Introduction
If you search for “how to do communications audit for nonprofits” or “communications audit example” you’ll find a ton of results, including:
📌Step-by-step guides for communications audit
📌Communication audit services
📌Best practices for communications audits
📌Communication audit tips, tricks and checklists
While all of these resources are useful, they can be overwhelming to understand all at once, especially if you’re short on time. Furthermore, none of it will tell you how an individual communications professional will make decisions about your communications. And that is where the value lies with each professional; it tells you what you’re paying for.
In this blog post, I want to show you what you pay for if you work with me. Here is a behind-the-scenes/under-the-hood look into how I conduct a communications audit using a real example of a project I did previously with a client.
Step 1: Discovery meeting
Family Service Toronto (FST) reached out to me in 2023 and we met shortly thereafter to meet and discuss their needs. I wanted to better understand their requests for my services as well as confirm that the services they chose are the most appropriate ones. Sometimes, different needs emerge during these conversations. So, it’s important to clarify the needs, challenges and desired outcomes as much as possible before doing any work.
Breakdown
Best practice: Listen more than talk.
Reason: Helps me understand the client’s needs, context and possible directions for the communications audit, including what will be audited and what won’t be.
Luckily, Family Service Toronto already knew that they needed a communications audit and why, so I did not need to probe about that. However, I wanted to know a bit more about how this communications audit would serve their business, connect to larger goals, ideas and current efforts, for example. So I asked some questions to key staff members.
Note: I’m not there to give anyone generic advice or typical speaking points or surefire plans of action. I’m there to understand.
Sample questions
- 🚦What specific goals or outcomes would you like to achieve by X date?
- 🚦What kind of progress toward those goals would you be happy with?
- 🚦What marketing efforts or assets worked for you and which ones didn’t?
- 🚦What’s getting in your way?
We had several clarifying meetings after that and ended this step with actions items to complete.
Step 2: Examine communications
The Family Service Toronto team sent me external communications samples that I requested. While I did not get everything I wanted, I was still able to work with what I had, particularly because I also had some analytics to examine. I’m all about working within the capacity of the organization because that yields true results and a better working experience.
In return, I sent them an outline of each step of this process so that they knew exactly what I was looking for in the samples they provided. Contrary to popular belief, there are several different kinds of audits. Some have more intense focuses than others. With this project, I was specifically looking at:
- Channel audits
- Content and messaging audits
- Editorial style audits
- Strategic objectives audits
- Patterns and practices audits
Breakdown
Best practice: Attach questions to each category/criterion of the communications audit
Reason: Personally, I find that this practice makes it easier for clients to understand the results of my work. For example, for the “Content and messaging” category, I associated it with the following questions:
Sample questions
- 🔎What topics is FST discussing externally?
- 🔎What are the calls to action?
- 🔎Is the content appropriate for target audiences?
Note: This assessment was specific to Family Service Toronto; it will always change depending on the needs of the client.
Step 3: Gather insights
You might be wondering why this step is third and not second. The answer is timing. Like many nonprofit organizations, Family Service Toronto employees are pulled in several directions and have several priorities to balance and attend to. As a result, everyone who needed to be involved in the process couldn’t be at the scheduled time. So, we made it work.
Originally, I was going to conduct surveys with select employees for both internal and external communications. However, that did not work out for several reasons. What I learned from that experience is that I needed to narrow down the number of select employees to gather insight from. The reason was two-fold: Firstly, everyone could not provide insight because some were largely removed from the process of communications; secondly, those select employees consumed FST content at differing levels and not everyone was available.
To adjust, we (myself and FST) decided on doing small, interactive online focus groups (This is where my facilitation background kicked into high gear!). I used Miro to facilitate the focus groups.
Breakdown
Best practice Design the experiences that you want your clients to have
Reason: It’s more fun! None of this has to be boring, repetitive or unengaging. There are some really cool tools out there that can facilitate the questions you want to ask, so go for it!
Sample questions
- 🤔What information do you wish you had more of? Less of?
- 🤔What is a recent example of internal communications that worked really well? Failed?
- 🤔How well do you think the mission, vision and values are reflected in your organization’s online presence?
- 🤔In your opinion, what should Family Service Toronto gain from using social media?
- 🤔Out of all the channels you use to communicate externally, which one do you think is best at reaching the right people?
- 🤔What kind of content would you like to see more of online from Family Service Toronto and why?
Note: I did not always ask these questions verbatim; sometimes, I remixed them depending on how the conversation was going. For example, I adjusted questions about the communications audit when the conversation was more lively and when it was less than.
Step 4: Writing the Report
I took everything I learned about FST’s internal and external communications and created two reports for each. I also created a mini-implementation report that I framed in such a way that action items, the order of next steps and exact challenges being addressed was extremely clear. Additionally, I aligned the next steps and recommendations with the project objectives to further explain why I made the recommendations that I did.
Breakdown
Best practice: Create a schedule of recommendations and frame them in terms of “how to implement” and “how to get started” (i.e., instructions).
Reason: Instructions are more encouraging and less overwhelming than a bunch of next steps. I find that clients can visualize exactly what needs to be done and what works best within their current capacity.
Sample: Visual content library
How to implement:
Use this library anytime that an FST staff member has an idea about graphic design elements for any content
How to get started:
- Create folder with department name
- Create folders within that folder that organize:
- Past and present poster/flyer images
- Any images that could work for future content
- Templates for all types of content
- Previously used text for promotional content
- Drop files into the appropriate folders
Step 5: Presenting the reports
Finally, I presented the reports to the FST team. I created a few formats for these reports:
- The actual reports
- One-pagers (At the request of FST)
- Audio-recorded presentations with PowerPoint slides
While the multiple formats was not necessary, it made sense given the circumstances of FST and the team. For example, some team members may not have time to read the reports immediately. Instead, mini-versions of the reports would be helpful. The same goes for audio-recordings. I also provided opportunities for the FST team to chat with me about any questions, comments or concerns they had about the report. Ultimately, My job is to ensure that my clients completely understand the work that was done and are clear on next steps.
Over to you
With this blog post, I have taken you through the process of a communications audit from start to finish. I hope that this example of a communications audit helps you better understand what my process is when I work with clients. From the discovery meeting to the presentation of the report, I am dedicated to ensuring that my clients clearly understand each step, decision, idea and question. My job is to help you not just acquire a service but to gain a better understanding of your capacity and how you can leverage it to meet your goals. I hope this post makes that feel more attainable to you.