and pique your audience's curiosity about your company? Think about:

• Content creation (newsletter, guides, etc.)
• Customer cases and success stories.
• Flyers or leaflets that you can hand out during events.

Do you have a conversion objective and want to boost your sales? These channels could be the way forward:

• Sales outreach e-mails (with a promotional code, for example).
• Online paid advertising.

Remember, your goals (and customer journey) will vary according to your industry. Not all of the above actions will be relevant to your offer, and it's by no means an exhaustive list. You'll to need find the best communications channels to reach your unique target audience.

Let's say, for example, that you're a restaurant owner looking to boost your business's visibility and get your name out there. It probably wouldn’t be relevant to write blog posts or extensive website copy. On the other hand, you could create an Instagram account with attractive photos and video clips of your popular dishes, or partner up with food influencers in your local area.

You also need to identify your target audience's behavior patterns so you can be active on the right channels:

• Are they individuals? Are they professionals?
• What age range(s) do they fall under?
• Are they tech-savvy? Do they prefer traditional media (magazines, newspapers, television, radio...)?
• Do they usually consume written content?
• Do they listen to podcasts?
• Are they a local audience? Or national?

The more information you have, the better you’ll be able to reach your audience via the right communications channels.

Let's go through a few examples to show how a solid understanding of your customer persona will shape your communications strategy.

Example 1: Imagine a company that offers in-home services for older people around the city of Lyon. Your target audience is made up of older citizens in Lyon who don’t spend much time online. In this case, it might be better to distribute posters and flyers around some key spots in the city, and not spend much effort on online communications campaigns.

Example 2: Now, let's consider a company that offers services for freelancers. In this scenario, the company could:

• Organize event-based communications initiatives for freelancers and entrepreneurs.
• Sponsor or create a podcast that covers topics freelancers are interested in.
• Create informative and reassuring 'how to' content about how to complete administrative tasks as a freelancer.
  
  

Example 3: Let's imagine a jewelry e-commerce brand who's target audience is made up of women between 18 and 25 years old. The customer persona is young and regularly consumes content on social media. Here, it could be worthwhile to create content for distribution on platforms like Instagram and TikTok, while partnering up with relevant influencers.

So, you've put together a communication strategy that's tailored to your industry, your target audience and your goals?

Congratulations! the hardest part is now behind you. But the work doesn't stop there. Now it's time to put your strategy in motion.

There are several options for implementing your strategy. It all depends on your budget, the size of your company, and the skills and bandwidth of your teams.

• Execute your communication strategy internally, within your marketing and communication department.
• Delegate the execution of your strategy to specialist communication freelancers (article in French).
• Consult a communication agency (they would usually take care of the strategic aspects of your plan).
  
  

In any case, it’s essential to stay organized and monitor the progress of your communication actions.

Try creating a communication plan to better visualize all the actions you'll carry out. There are many useful digital tools (article in French) to facilitate teamwork and project management, like Notion or Trello.

Don't forget to share around the key messages and the editorial style guide that you created beforehand. Like this, every contributor will be well aware of your guidelines, and your communication will be consistent across every medium.

This last step is often overlooked, but evaluating the performance of your strategy is crucial.

In order to refine your strategy going forward, you need to measure the impact of your communication actions by tracking key performance indicators (KPIs)

The KPIs to follow depend on your objectives. If you’re aiming for increased visibility, keep an eye on:

• The number of visitors to your website.
• The subscriber growth rate across your social media channels.
• Your content's engagement metrics (number of comments, shares, likes).
• The number of subscribers to your newsletter.

Do you have a sales-related objective and are looking to boost conversions? The following metrics are worth looking at:

• the number of contact requests you receive.
• the cost of acquisition (the amount spent to acquire a new customer).
• the click-through rates on your calls to action (CTAs).
• the turnover generated from specific initiatives.
• the overall growth of your revenue.

Keeping an eye on these metrics will help you to evaluate your strategy’s effectiveness, to readjust it if necessary, and to test new ideas.

Even if your strategy is performing well now, it will no doubt evolve over time. You’ll probably have to adjust it regularly in order to adapt to developments in your industry and the emergence of new communication channels.

You're now equipped to build a communication strategy that will reflect your brand image, align with your objectives, and make an impact on your target audience.