Develop a campaigns and communication strategy

A communication strategy is a tool that will guide campaign development and implementation. The creative agency will often develop a communications strategy to translate learnings from the situation analysis and audience analysis into opportunities as the focus of the campaign. It will describe the agency’s overall approach to meeting your campaign goals and usually includes communication objectives, strategic communication approaches and an overview of proposed campaign activities. However, you may elect to work collaboratively with the creative agency on developing a communication strategy.

It is critical to ensure that the creative elements and communication channels work together to support behaviour change. Most campaigns will use a combination of media amplification and community mobilisation activities. Media amplification is used for SBCC campaigns to raise awareness and create public discourse on issues. Media channels may include radio; television; newspapers or print media; outdoor media, for e.g., posters, billboards; mHealth (or mobile health) and social media; and information, education and communication (IEC) materials. Community mobilisation is used for SBCC campaigns to drive community engagement, education and behaviour adoption. Community-based activities may include training and capacity building; advocacy; and community theatre or enter-educate events.

A communication strategy is also an important tool that helps to ensure that the programme team, CMT, CAC and creative agency share the same understanding of the campaign direction before the creative development process truly begins. While creative agencies may have different approaches to developing a communication strategy, there are common considerations that should be included. The core elements of a communication strategy are:

1. Overview: This should focus on the main challenge(s) that the campaign will address. It can be a summary of information from the Creative Brief where you provided background information about your programme, the problem your team is trying to address and the status of your programme work.  
2. Situation Analysis summary: This should include an overview of the priority IYCF behaviours that were identified during the situation analysis. It should also note any complementary programmes and policy priorities that align with your chosen IYCF behaviours.
3. Primary Audience summary: This should include an overview of the primary audience that was detailed in the planning phase. It should also describe the primary audience, including demographic information, media use and habits, social habits and more. Any other important groups or audiences should also be discussed here.
4. Barriers and challenges to IYCF behaviour change: This should include a summary of findings from the audience analysis, including the behavioural determinants identified that may limit how and whether the primary audience is able to implement the actions or solutions proposed in the campaign. It is helpful to think about the behavioural determinants in alignment with the elements of the COM-B model (capability, opportunity, motivation), as highlighted in the introduction section.
5. Overcoming barriers and challenges: Using the barriers and challenges to behaviour change in the previous section, this section should be used to outline how the campaign will address those elements. It should include campaign activities, approaches, messages and more to guide how the campaign can be used to help the audience overcome the barriers and challenges to IYCF behaviour change.
6. A communication objective: This is a statement that describes the intended impact of your campaign communications. What do we want the audience to feel/do/know from our messages and materials? Your team may already have a clear answer to this question. If unsure, the following questions can be used to guide your thinking:
   1. Who needs to make the behaviour change?
   2. What is preventing them from making the behaviour change?
   3. What action does the individual need to take? Or what do they need to do?
      Depending upon your campaign goals, you may also consider adding how much change is needed and over what period of time. Together, all of these questions follow the SMART criteria that will make your objective: Specific, Measurable, Appropriate, Realistic and Time-bound.
7. Strategic communication approaches: Here, you and the creative agency should consider which communication channels will be used for the campaign to ensure that the messages reach the intended audience. Examples include television, radio, print media, outdoor media, community programming and more. Multiple channels can be used for campaign messaging so that the audience is exposed to the message in different ways. Communication channels are further detailed in the next section.
8. Outline campaign activities: You may have an idea of which activities will be included in your campaign, but it is important to align the strategies with your strategic communication approaches and list activities in the strategy. For example, if including television, will you use dramas, commercials or spots for messaging? If using community mobilisation activities, will campaign include theatre productions, discussion groups, mothers/caregiver groups, door-to-door outreach or market-based demonstrations? Communication channels and associated activities of each should be outlined.
    

This communication strategy was developed by a creative agency to inform the campaign in Tanzania.