Assessing communication campaigns: Framework integration

From the Collin’s dictionary definition –  If you describe something, such as an amount of money, as derisory, you are emphasising that it is so small or inadequate that it seems silly or not worth considering. In the contact of corporate communication, not focussing on the design of domain-specific items leads to data sets which are in a very large effect – derisory. This is in following with last weeks article where the necessity of a panoramic view was emphasised. 

While there will be a lot of focus on the outcome of a communications campaign the framework of actually drawing conclusions requires a functional integration dimension. The framework and the entire function of corporate communication should enable the integration of externally provided content or feedback in the assessment. This is of vital importance when focussing on the domain-specific support measures as a result of such an assessment. For example the actual data mining to search for validated references to the outcome of a campaign.

Delving deeper into the framework the first line item is the communication administration and its impact. In a corporate setting the first line drawn to this, be it advertising or public relations or stakeholder engagement is the – impact on profit. This is a large context of the outcome of the campaign and the very first point of reference for an assessment. There are normally three variables to this context – 

1. Positive impact
2. Negative impact
3. No impact

While this remains rather straightforward enhanced focus is required on the structure of the campaign itself, where the communication vehicle and the strategy is built to suit the required positive outcome.

The second line item, is the communication administration and its accounting. It is this accounting which forms the basis of an internal assessment of the communication campaign and is broken down to two basic variables

1. Inventories
2. Revenues/costs

The inventories typically relate to the stock of communication content available for dissemination and the costs associated with the dissemination. For example – the key spokesperson travelling across geographies to meet key stake holders across multiple formats. The information that comes from this classification exercise provides the ability to procedurally evaluate the domain specific inventories and the costs associated with them. This enables the assessment according to domain-specific rules. 

The third line item is the communication process modelling. This is a business process modelling exercise where the function of corporate communication looks to explore almost all scenarios where the communication can go wrong. This step remains an ongoing effort through the assessment of the campaign involving multi-step interaction with the organisation and the segmented stakeholders. The aim is to make the organisational processes representable and supportable by information feedback and, importantly, more transparent to members of the organisation.

These three items or steps of assessment form the basis of the framework and drive a more focussed approach towards the domain specific analysis. The framework and the analysis of an assessment implementation with these basic line items provides an amount of flexibility for designing and enmeshing a feedback mechanism into any communication strategy.

This approach then leads to the classical statistical approach of Quantitative and Qualitative analysis. Qualitative data, collected primarily from open-ended prompts within the assessment, allows for emergent themes to be discussed and can help determine dependability of the campaign strategy. The goal in exploring qualitative data is to primarily interpret 

1. The categories used 
2. The concept of the campaign and
3. The communication experiences both internal and external

The quantitative information and data gained from the application of the line items help in “uncovering embedded information and making it explicit”. This is the confluence of the qualitative assessment of a communication campaign and bolstering the use of the strategy with quantitative data. The framework is applicable in domain specific areas, for example a campaign for a financial product cannot be reproduced for a pharmaceutical advisory campaign.

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Amit Paul

With over two decades of diverse experience, Amit has worked closely with corporates, industry houses, academies and institutions helping them bridge the learning divide and implementing management solutions, focussing on the geographies of the Middle East and the ASEAN region.
Currently he is the Principal Consultant at NAC Singapore, and works on the confluence of technology and safe living focussing on building safe and smart cities.