International Non-Profit Organisation: UNICEF - Essay Example

International Non-Profit Organisation: UNICEF INTRODUCTION Marketing communications is important for both profit organisations as well as non-profits organisations. Non- profit organisations need to develop their niche market and create awareness about their organisation accordingly. Non profit organisations do not usually sell products rather they are in the field of selling their programmes and idea, their strategies for working for a noble cause. They are working upon selling the mission of their organisation. They work upon creating awareness in the community for supporting the underprivileged people via different events and strategies. This paper discusses about the importance of marketing communications for UNICEF and also evaluates the marketing communications strategy and tools used by UNICEF for achieving their goals and objectives. UNICEF UNICEF is an international non-profit organisation; the full form of UNICEF is United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund. UNICEF is an organisation that works upon ensuring that the rights of children are realised by the world. They have the authority to affect the decisions taken by other international bodies. The main focus areas of UNICEF are working towards child survival and development, providing basic education to both genders on equal basis, working on the areas of aids and children, working towards protection of children, and policy advocacy and partnerships (UNICEF, 2012). IMPORTANCE FOR MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS FOR UNICEF Marketing Communications is important for UNICEF as it needs to have a strong image of its organisation in the community. It is working for the welfare of children all around the globe and hence it needs to ensure that its presence is known by the people all over the globe. UNICEF’s identity should be visible and it should reflect credibility of its operations via its marketing strategies. Marketing in such a way will allow UNICEF to gain support from majority of the individuals and communities. To plan future activities, the non profit organisation needs to remain financially stable so that accordingly the international events can be conducted. Non profit organisation may not succeed in its mission if it does not create awareness about its services (Heney, 2001). Even if UNICEF is providing excellent services for children, but if it does not create proper awareness, all its plans would be unsuccessful. The target audience need to know the plans and activities of how UNICEF will proceed with its activities. They need to know the resources and the people conducting the activities, the success rate so far achieved by the organisation and its future plans as well need to be known by the target audience. UNICEF needs to have associations with other groups and businesses and it needs to constantly work upon maintaining their marketing activities so that the awareness of UNICEF activities is constantly noticed by everyone. Marketing communications allows UNICEF to have an understanding with the community and also make them understand the importance of helping needy children worldwide. Children are a very important element of the society, and the society would be willing enough to assist organisations that are helping the needy children in the community. Proper communication also promotes change in an effective way. The organisational level goals and objectives are achieved by UNICEF by communicating their intended message in an effective way to their target audience and generate cooperation and coordination by the target audience. The message should be designed in a clear and simple language. No technical jargons should be used so that masses can understand the message. Target audience of UNICEF The target of audience of UNICEF is the various other NGO’s operating for the welfare of children, the social enterprises operating in the country, the communities and organisations working for children’s cause, the businesses involved in corporate social responsibility and other such groups. The student bodies in universities and colleges are also one of the most important target audiences for UNICEF. The student bodies consist of young minds and dynamic personality individuals who would strive towards bringing a positive change in the society. Such student groups should be targeted by UNICEF for generating creative ideas for their firm. UNICEF at times targets the public and legal bodies that are required for implementing certain marketing strategies. Marketing Communications Objectives All plans need to have certain aims and objectives so that accordingly the ultimate goal of the plan can be attained. The suggested marketing communication objectives for UNICEF are as follows: To promote the projects being done by UNICEF at a global level To increase the number of donation retrieval via marketing activities that convince the target audience about the reliability and credibility of UNICEF programmes To promote charity related events in a positive manner so that the target audience trust such services and assist them To have associations with other non profit organisations that are working for children specifically or that are general charity organisations. To make their email campaigns attractive so that the email is forwarded by the viewer to all others on the contact list and also reply to queries promptly. To develop partnership with more firms in various regions of the globe so that the organisation remains financially stable for conducting future marketing activities successfully. In our environment when we observe the people in our lives daily and communicate with them on different aspects we can come to the conclusion that majority of them are supportive of the work of non profit organisations. The cause for which the organisations are working is a very noble cause and individuals and communities regard such services as a need of the underprivileged people. Non profit organisations such as UNICEF need to have effective strategies of communication with the target audience so that they can build a good reputation about their firm and also generate funds in huge amounts (Reinold and Tropp, 2010) Non profit organisations need to start creating awareness firstly from their community, if for instance, the local community is unaware of the work being done by the non profit organisations; then it is difficult for the non profit organisation to generate funds (Chain, 2008). The impact of this would be that non profit organisation would not be able to show that they are being supported by the local community and hence the organisations that are running privately may not award any grants to the non profit organisation as they are not even able to generate funds from the local community. The different foundations review the grant proposals for evaluating the ways in which the non profit organisation is communicating their message to the target audience. If any loop hole detected in the marketing message then these organisation are not that willing to help the non profit firms due to poor communication of their mission to the target audience at large. Hence communicating via the right marketing tool is important for UNICEF. MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS STRATEGY AND TOOLS FOR UNICEF Non profit organisations are thought of as firms working towards a noble cause for the community. It has the potential to have strong friendly relationships with its target audience that can last for a very long time. Non profit organisations can affect the minds of the community as well as their hearts by promoting the message of charity and assistance in the right manner (Keller, 2009). There are many children around the world that need help and UNICEF can promote this message by using the marketing communication tools and strategies. The marketing communication tools will assist them in successful accomplishment of their goals and objectives. The most appropriate marketing communication strategy and tools for UNICEF can be as follows: Website Websites are mostly an important requirement for all organisation, be it they profit or non profit organisations. Customers look for organisation websites to learn more about their products and services and hence this strategy is a useful strategy to communicate the message to the target customers. The website strategy helps UNICEF in receiving more donors for their firm, the cost of paper is reduced by using websites, the mission statement of UNICEF is shared with the stakeholders as well as the customers, the website has the potential to act as a ambassador for the community, and lastly website of UNICEF allows customers to remain up to date with the latest happenings. Post event information is uploaded on the website along with videos for the target audience to review the happenings. Email Campaigns Email is one of the most viable and important tools of communication in the digital era that we all are residing in. Emails allow the message to be transferred in seconds and it is a convenient way of building valuable relationships with the customers (Rowley, 2010). Email can act as a relationship building tool for UNICEF and such non profit organisations need to work on building strong relationships with their customers to achieve their goals and objectives. The target audience of UNICEF can remain up to date through the email campaigns. UNICEF needs to control the frequency of emails as bombarding emails daily would not be a good option. The audience would lose interest if emails are being bombarded intensively. Once a week would be good enough for letting the customers know about the latest happenings in UNICEF. The email content should be relevant and should be personalised as well so that the interest of the target audience is retained. Such types of email campaigns can allow UNICEF to promote their message to all target areas in a consistent manner. UNICEF UK has regular campaign updates of which the details can be received via email. They also send the monthly newsletters via email for whoever wants to remain updates about the key events of UNICEF. The individuals who want to receive the campaign updates need to sign in the website via their email account (UNICEF United Kingdom, 2012). Alliances UNICEF can use the alliances marketing communication tool as well as this tool will allow it to build upon its image. In this strategy, the non profit organisation can form alliances or alignments with other organisations as this would allow them to gain a large critical mass for their firm. UNICEF can form alliances with other strong influencing organisations in the community and this would enhance UNICEF’s image in the community. Building contacts through contacts that are strong and are stable would allow UNICEF to achieve their goals and also increase their customer base. They may be able to retrieve huge amount of funds as well for their organisation. UNICEF has alliances with the international airline industry titled as Change for Good. With this partnership, UNICEF has gained around $111million and with this fund they have helped children towards betterment (UNICEF United States Fund, 2012). Check out for Children is another corporate partnership of UNICEF with Starwood Hotels and Resorts. In this alliance, the guests at the hotel are requested to donate $1 with their checkouts and this donation goes to UNICEF funds. This strategic initiative with the hotel is present in European countries, as well as Asia-Pacific and Middle East (UNICEF, 2012). Events Non profit organisations need to constantly conduct fundraising events so that they are able to gain funds for their organisation. These funds are used in facilitating the services of the organisation. As in the case of UNICEF, they need to conduct fundraising events in universities or amusement parks where there are going to be many customers. This way the team can enjoy their promotion events and also earn huge amount of revenue for facilitating the goals and objectives of UNICEF. Public Relations and Media Efforts Pubic Relations and media efforts marketing communication strategy would prove to be highly useful for UNICEF as a mass market would be targeted through this strategy. A wide audience would become aware of UNICEF services and hence accordingly gain interest in assisting the organisation with their services (Bryce, 2007). UNICEF can create write-ups for the local press and accordingly get the news published so that all the people who read the newspaper can get the message of UNICEF. The news should have the potential in it so that the reader’s interest is retained in reading the news about UNICEF. The news starting should be powerful so that the reader takes interest in going through the news. Pictures and UNICEF success statistics should be shared in the news so that a positive image of the organisation’s services can be formed in the minds of the target audience. The news should be worth reading and this means that the matter written should be useful for the reader. UNICEF can also work upon sending their newsletter to the media for getting publicity and promoting their message for helping children everywhere around the globe. One of the recent happenings of UNICEF that has been in the news is about UNICEF and Nokia having a partnership for supporting young people towards the using digital media in a safe mode (UNICEF, 2012). Networking Networking is a very powerful tool for non profit organisations to implement in their firm. Through word of mouth networking UNICEF can target their audience. It is observed that people tend to trust the opinions of their family, friends, and colleagues and hence through positive word of mouth marketing, the message of the organisation can spread across wide dimensions. Networking is a constant task and one needs to constantly be in the loop to be remembered always (Sargeant, 2008). CONCLUSION Using the appropriate marketing communication tools and strategies in a structured way can allow non profit organisation, in this case, UNICEF, to build the brand name which would ultimately result in attracting volunteers and donors for the organisation. Marketing communication tools helps in promoting the message across wide horizons and hence many people come forward for helping the non profit organisation in achieving its goals and objectives successfully. For non profit organisations, the marketing communication tools and strategy are an integral part of the organisation strategy so that the required amount of funds can be raised for the non profit organisation. The message of UNICEF should be such that it impedes a response from the individuals, other organisations, communities and other people in the society. It is vital for UNICEF to generate a positive response from its target audience so that the required goals and objectives can be achieved by the firm. UNICEF follows this strategy and must continue to do so in future as well so that its activities for helping children around the globe can be successful. UNICEF has many corporate partnerships as can be seen in the discussion above. These partners assist UNICEF in many ways that helps the organisation in moving forward and taking major decisions. The partnership allows UNICEF to have financial support and stability which is a very important element required for success. The partners assist UNICEF towards the research and development category which opens new opportunities to be catered by the non profit organisation. The technical knowledge requirements are fulfilled by UNICEF as well as access is promoted towards the logistic networks. The communication channels for UNICEF promote the message to be spread across wide dimensions through their various partnership and alliances with other profit making organisations. References Bryce, H.J., 2007. The Publicʼs Trust in Nonprofit Organizations: The Role of Relationship Marketing and Management. California Management Review, 49(4), p.112. Chain, M.V., 2008. Marketing Evolution. Marketing Science, 17(April), p.144-153. Henley, T.K., 2001. Integrated Marketing Communications for Local Nonprofit Organizations: Messages in Nonprofit Communications. Marketing Communications, 9(1), p.179. Keller, K.L., 2009. Building strong brands in a modern marketing communications environment. Journal of Marketing Communications, 15(2-3), p.139-155.  Reinold, T. & Tropp, J., 2010. Integrated marketing communications: How can we measure its effectiveness? Journal of Marketing Communications, 18(2), p.1. Rowley, J., 2010. Remodelling marketing communications in an Internet environment. Internet Research, 11(3), p.203-212. Sargeant, A., 2008. Marketing for nonprofit organizations. In Harvard Business Review. Butterworth Heinemann, pp. 1-8.  UNICEF, 2012. Focus Areas. 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