pigeonBuild a communications strategy

The use of Social Media within the Voluntary and Community Sector is just beginning.  For many organisations and people this is a worrying time with a real concern that organisations will lose control of their identity.

There is a danger that organisations, or individuals within organisations leap in without any planning and that the entry into social media is disjointed and fails.

readUp to 16 million adults - nearly half the workforce - are holding down jobs despite having the reading and writing skills expected of children leaving primary school.

The above sentence needs the reading ability of an undergraduate. That is the problem. People have spent years at school being told that good writing has big words.

The aim of writing is communication. Communication fails if it is not understood.

Here are some simple guidelines for accessible writing.

ShakespeareWhen you have a CMS (Content Management System) website then you have the power and the opportunity to create your own content. However, with great power comes great responsibility, (I heard that somewhere). Before you start to create your content you should consider the following points.

Who are you talking to?

There is a tendency for organisations to talk to themselves. Sentences start with ‘Our objectives are...'; ‘We have our ethical...'

Do you work with blind and partially sighted people?

Image of flier for free learning days (click to download)Do you want to welcome blind and partially-sighted people into your organisation?

Many people who carry mobile phones, MP3 Players, Ipods etc. use Itunes to help manage their music and podcasts.

Now I am not a great music fan, my phone has a the Beatles album Sgt Pepper, some Beautiful South and a few other songs.  But it does have around 50 podcasts ranging from History of Ireland, Friday night comedy from radio 4, Beekeeping and then some random stuff.

You can now publish podcasts to Itunes direct from your IPADIO account.