Strategic communication is foundational for the success of any organization. Your organization’s communication affects everyone from client relations to target audiences to everyday operations. Strategic communication establishes a flow of accurate and timely messages between an organization and its audiences. By embracing strategic communication, an organization reduces its potential for a crisis to happen, including dissatisfaction, mistrust, or misunderstanding.

Read on to learn about what precisely strategic communication is and what it can look like for your organization. 

What is Strategic Communication?

Simply put, strategic communication is the use of communication as a business tool to further your organization’s goals. This can look like a million different things, but to paint a picture, here’s an example:

Let’s say you’re an economic development organization, and your reputation among your target audience has become misconstrued and inaccurate. In order for your organization to reach its overall goal, you need the support of this audience. Now, instead of working toward your goal, your day-to-day operations are filled with putting out fires. 

This is exactly where strategic communication comes into play. Through it, you can gain an understanding of this target audience and how to effectively reach them with consistent and accurate messaging – to ensure your audience is on the same page as your organization. In addition, strategic communication can also help your organization better prepare for potential fires and have a proactive plan to put them out.

Why a Strategic Communication Plan?

The communication plan is the strategic approach that defines the who, what, when, where, and why. Who needs to hear your message? What messaging do they need to hear? When exactly should they hear it? Where should this messaging be placed? And finally, why you should be communicating in the first place. 

A strategic communication plan: 

• • Allows an organization to keep an eye on the whole brand and its communication – it’s both the 30,000-foot view and the tactical implementation. 
  • Creates an understanding of the target audience, how to reach them, a reflection on past efforts, how well they worked, and what messages to deliver to each audience.
  • Provides employees with the tools for a stronger and more consistent expression of the organization’s brand.
  • Gains a better understanding of the challenges within the organization and how to better prepare or prevent them.

Overall, a strategic communication plan makes an organization stronger and paves the way for its success. At Siren, we say this from experience: 

• • Kirtland Community College decided to move its campus to a new location and build completely new facilities. We built trust with the student body and the community by strategically and proactively communicating during this transition. 
  • Community Choice Credit Union was on a steep growth path and we helped them grow meaningfully during a merger, assured local residents their jobs would be secure and that the community would be supported, and built trust in new markets.
  • As the primary source for higher education in their northern Michigan region, Kirtland Community College cares about its reputation. We launched a successful strategic communication effort focused on clear communication to improve their reputation and foster an environment for their continued growth.

Best Communication Practices

There are many services wrapped around strategic communication that a partner can offer your organization: crisis communication, strategic planning, and brand message development. If your organization is looking to improve its communication, here are some best practices to start implementing right away:

• • Identify key themes amongst target audiences and stakeholders.
  • Maintain consistent brand messaging for business objectives.
  • Keep messages clear and simple. Often, this is the most overlooked practice.

The Power of Strategic Communication

When done effectively, strategic communication can be a very powerful business strategy. By implementing this business strategy, your organization ensures that important messaging is relayed to the right people at the right time, creates a positive presence in the market, and creates alignment between its employees, target audiences, and stakeholders. 

Does Your Organization Need a Strategic Communication Plan? 

Now that you understand the importance of strategic communication, are you still unsure about when your organization should activate a communication partner? If you find your organization often struggling with any of these pain points, now is the time:

• • Your most valuable resources – your time, effort, and creativity – are expended on tactical activity. 
  • Your organization’s goals have no objective measure of success, and no way of demonstrating results, value, and performance.
  • Your organization misses opportunities that could have a major impact (good or bad) on your business or brand.

Many organizations and companies struggle with these pain points, and activating strategic communication as a business strategy can relieve them and aid you in achieving your goals. 

Conclusion 

Often, many organizations don’t understand the importance of strategic communication until its pain points have become strenuous. Save on your organization’s resources by partnering with a strategic communication partner and lay the foundation for your success today. 

As your strategic communication partner, Siren can help your organization communicate clearly and effectively. Learn more about our services. 

 

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