Research in communication projects

I came across this useful table from the Devcom blog which explains how research can be used at different stages of communication projects. There are many elements that will be familiar to readers, but what caught my eye was the first method “audience analysis” – which is often ignored by communicators in their rush to create materials and campaigns. The blog also has an example of an audience analysis (pdf) for readers. And method 3 – pretesting of prototype material – is another step often skipped over.

Read the full post here >>

Method	Purpose
1. Audience analysis	To characterize audience (demographics, communication environment) to develop content of materials, set campaign targets
2. Baseline survey	To assess knowledge, beliefs and behavior – to document current scenario
3. Pretesting of prototype materials	To determine appeal, understandability of materials (radio drama, campaign materials)
4. Management monitoring survey	To track implementation plans and make adjustments as needed
5. Content analysis	To analyze the content of audience feedback
6. Post-test survey	To determine whether the project has achieved its objectives

Evaluation and communications for development

If, like me, you are interested in how communications can support development programmes – and consequently how it can be evaluated – then you might want to check out the evaluation page of the Communication Initiative Network website – where you can find 100s of evaluation studies and reports on communication for development – ranging from reproductive health to tobacco control to conflict. View the range of subjects here>>

Open source movement measuring social media

I’ve written previously about measuring social media  – now here is an interesting initiative – an open source movement measuring social media. They have a useful resources page and what we are trying to measure page. It’s also great that it’s an open source initiative as there are companies promoting proprietary solutions that claim to measure social media  – but aren’t willing to share the methodology of how they do so.

Glenn

Evaluating Public Information and Advocacy Campaigns

Last week, I was at the European Evaluation Society Biennial Conference in Lisbon, Portugal and presented a paper on “Evaluating public information and advocacy campaigns”.

Here is a summary of the paper:

Increasingly non-governmental organisations and international organisations use public information and advocacy campaigns to support their goals. Existing methodologies are rarely applied to evaluate campaigns. However, meaningful evaluation of campaigns is possible by taking into account the specific nature of campaigns while meeting minimum requirements of evaluation. This paper discusses “lessons learnt” in evaluating campaigns and particular challenges faced in assessing international campaigns. Although a standard methodology is yet to emerge, this paper describes the desired outcomes that many campaigns share and the appropriate evaluation methods that have been successfully used.

Read the full paper here (pdf)>>

Glenn

Blog on event evaluation

This is the first blog I’ve seen that focuses 100% on event evaluation: Constellation Communication blog. Many interesting posts on event evaluation and ROI for events.

Similar to what I do with an “event scorecard”, here is an interesting post with visuals on how to represent event evaluation – the ROI measures are particularly useful.

View the blog here >>

Glenn