It’s important to be able to tell people about your campaigns. We all have to spread the word at some time - behind a stall, to your friends, in front of an audience of hundreds, or when meeting an MP or Vice Chancellor.
Top Tips
- Be strategic and have a clear message;
- Use the AIDA model to structure your communication;
- Don’t get drawn in to arguments.
Communication in Campaigning
As with all your campaigning, whatever you are communicating should ultimately be trying to achieve your campaign aims and objectives as decided during your campaign planning.
Planning your communication
Before you start communicating your campaign, and as part of your campaign planning you should think about:
What are your overall communication goals?
- What change are you trying to create? What are your campaign aims and objectives?
- What are you asking people to do?
- Do you have additional goals beyond your campaign aims and objectives? e.g. to recruit new members, create more awareness about your group, gain access to more resources?
Who are your target audiences?
- Who are you trying to reach to achieve your communication goals?
What is your message? * Develop a phrase of about four to ten words that sums up your campaign demand and that your group would like to use every time you communicate.
Communicating your message
A useful aid for structuring your message is to use the acronym AIDA:
- A ttention - what is the injustice in the issue?
e.g. it is good to open with something that attracts the person’s attention for example: ‘have you ever … ?’; ‘have you noticed …?’; or ‘can you see …?’; - I nterest - make a comparison, what is this person’s connection to the issue?
e.g. you can get interest by: listening to them; telling them things that affect them; demonstrating things, rather than just telling; getting them actively involved; - D esire - what are others doing?
e.g. they can recognize that they have a need, but this is not desire, i.e. a motivation to act that can be prompted by: showing them how the action will not be available for long; showing them that other people approve of the action and have done it; showing them how what you have to offer will solve some of their problems; - A ction - what can they do?
e.g. listen to the signals they are sending and summarise how what you are proposing solves the problem.
You can use this tool for anybody you are communicating your campaign message to in any situation, however, there are useful additional things to think about to in order to sound convincing and when public speaking or running a stall. Further information about these are on the following pages.
Why me?
Trying to win an argument or give a talk that doesn’t need to happen can be very demotivating, so before launching in ask yourself a few questions:
- Why do you want to talk to this person? What will it achieve?
- Is this the best way to get the message across? Giving them a briefing, directing them to a website, or giving them someone else’s email might be a better solution.
- Are you the best person to have this discussion or give this talk? Pick the role you’re most comfortable with, but don’t be afraid to stretch yourself.