Strategic Plan Strategic Communications Awareness Campaign

CameronPotter

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Research………………………………………………………………………………………………………3

KeyFindings………………………………………………………………………………………………….4

Publics,Goals&Objectives…………………………………………………………………….……….5

KeyMessage………………………………………………………………………………………………….6

Strategies……………………………………………………………………………………………………..7

Tactics………………………………………………………………………………………………………….8

Timeline………………………………………………………………………………………………………..9

Budget…………………………………………………………………………………………………………10

Evaluation…………………………………………………………………………………………………….11

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RESEARCH

Potential Students:

• Surveys gauging previous knowledge of the Strategic Communication major at Miami University.

• Same surveys would be sent out to prospective students at Ohio University and Kent State University. This will gauge their knowledge about the subject at their respective schools.

Tour groups:

• Collect data from the admissions office about prospective majors from high school students in tour groups. (Find out how many are interested in Business, Journalism, etc..)

Freshman and Sophomore Students:

• Conduct focus groups to learn the current opinion of the Strategic Communication major among underclassmen at Miami University.

• Conduct focus groups with solely students who are undecided in the Farmer School of Business.

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KEY FINDINGS

Potential Students:

• 74% of potential Miami students did not realize that the Strategic Communication major was offered.

• 32% of prospective Miami students know about the Strategic Communications major while 68% of prospective students at other schools know about their respective schools Communications programs.

Data collection from the Admissions office

• 48% of prospective students that tour Miami University are interested in the Farmer School of Business.

• 21% of prospective students that tour Miami University are interested in an Engineering degree.

• 10% of prospective students that tour Miami University are interested in Journalism. • 6% of prospective students that tour Miami University are interested in solely pursuing a

degree in Strategic Communication. • 15% of prospective students that tour Miami University are interested are interested in other

degrees.

Focus groups with underclassmen

• 29% of underclassmen don’t fully understand the program or the benefits of having a major in Strategic Communication so the have neutral feelings towards it.

• 74% of underclassmen feel that not every major at Miami receives the same amount of exposure and recognition and that they don’t have time to fully explore their options before they have to choose a track to follow.

Focus groups with undecided Business majors

• 48% of students that are undecided feel that the requirements to both get in and remain in the Farmer School of Business are too high.

• 41% of students said they would be willing to find out more information about Strategic Communication and fully explore their options.

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PUBLICS, GOALS & OBJECTIVES

Publics: • Potential students

• Tour groups

• Freshman and sophomore students

Goals: Our goal is to raise awareness of the benefits, role, and the faculty involved in the Strategic Communications major to our target demographic of potential and underclassmen students here at Miami University.

Objectives: Our objective is to raise awareness of the benefits and overall role of the Strategic Communication major by 30% among potential and underclassmen students here at Miami University by the end of this one-year program.

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KEY MESSAGE

Strategic Communication is the study of how individuals and organizations use communication and media to negotiate their role in highly mediated societies. Public relations is a central aspect of strategic communication and involves the study of how organizations influence opinions and the behavior of key publics (e.g., employees, consumers, government, community, media) and how they try to respond and adapt to the concerns of these publics. The curriculum emphasizes an ethical approach to public relations and analyzes the impacts strategic communication practices have on societies.

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STRATEGY

• We plan to reach potential students by using school marketing resources, social media outlets, and out reach programs in order to make them aware of how successful the administration in the Strategic communication department is.

• We plan to reach high school students on tours by using student-marketing resources to take away some attention from the Farmer School of Business and emphasize that Strategic Communications still involves many similar aspects of business without the strict qualifications needed.

• We plan to reach underclassmen at Miami University through social media and resource allocation programs to bring awareness to the variety if uses of the knowledge gained through the Strategic Communication path.

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TACTICS

• Hire three Miami students to run our program and control media outputs.

• High School College Fairs o Currently, when we conduct high school visits we tend to put more

emphasize on our Business and Engineering programs. We will restructure our recruitment strategy and materials to make more room for Strategic Communications to be advertised.

• Use the Farmer School of Business o Create flyers showing how some fields of Business and Strategic

Communications are the similar. § Students could get a job in marketing and sales with both types of

degrees, but you don’t need to meet the requirements of getting into the Farmer School of Business to be a Strategic Communications major.

• Use of PRSSA o Allow student organizations to be able to hire PRSSA. o Would be extremely useful in the Greek community. o The organizations would have to advertise that they use PRSSA.

• Social Media

o Twitter & Instagram § Have a professor of the month for the Strategic Communications

department. A picture would be posted along with their accomplishments, career history, and a description of how they have benefited from Strategic Communications.

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TIMELINE September 3rd-December 15th: Use revamped recruitment materials at all high school college fairs. September 6th – Start bi-weekly distribution of flyers comparing several business majors with Strategic Communication. September 13th – Start “Professor of the Month” posts on Instagram and Twitter. September 20th – Bi-Weekly Distribution of Flyers October 4th - Bi-Weekly Distribution of Flyers October 13th - “Professor of the Month” post October 18th - Bi-Weekly Distribution of Flyers November 1st - Bi-Weekly Distribution of Flyers November 13th - “Professor of the Month” post November 15th - Bi-Weekly Distribution of Flyers November 29th - Bi-Weekly Distribution of Flyers December 13th - Bi-Weekly Distribution of Flyers / “Professor of the Month” post WINTER BREAK February 6th -10th – Greek Week use of PRSSA for their events. February 7th – Continued Bi-Weekly Distribution of Flyers. February 10th – Continued “Professor of the Month” posts. … May 13th – Campaign End

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BUDGET

Resources # of units Price Per Unit Subtotal

Student Worker @ $8/hr

4hrs/week for 30 weeks

3 $960 $2,880

Flyers 10,000 $0.10 $1,000

TOTAL $3,880

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EVALUATION

As Public Relations practitioners we spent time after the completion of our plan to measure the success of our campaign. The objective of our plan was to raise awareness of the benefits and overall role of the Strategic Communication Major by 30% among potential and underclassmen students here at Miami University by the end of this one-year program. We have evaluated our plan through social media, surveys and focus groups conducted both at the beginning and our program. Our final evaluation showed that awareness of the benefits and overall role of the Strategic Communication Major increased by 37% over our 1-year program. The social media analytics showed that the number of followers on both Instagram and Twitter increased by 200%. These results show that our program was successful and our objective was surpassed.