How do you evidence the effectiveness?

The evidence cited here (posters, leaflets, etc.) provides evidence that you are producing marketing materials, but doesn't demonstrate that they are effective.  To do that, you need instead to show some analysis of your marketing methods (numbers of attendees to events, hits on website, enquiries, etc.)

Why the contribution is important

There are ever increasing ways of communicating and marketing (once you start with social media alone, where do you stop...? blogs, facebook, twitter, flickr, are just for starters).  It might look impressive to be able to show evidence that you tweet and blog, as well as producing newsletters, leaflets, posters, press releases etc.  But it would be much more impressive to show that:

  • you've analysed the most appropriate communication methods for different  types of communication
  • you've written things in different styles to appeal to different audiences
  • you've tested or got feedback on your communications and improved them as a result if necessary
  • you've analysed their effectiveness in doing what you wanted them to do (e.g. raise your profile with certain stakeholders or bring in people to an event)

Problem is that some of this may not be documented at the moment - so this may well result in a lot of work for people.

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Posted by TimG February 28, 2012 at 14:18
Although one cannot argue with what SChubb has said, the problem is the amount of time that it takes to undertake such analysis, on top of the time spent doing the communicating in a variety of media. In the current climate of reducing staff levels how much of this is really feasible. Could the degree of analysis determine whether one is at level one or level two ?

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Posted by pbirch February 28, 2012 at 21:04
I know we think long and hard before venturing into trying to communicate through different media - our communications department make it very difficult for us to use any form of media - 3 page risk assessment to set up a Twitter account! This means that if we do try something new we definitely review effectiveness before we decide whether to continue or repeat it so I'm not sure it would make that much more work. However I think the assessment needs to realise that some measures of promotion will be short lived just because we cannot justify the work involved in using them.

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Posted by mhaunton February 29, 2012 at 12:27
Assuming as pbirch says that there is a degree of preparatory work before most such initiatives (whether it's a full communications plan or a much shorter document), could that be submitted as evidence of planning?

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Posted by cwilliams1 February 29, 2012 at 12:34
It's important not to see any of these requirements in isolation. How an archive communicates to its users should be a natural byproduct of '3.1.3 The archive service devises plans to broaden its range of users', for example. So where there are issues of the potential challenge of extra work, it might be helpful to think about how archives can meet several requirements through single or grouped activities. I agree that the most important thing is not the mechanism for communication but its use and effectiveness; and I also agree that the potential scope of communications and marketing is enormous and similarly, the potential resource challenge. So in achieving the standard, archives might at least be required to demonstrate that they have considered how to make the best of their own situation and have thought about what works to improve 'archive awareness' whether through initiatives of their own design or by benefitting from collaboration within or outside of their parent body.

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Posted by hmcintosh March 01, 2012 at 15:52
'Effective' communication surely relies on the communication being a two-way process as well? It's not just a case of pushing lots of messages out there that nobody listens to.

Maybe some of the evidence for this section could come through work or consultation with a Friends group, for example, or feedback through other means (although I know that user feedback is addressed elsewhere in the Standard).

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