A little forward planning will lead to more consistent communications and less last minute stress
If you haven’t done it already, the wind-down (or is it up?) to Christmas offers an ideal time to start planning your charity’s editorial for next year.
Forward planning will prevent last minute rushes to get copy out, and should reduce the ‘what are we going to include?’ panic a few days before your newsletter is due to go to press.
Planning will also ensure you cover all your critical messages over the course of the year, and build towards key supporter asks in the right places.
Any plan is better than none. Why not get started right now by putting down a list of the key dates, subjects and ways you will communicate with your supporters during 2012?
Here are 12 top tips:
- Invite your team and any other interested parties into a room together to throw around ideas for editorial subjects next year. Bribe them with coffee and cake and assure them all ideas, however crazy, are welcome. If you end up with a large group, split into smaller ‘teams’ that will report back to avoid one or two voices dominating the discussion. Get all thoughts down on paper, and use them to inform (though not dictate) your editorial plan.
- Another good source of ideas is your web statistics. What pages are most popular on your website? What stories in your newsletter got the most response? What kinds of subjects generate the most interest, clicks or donations? Give your readers more of what they already like, and you’ll build stronger relationships with them.
- Give some thought to the key issues you will need to cover over the year. What campaigns, initiatives or projects will you be launching during 2012? What reports or research will be published? How far in advance (their ‘lead time’) will you need to start writing about them?
- Research holidays and anniversaries you might want to mark over the year, but also gather together your own holiday dates and those of the team you work with. Consider half-terms, bank holidays and other dates your supporters and target audiences might be less engaged with your materials.
- Consider using an Excel spreadsheet to plan your editorial, with your dates (weeks or months) down the left hand side, and your media (newsletter, blog, website, social media) across the top. You can use different colours to indicate who is responsible for each subject. Excel allows you to add in rows and columns really easily, creating a flexible plan that can grow and change as the year goes by.
- Plan the first three months of 2012 in more detail, with only an outline plan for the rest of the year. Make one of the last actions for March to plan the next three months in detail.
- Work out how long it usually takes to put critical communications together like your newsletter or annual report, then build plenty of time into your plan so you start work on them in plenty of time.
- Build in flexibility to allow for printer delays, changes in focus, emergencies and other unforeseen events.
- Circulate your plan, so people in your organisation know what’s coming up. If they see something relevant or have a story that matches your theme for the month, they can send it on to you.
- Think about how you will build momentum in your messages and campaigns. Small mentions of a summer campaign early in the year allow you to build interest, but also test your messaging. Try to float the more difficult or controversial ideas early, to give you a heads-up for the issues you may need to tackle in more depth when the campaign launches later on.
- Don’t forget images, video and other media. Carefully plan what extra material you’ll need to go with the writing you’re putting together, leaving enough time to commission photography or search for imagery. Planning ahead will prevent the mad rush to find something suitable or simply using the same old images again and again.
- Don’t be tempted to veer too far from your plan a few months down the line because a subject you’d planned to write about is difficult or boring. You included it for a reason.
