The communication strategy is one of the aspects that guarantees that a company’s objectives are achieved: 41% of the companies questioned for the ACSEL barometer affirm that digital has contributed to their turnover.
In order to communicate your message more effectively, you need to have a good strategy.
This guide will help you explore the steps to create a successful communications strategy.
What is a communication strategy?
A communications strategy is your roadmap for building and maintaining relationships with your target market, leads, prospects, customers , and employees.
It is in fact a set of actions or measures taken to ensure effective communication with your various stakeholders.
The strategy must be aligned with marketing , sales , etc. strategies.
For example, a new DNVB (digital native vertical brand) begins its activity. Nobody knows her. During the first year, its communication strategy will be:
Build your online brand image to achieve 2% brand awareness in your niche market
with an SMO campaign on Instagram
by creating partnerships with influencers
Acquire your first 100 customers
by carrying out targeted advertising on social networks
using SEA campaigns
The 6 steps to define your communication strategy
We have summarized for you the 6 essential tips for your communication plan.
How to write a communication strategy?
You will need:
Create a customer profile
Create a customer journey map
Define your target audience
Set goals for your communication strategy
Choose communication channels
Determine the type of content you need to create
Write a communication plan
Let’s take a closer look at all these steps:
1 . Define your communication objectives
To complete any project, you should set goals.
Defining goals is good, but having SMART goals (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time- bound) is even better!
SMART goals are a method of ensuring a specific goal. The more specific the goals, the easier it is for you to achieve them.
❌ “Thanks to its communication, the company will develop its turnover at the end of 2025” âś… “Thanks to a communication budget of 5 million euros over the year, the company will have a turnover of 50 million euros in 2025, against 30 million this year”. |
These objectives must be measurable. If the result is not quantifiable , you will be walking in the dark: otherwise, how do you know if the results are satisfactory or not?
Also, every goal you set should be achievable . Do you have the human , financial (and other) resources necessary to achieve your objectives?
In addition to being achievable, are your goals achievable ?
We must remain realistic when defining these objectives.
Also, make sure your goals are time-bound. Your teams will know by what date they must complete their work to achieve their objectives in the right time.
By respecting its steps when you define the objectives of your communication, you will ensure that you work effectively to achieve your objectives. The communication objectives of a company can be:
Emotional – develop your brand image.
Cognitive – develop the notoriety of your company.
Conatives – induce a customer to take action.
Iterative – build customer loyalty.
Example:
“Increase the retention rate of existing customers from 20 to 35% in 6 months”: this is an iterative objective.
2 . Specify your target
Your target market is made up of all different individuals. To better target it, you must represent it with a persona.
To know your target, you could seek to have the following information:
age
Genre
The profession
The average income
The level of education
Marital status (married, in a relationship, single, etc.)
His hobbies (going out at night, doing cultural activities, watching series, etc.)
His aspirations (his life goal, his political beliefs and his ideal of society)
His fears and frustrations (not shining at family meals, spending too much time at the office, seeing his family in poor health, etc.)
The problems of his daily life (late transport, the meal to be prepared, the unbearable neighbor, etc.)
His drinking habits
This was only a non-exhaustive list of information that could help you define your persona profile.
Let’s take the example of the persona of a premium burger restaurant:
John is 37 years old. He works in the neighborhood. He is a manager and has little time for lunch. He earns around €2,500 per month. He’s in a relationship, and his girlfriend doesn’t like to eat fast food: he eats very healthily at home (frustration #1). He hates preparing food (frustration #2). He likes digital services (consumption habit): the restaurant offers to order online to collect his meal without waiting. |
3 . Choose a tone and positioning
When you chat with someone often, it is easy for you to recognize the sound of their voice. It’s exactly the same with your market, it recognizes your footprint , your way of communicating. The imprint you leave is your “ tone of voice ”.
The tone of voice or communication style of the company
Your company’s tone of voice is nothing but your verbal identity. Thus, the choice of verbs, the particular turns of phrase, the tone of the sentences, your humor (or your seriousness) will say a lot about your style of communication.
Your tone of voice should be the same everywhere. It should ideally be unique based on:
Your target audience
Your philosophy, your brand identity
The tone of voice will allow you to be easily recognizable by your market, to retain your customers and to acquire new ones.
For example, Innocent is a fruit juice brand whose mission is to “make the planet healthier every day” with quality products offered to their customers.
The style and their colors they use align with their missions and differentiate them from others.
Everything is very colorful and their packaging has a slightly different shape than other brands:
In this colorful spirit, the brand must apply a consistent tone of voice. On Instagram, she shares (very) funny posts:
When you are told that your tone of voice must be consistent everywhere, Innocent is an example with its bottle labels:
The positioning of the company
Your company’s branding gives you a place in the minds of your consumers. This place that you occupy in the life of your consumers in relation to your competitors constitutes your positioning .
In order to properly define its marketing positioning , the following steps must be followed:
Analyze the market
Identify potential competitors
Clearly identify your offer
If we take the example of Innocent again, their market is mainly made up of customers looking for good value for money. But some customers are looking for quality, with a larger budget.
Among their competitors are Andros fruit juices. But their premium communication is not as developed, and their distribution channel is mainly catering.
Innocent is positioned in the premium niche market , with an expensive but excellent quality product.
4 . Choose the means and the best time
For a communication to reach its target , it must be broadcast at the right time and through the channels used by the latter. There are 4 main types of communication channels, namely:
1. Social networks
The number of active social media users is over 4 billion, or more than 50% of the world’s population.
2. The media
The internet occupies a big place in our lives today. However, the traditional media did not lose their affluence. Thus, television, radio and the written press are means by which you can reach your target.
3. Websites
According to Orson , 92% of VSEs and SMEs consider their online presence essential to their business and 66% of them have a website.
4. Blogging
Blogs are channels through which you can add value to your customers while generating more traffic. Thus, you position yourself as an expert in your field and you generate interest if your content is of quality.
5 . Specify your budget
For each action of your communication strategy, you will need to allocate a budget. There are several methods to make this allocation and predict the return on investment (ROI).
Plan your target ROI by source of acquisition
ROI is a comparison made between the cost of a campaign and the sales made through it.
Example:
Company X invests €200 to advertise its new product on Facebook. Thanks to this advertisement, she was able to make €2,000 in turnover (including €600 in margin). Thus, the ROI is x10 compared to the turnover and x3 compared to the margin.
Specify a target customer acquisition cost (CAC)
To calculate the cost of acquisition , divide the budget allocated to the campaign by the number of customers obtained over the period.
Example:
Company Y’s daily Instagram marketing campaign cost it $500 and brought in 100 customers. Thus, the acquisition cost is €5 (500/100).
In order to avoid making huge losses, it is necessary to define beforehand a target acquisition cost above which it will be considered too expensive.
6 . Create your communication plan
The communication plan represents all the actions that help guide the communication strategy.
To define it, follow these steps:
Define the problem to be solved (customer retention is low – less than 5%)
Analyze the project environment (sales and customer support are not aware of the problem)
Set your goals (increase retention to 10% by next year)
Identify your target (existing customers)
Define the campaign theme (train teams and launch email campaigns)
Good communication practices
Be original in your communication strategy
The originality of your communication will allow you to have a certain place in the minds of your consumers.
For example, Burger King has a community manager who does a good job on Twitter. In their communication strategy, they have chosen to be fun and quirky:
To be reactive
Being able to respond as quickly as possible to customer expectations is one of the best communication practices.
What not to do in your communication
In communication, certain practices should be banned.
Have a heterogeneous speech
Your tone of voice gives you a unique identity. When you suddenly change your way of speaking , communication channel or graphic charter, it is difficult for your customers to find the image they have built of you.
Continue to share outdated information
For example, leaving an old PDF online that talks about old methods that are no longer used, leaving a web page that gives outdated rates, etc.
You have probably already experienced this situation: you check the opening hours of a restaurant online, and it is open. But when you arrive at the restaurant, you discover that it is closed… It’s a disastrous customer experience for its image!
In summary: how to succeed in your communication strategy?
To succeed in your communication strategy, you must:
Develop your communication plan well
Clearly define your goals
Moreover, depending on the type of target, the objectives may vary. In B2B, it will be necessary to set up a more specific communication strategy because the target companies are well informed about the product and carefully analyze their needs: the communication objectives are conative, cognitive and iterative.
On the other hand, in B2C ( Business to Customer ), communication is more emotional.
In B2B, who says good communication says good tool.
Twilead is an all-in-one CRM that makes it easy to achieve your communication goals.
It integrates:
A CRM to personalize your communication and your customer relationship
Prospect capture features (websites, sales funnels, questionnaires, etc.)
Email marketing automations
An unlimited online calendar
A centralized discussion thread
A reputation and review management tool
You can request a demo .
Bonus: your most frequently asked questions
What are the communication strategies?
1. The cooperation strategy: allowing all parties to contribute
2. The strategy of opposition: defending your position
3. The strategy of influence: having an effect on others
What are the 3 types of communication?
1. Mass communication: a message addressed to the crowd (a TV ad)
2. Group communication: between several people in private (a webinar)
3. Interpersonal communication: between two people (for example between your salesperson and the customer)
What are the 4 challenges of communication?
1. Informative : convey a message
2. Relational : create a relationship or strengthen it
3. Influence : having influence over someone to change their habits
4. Identity : expressing your identity
How to develop an internal communication strategy?
1. Analyze the situation of the company (many CSR initiatives not communicated)
2. Define communication objectives (share these initiatives)
4. Prepare the messages to broadcast and the distribution channels (videos by email)
5. Develop the schedule (one per week)
6. Identify the KPIs (the opening rate) of your communication strategy
