Noncommunicable Disease Alliance – Geneva
Challenge: Build awareness of the causes and consequences of NCDs and potential solutions, and deepen the engagement of advocates through more accessible content
Audience Growth
- Monthly Content Reviews identifying top-performing content on the site, Social and Search, plus discussion of new engagement tactics to test.
- Short-form social videos highlighting positive stories on NCDs and audience-first packaging tactics, including a focus on the first frame, large captions, and tightly edited scripts to maintain viewer interest.
- Sharper visuals and text to make social posts that pop, site content easier to read, and the use of ‘hooks’ to place audience interests at the heart of decision-making.
Newsletter optimisation: Increased attention to subject lines and blurbs, retarget non-openers.
Skills Coaching
- Intensive coaching for the team on Writing for Online.
- Individual coaching on Social Posting, Social Video Creation, and Newsletter Optimisation.
Results 2021-2022
- 22% rise in Website Traffic, with views of specialist content doubling
- Social followers climbed more than 50%
- Video views up more than 10-fold
- The newsletter opening rate rose by 28%
Jimena Marquez Donaher
Director of Communications, Noncommunicable Disease Alliance
I appreciated immensely his advice on implementing audience-first approaches, creating social video formats that attracted bigger audiences, and his coaching sessions on writing for digital across social posts, news pieces, and newsletter production.
Reliance Foundation – Mumbai
Challenge: Tell the story of Reliance Foundation projects for a broader audience and create a new site that will attract development professionals
Strategic Review
Audience Analysis: Employees, Development Professionals, Curious Public
Unfulfilled Needs: Explanatory content, Curation of positive case studies
Engagement gaps: User-focused website, content volume, smart visual storytelling, SEO
Audience Growth
- High-level specifications for a new website, potential developers reviewed, and Runcible acted as a ‘thought partner’ as the new site was developed
- Monthly Content Reviews to analyse performance on Search and Social and sharpen focus on the quality of ideas, packaging (especially engagement hooks) and the efficiency of workflows
- Digital campaign ideas supplied for promoting a series of e-books and one-off publications and events
Skills Coaching
- Team-wide training on Writing for Online, Highly Visual Content, and Search Engine Optimisation
- Coaching for leadership team on creating an Ideas Engine, and Blog Workflow
UN Global Compact – New York
Challenge: Create a digital content strategy to support the 2021-2025 UNGC Strategy
Agreed on the key questions:
How is the role of communications evolving at UNGC?
Where does the UNGC stand in 2020 in terms of communications impact?
How does UNGC perform in communications compared to similar organisations?
What are the key audiences?
What strategic shifts are required of the communications function?
What are the strategic issues to consider?
What key initiatives and projects will be needed to get the ball rolling in 2021?
What do the shifts imply for current communications activities?
What investment in communications will be required?
What KPIs would be appropriate?
Scrutinised the state of play
- Interviews with all board members and key stakeholders
- Analysed existing website, content, and social programming for effectiveness
- Established best practices amongst peers and leading purpose-driven organisations
Presentation of Digital Communications strategy
- SWOT Analysis
- Prioritisation of opportunities
- Creation of a 10-point implementation plan
Dan Thomas
Chief Communications Officer, UN Global Compact
Mark was quick to understand the challenges we faced and see the opportunities too. He did an excellent job at eliciting and synthesizing the views of leadership and senior stakeholders, identifying areas likely to have the biggest impact, and then stitching it all together into a clear, coherent, actionable communication strategy.
International Labour Organisation – Turin
Challenge: Tell us how to improve our digital media campaigns to eliminate child labour
Strategic Review
360-degree consultation with key stakeholders: What worked, what needs improving?
- Detailed interviews with campaign sponsors
- Discussions with key staff
- Survey of delegates and email subscribers
Assessed adherence to industry standards
- Identification of the key elements of successful advocacy campaigns
- ISO standards for project management
- Was there a unifying ‘Theory of Change’?
- Campaign results versus industry benchmarks
- Analysis of costs of campaign elements against engagement levels they achieved
Analysed ‘best practices’ across all content strands:
- Website effectiveness
- Site content, newsletters, social posts, video
- Media Relations
- Live streaming
- Promotion: Use of influencers, paid promotion, use of ILO and other networks
Recommended 16 changes for future campaigns
Tom Wambeke
Chief Training Officer, ITCILO
Excellent collaboration with Mark Jones, based upon his extensive experience in the communication field. Strategic and concrete at the same time and fully adapted to the digital media channels of the 21th Century.