Topic 3 External communication
Implementing Circular Economy is all about creating new systems and cooperations. This can bring extra effort and become time-consuming. Nevertheless, building relationships and networking with other SMEs or partners are key points to draw energy from. One major key point will be to explain what you can bring to potential partners and to the society in implementing circular tourism practices. You will need to be clear how you articulate your arguments to be convicing. You will have to improve your arguments, remember how you have convinced or not people of your entity.
To develop a useful network to achieve your objectives, you need to:
- Communicate on the vision of your entity and its actions;
- Be open-minded about the suggestions of your network and be ready to adapt if this make sense with your project.
Indeed, the more the vision and related objectives are defined and shared, the more people can imagine what it could bring to them and the more you will receive feedbacks and potential opportunities.
The biggest risks are to invest too much time or resources in comparison to the benefits achieved or to divert it from the core objective you had.
Let’s have a look on the Communication Mix. McCarthy (1998) determined the mix of marketing communications as a specific combination of elements: advertising, personal selling, sales promotion, public relations and direct marketing that companies use to implement their targets for advertising and marketing. All communication activities must be well prepared and conducted in good order through comprehensive management.
Here the Communication Mix elements/activities are explained briefly:
-Advertising: “is the dissemination of information privately through paid media where the source is a sponsoring organization.” Advertising is important to the business as a whole because it enables the business to attract more customers, thus boosting business recovery.
-Personal Selling: It is is defined by William J. Stanton as «a promotional method in which one party (e.g., salesperson) uses skills and techniques for building personal relationships with another party (e.g., those involved in a purchase decision) that results in both parties obtaining value.»
-Sales Promotions: It includes “marketing activities adding value to products for a limited period of time in order to stimulate consumer purchases and effectiveness of intermediaries.”
-Public relations: “are an interactive system using one or more communication devices for notice measurable effects. They are relevant to all activities in the organization and cover all communications. PR are not focus on the product, they are focused on the whole company.”
-Direct Marketing: “Traditionally, direct marketing is not considered as part of the promotional mix, but it has become an integral part of the integrated marketing communications of many organizations and often includes separate targets, budgets, strategies.”
Be consistent!
We have more and more communication channels. The objective of this module is not to explain how to communicate with the numerous media available, but to be aware that you have to communicate in compliance with your vision and your actions whathever is your communication channels (Webpage, Facebook, Instagram, leaflets, oral presentations, etc.).
General Communication tips
When addressing your team, your stakeholders, your customers:
- Provide time for people to ask questions and provide input; people must feel involved about the changes;
- Be clear about the purpose of the change through clarifying the context and the needs
- Clearly communicate the vision, the mission and values;
- Help people understand how the changes will affect them personally;
- Recognize and embrace positive approaches, no matter how small or big the accomplishment is;
- Communicate your progress, success and failures. Show what you concretely do, and the benefits you bring to your clients. Introduce the community you identify with, and the society that you envision.