Week 6: Marketing Communication Plan

Marketing communication planning model: what are the stages?

For this week’s post, we’ll be looking at marketing communications planning. Marketing communications differ from marketing plans. A marketing plan seeks to sell, communications plan devise a way to tell. Let’s jump in.


For an example of a well thought out model, we’ll take a look at will be the marketing and communications planning framework (MCPF) taken from Chris Fill’s Marketing Communications: Brands, Experiences, and Participation (2013). The MCPF (seen below) is a model for understanding the different pieces of a marketing strategy and how they relate to one another.



The MCPF diagramed (Fill 2013)

This model is linear in theory but may not be in practice. Regardless of the lack of linearity, we will start at the top. The model begins with context analysis. This means an analysis of the factors surrounding and influencing the delivery and reception of the desired communication. Factors that may positively or negatively affect the brand should be considered and compiled. The author stresses that organizational factors should be avoided as they have most likely been considered during the creation of a marketing plan and will take the focus off of communications. The backbone of the context analysis is information gathered through the marketing planning process. Market analysis, business, and marketing goals, segmentation are all factors that should already be at hand when forming the communication plan. The goal of the context analysis is to provide justification to the rest of the plan. The context can be broken down into customer context, business context, internal context, and external context.


The next step is communication goals and positioning. This step consists of three groups of goals: corporate, marketing, and communication. The corporate goals should come straight from the business plan and the organization's mission statement. The marketing goals are KPIs related to sales and should be found in the marketing plan. The communications goals include choices between maintenance of the brand or repositioning, levels of perception and awareness, and attitudes, to name a few. The context analysis should help guide the creation of the communication goals.


The following step is the 3Ps of communication strategy. Here the “P’s” stand for push, pull, and profile. Push strategy is all about communicating with intermediaries such as retailers, while pull strategy is about talking to the consumer or end user of the product.




Example of the flow of communication in push strategy (Fill 2013)





Example of the flow of communication in pull strategy (Fill 2013)


Profile strategy is about evaluating communications toward other stakeholders such as NGO’s, governmental bodies, community organizations and so on.


The flow of communication in profile strategy (Fill 2013)


It is of the utmost importance for marketing managers to understand who the intended audiences are, their level of priority and which strategy they fall under. As we discussed last week, all communications should be integrated but that doesn’t mean different strategies don’t apply. Positioning may largely inform decision making on which strategy will be become the focus. While all parts are important, a business undergoing an identity redesign may see pull strategy being the most important factor to inform their customers of the change. On the other hand, a business that has had a management shakeup or has new ownership requires a push strategy to assure partners that all is well or that the appropriate corrections have been made.


Once the marketing communication strategies are in place, it’s time to sort out the coordinated communications mix. This will be the rough draft of the communications to be delivered. This is where style, type, media should be considered and chosen for each of the pertinent stakeholders. Goals should be weighed and choices should be justified by their importance and the resources available. This step may also include outside agencies to begin the process of drafting the communications.


The next point is Resources. Resources entail the use or procurement of project planning software such as Microsoft Project. Firm cost estimates should be made so financial resources can be approved and allocated. An evaluation of staff needs and assignments should be made. Necessary recruitments should be made. Lastly, issues of time available should be assessed. Which leads us to Scheduling. This part is pretty self-explanatory. Communication should be made with applicable partners and intermediaries to strategically rollout the plans events, methods, and media. The timing for media pushes may be critical depending on segmentation and the forms utilized.

The final levels are Implementation, Control and Evaluation. Implementation is as straightforward as it gets. Pull the trigger. Tip the domino. Once the rollout has begun, control and evaluation are critical to the success of the project. As Chris Fill puts it, “Unless there is some form of evaluation, there will be no dialogue and no true marketing communications.” (2013). A special attention should be made to the communication goals and objectives set at early on in the process. A factor that is shown in the diagram, but not mentioned by name, is feedback. Throughout the entirety of the process, information is fed back up the latter to hone and improve each step. Goals and scope may change as factors shuffle throughout the process. Being open to feedback is crucial to the success of any project and is certainly pertinent here.

Another method for communications planning could be the SOSTAC model. While this was developed for digital marketing, it can be utilized for larger communications plans. However, due to its multi-purpose functionality, author Chris Fill warns that the communication focus may be lost or blurred while using it. See the video below to hear more about SOSTAC from its creator PR Smith or check out a thorough guide for building a SOSTAC model here.

A quick guide from the SOSTAC creator PR Smith (2013)

What are the characteristics of a successful marketing communication plan or campaign?

Highly successful marketing communications plans are always goal-oriented. These objectives may take the form of communication objectives or behavioral objectives. Communication objectives are concerned with influencing customer attitudes toward the product or to inform. Behavioral objective do exactly what they say on the tin, they seek to change customer behavior. These can be measured through market research or what I called “feedback” in the previous paragraph. Communication objectives can be analyzed by brand recognition, awareness, recall, attitudes, and knowledge. These may be difficult to pin down and may require a great deal of research. Thankfully, behavioral objectives are much easier to measure. These factors include repeat purchases, first-time purchases, market share, ROM, click-through rates, likes, shares, etc. These data are then fed back into the communication plan for further refinement. (De Pelsmacker, Geuens & Bergh 2018)

A marketing communication success story

For an example of a successful communication strategy, let's take a look at the worlds first trillion-dollar company, Apple. In the late 90’s, the company was in shambles. Teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. Enter Steve Jobs. One year later, the company would reintroduce itself an electronics maker for those that didn’t fit the mold. The slogan of the iMac would be “think different” and its looks were copied by everyone in the market. The machine reminded us of the Macintosh in all the right ways and signaled that the old iconoclast was back. 20-plus years later, this marketing communications plan is still the hallmark of the company. Still convincing us that buying from the world’s most successful company is a declaration of individuality.

Sources:
De Pelsmacker, P., Geuens, M. and Bergh, J. (2018). Marketing Communications: A European Perspective. 6th ed. Harlow: Pearson, pp.148-149.

Fill, C. (2013). Marketing Communications: Brands, Experiences and Participation. 6th ed. Harlow: Pearson Education Limited, pp.152-154, 160-168.

PR Smith. (2013). SOSTAC® Planning. [online] Available at: https://prsmith.org/sostac/ [Accessed 2 Oct. 2018].

Swan, S. (2018). A SOSTAC® Plan example | Smart Insights. [online] Available at: https://www.smartinsights.com/digital-marketing-strategy/sostac-plan-example/ [Accessed 2 Oct. 2018].