Proper Cards Strategic Communications Plan

Proper Cards Strategic Communications Plan 1
Proper Cards
Strategic Communications Plan
February 1, 2015
John Lee
National University

INTRODUCTORY MEMO
This strategic communications plan outlines the objectives, methods, and timeline for the initial
launch of the Proper Cards website. Please review all information detailed herein and contact me
should you have any questions or concerns. We greatly appreciate any feedback you would like to
offer, please feel free to contact us at any time.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Proper Cards is a specialty invitation card company that was founded in 2014. The product line
focuses on offering customizable formal wedding and event invitations. These invitations are set
apart from the rest by the use of only premium cardstocks and a simple yet elegant design, all at a
very reasonable price.
The primary target audience are couples looking to purchase invitations within the next 12 months.
A plausible secondary target audience would be wedding and event planners that may utilize
Proper Cards for bulk or wholesale services. The message that Proper Cards will be attempting to
transmit will be the company slogan, “A Proper Card at a Proper Price.” The primary media in
which we will attempt this through will be the most popular forms of social media, specifically
Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. As the website has yet to launch, the measures to determine
success will initially be quite conservative. A determination of success will be heavily determined
by an increase in web traffic flow and sales by at least 10% every subsequent month for the initial
twelve months.

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Company Background 4
Situation Analysis 4
Opportunity Statement 6
Goal Statement 6
Objectives 6
Key Publics 7
Messages 7
Strategies and Tactics 8
Evaluation Criteria 12
Conclusions and Recommendations 12
References 14
Appendix A 15

COMPANY BACKGROUND
Proper Cards was developed after the founder of the company became engaged to be married and
found that most online invitations companies offered poor quality, limited customization, or
overpriced options. This prompted the crafting of a new kind of invitation. Invitations that were
sufficiently formal with a touch of elegance, yet maintained a balance with affordability.
One of the greatest challenges with a new company and/or website is the manufacturing of
significant exposure in order to increase traffic flow and sales. As the website has yet to be
launched, it’s difficult to gauge an ideal amount of business transactions per month. However, a
good indicator of early financial success would be self-sustenance.
Mission Statement
While many other card companies offer low quality products at premium prices, Proper Cards
vows to provide a proper card at a proper price. In fact, the Proper Cards official slogan will be,
“A Proper card at a Proper price.”
SITUATION ANALYSIS
Proper Cards is looking to maximize the benefits of communications strategies while utilizing a
minimal budget. In order to maximize the potential of any marketing efforts, research was done to
find the most effective ways of reaching the target audience.

The primary forms of marketing efforts considered were social media, online advertisements, and
word of mouth. It was concluded that word of mouth had the strongest influence on our target
customers. However, that brought about a unique obstacle in that a new company cannot utilize
word of mouth advertising to gain a wave of initial buyers. That led to the utilization of the second
tier option of social media. This was due to the way the way that social media can sometime behave
in ways that are similar to word of mouth advertising.
SWOT Analysis
Strengths Weaknesses
Fair pricing
High quality intricate product
Unique, customizableproduct
Small business requires less inventory
New Company
Lack of Exposure
Small order processing capability
Opportunities Threats
Customers aremore open to spending
for formal events, which would be the
primary focus of Proper Cards.
Direct competitors
Printing services
Home crafters
Small business budget

OPPORTUNITY STATEMENT
As Proper Cards is a small business with minimal startup funding, a well thought out strategic
communication plan is necessary to make the best use of all funds available.
GOAL STATEMENT
The vision statement would be to establish a loyal base of customers that turn to Proper Cards for
all their invitation needs again and again.
OBJECTIVES
 Utilize social media and internet advertising in order to increase exposure and traffic to
website.
 A three month long concentrated push of advertising should double website traffic flow
while campaigns are active on social media individual accounts, social media
advertisements, and search engine advertising.
 After three month external advertising push, focus will shift to increasing repeat
customers by offering coupons for next purchase.
 At the six month phase, introduce loyalty rewards program.
 A month to month increase in sales by at least 10%. This should be easily achievable in
the first 12 months as Proper Cards will be starting at zero.

 Operations and marketing budget to expand in line with increase in sales based off of
quarterly sales results (as to not under or over react to any fluctuations or outlying sales
data).
KEY PUBLICS
The key public of Proper Cards is individuals and/or couple looking to purchase wedding or other
invitations online.
 Men or women may be tasked with purchasing invitation for large formal gatherings. All
age demographic above 18 are considered valid here.
 Individuals/Couples who must purchase invitations for a wedding or other formal occasion.
 As Proper Cards is a new company, all customer would currently be first time customers.
 Customers would need to be swayed away from pricier larger companies as well as printing
invitation at home.
 These customers should enable Proper Cards to build a loyal base of repeat customers that
will also refer friends and family.
MESSAGES
Primary Messages
 A proper card at a proper price. An invitation that offer quality and elegance within a price
package made for you.

 Invitations you’ll want to keep forever at a price you’ll never forget.
 Great option for couples who know what they want but don’t want to overspend to get a
customized product.
Secondary Messages
 Formal Invitations for under $4.00 per piece
 Volume Discounts
 High quality cardstocks all above 100 lb. weight
 Customizable text
 Customizable color combinations
 Customizable paper textures and weights
 Multiple choices of wax stamps and colors
 Designs that are elegant yet simple
 Samples may be created and viewed in person before certain volume orders are placed
STRATEGIES AND TACTICS
Primary Key Public Strategy
The Primary Key Public for the Proper Cards brand will in fact be couples looking to throw a
wedding within a 12 month timeframe. Utilizing previously completed in house research (See
Appendix A) it was discovered that many couples valued word of mouth recommendations more
than any other form of advertising. However, this poses a dilemma for Proper Cards as the website

has yet to even be activated. This has led to the use of a tiered strategy of offering deep discounts
through social media for approximately one month and then offering this initial wave of purchasers
a future discount for continued loyalty and/or recommendation to friends and family.
While not cutting straight to the intended form of communication, the tiered strategy appears to be
the most accelerated approach to gaining some initial website traffic and then utilizing The Theory
of the Diffusion of Innovation (Wilson & Ogden, 2010) to create a sense of the community that
will lead to the desired word of mouth advertising.
Primary Key Public Channels
 Facebook
 Instagram
 Twitter
The decision to use these three forms of social media was based primarily based upon the fact that
accounts could be easily created for all three at relatively no up front cost. The three media
platforms are also currently have largest number of user worldwide (Duggan et al. 2015). Facebook
does allow the option to purchase advertising on the website, however that is currently not
something that is being considered due to the large upfront costs. All three forms of social media
allow for the spread of images and recommendations to millions of people with a simple hashtag
and description. There is hope someday, #ProperCards will be trending on all three social media
platforms.

Primary Key Public Secondary Channels
 Pinterest
 Linked In
These secondary channels may be used should the need for additional exposure feel necessary.
While Pinterest and Linked In both have plenty of users (Duggan et al. 2015), the purpose of these
websites are not as agreeable as the primary channels previously mentioned.
Primary Key Public Tactics
 Accounts will be created on each social media platform
 Company information and relevant picture will be posted to all accounts
 Periodic sales offers will be posted on each site and differing times with differing discount
codes that lead generation can be tracked for future use.
 Once purchases are made, loyalty incentives will be introduced in order to promote word
of mouth advertising.
Secondary Key Public Strategy
The Secondary Key Public for the Proper Cards brand is for Event Planners. In addition to wedding
invitations, Proper Cards also plans to offer invitation services for formal gatherings of all kinds.
This will be the motivation to make a push towards individuals that solely plan events full time as
well as those that might do so occasionally as a secondary role in a company.

This secondary key public strategy will implement a discounted rate for charitable organizations
(services for smaller events thrown by charitable organizations may be offered in sponsorship) or
large events.
Secondary Key Public Channels
 Open to all charitable organizations
When a charitable organization throw fundraising or public awareness event, Proper Cards would
like to deliver the invitations. The desired outcome of offering services to this Key Public to
establish a hands on experience with the Proper Card product that will spread quickly due to the
size of events and the charitable support that Proper Cards is offering.
Secondary Key Public Secondary Channels
 Large Event Planners
This secondary channel would be also utilized be offered deep discounts in exchange for the
exposure that such large events might create for Proper Cards. Large events would need to be
quantified in terms of number of attendees and frequency of services required.
Secondary Key Public Tactics
 Contacting local charitable organizations
 Offering sponsorship of organization in the forms of inviting guests to formal occasions or
events

 All cards would be produced with clear and distinguishable logos directing interested
parties to go to http://www.propercards.com
 Desired outcome is an association of charitable work being established with the Proper
Cards brand.
 This will lead to increased purchases of Proper Cards products.
EVALUATION CRITERIA
 Was social media and internet advertising optimally utilized in order to increase exposure
and traffic to website?
 Did any concentrated push of social media activity and advertising increase website
traffic flow or sales?
 How effective was the shift in focus to increasing repeat customers?
 How did the loyalty rewards program affect repeat customers?
 Were month to month sales increased by at least 10% every month?
 Was the quarterly operations and marketing budget able to stay in line with all increases
(or decreases) in sales?
CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
This strategic communications plan is only the first step of many in fulfilling the potential of the
Proper Cards brand. If all plan objectives were satisfied, this plan should be considered a success

and new plan should include considerations for expansion and streamlined processes. If any
objectives were not completed, the objective should be re-evaluated to see if it was unreasonable
or what changes must be made in the future so that the objective can be satisfied in the future.

References
Wilson, L.J., & Ogden, J.D. (2008). Strategic Communications Planning: For Effective Public
Relations and Marketing. Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt Publishing Company.
Duggan, M., Ellison, N., Lampe, C., Lenhart, A., & Madden, M. (2015, January 9). Social Media
Update 2014. Pew Research Internet Project. Retrieved from:
http://www.pewinternet.org/2015/01/09/social-media-update-2014/

Appendix A: Internal Survey Results
1. How do you feel towards learning about a new product through online advertisements
that appear on the sides of search engines and websites?
 Strong Dislike (3)
 Dislike (4)
 Neutral (3)
 Prefer (0)
 Strongly Prefer (0)
2. How do you feel towards learning about a new product through social media?
 Dislike (1)
 Neutral (5)
 Prefer (1)
3. How do you feel towards learning about a new product through the verbal
recommendation of others that have used the product?
 Dislike (0)
 Neutral (1)
 Prefer (5)
4. When making a large purchase, do you lean towards simplicity or increased selection?
 Greater Simplicity (3)

 Some Simplicity (1)
 Neutral (2)
 Some Selection (3)
 Greater Selection (1)
5. What is the greatest amount of money you have ever spent on a card or invitation?
 $0.00 - $1.99 (1)
 $2.00 - $3.99 (5)
 $4.00 - $5.99 (2)
 $6.00 – 7.99 (2)
 $8.00 + (0)
6. After your first order with a company which of the following would most entice you to
reorder?
 Receiving points for every dollar spent on previous purchases that may be
redeemed for merchandise (0)
 Receiving a discount coupon for a future purchase (8)
 Receiving free small promotional items (i.e. a pen or keychain) (2)

Proper Cards Strategic Communications Plan

Recomendados

Recomendados

Mais conteúdo relacionado

Mais procurados

Mais procurados (18)

Semelhante a Proper Cards Strategic Communications Plan

Semelhante a Proper Cards Strategic Communications Plan (20)

Proper Cards Strategic Communications Plan