Let’s keep Harrow safe
Marketing & Communications Strategy
Marketing & Communications Strategy
Index
1. Overview
2. The Community Safety Campaign 3. Communications Strategy
3.1 Aim: The Communications Campaign
4. The Safer Harrow Partnership and the Community 5. Key Messages
6. The Identity
6.1 Delivering the Brand/Identity
7. External Communications Methods/Resources 8. Key Campaigns
9. Target Audiences
10. Timeline and Plan of Action (attached) 11. Communications Structure
12. Internal Communications 13. Targets/Reviews/Evaluations
1. Overview
The Communications Strategy should respond to the concerns of the community and draw together diverse communications network into a single communication.
Messages will be sent in a variety of ways – via the media, in leaflets, via posters, through the community safety mobile unit, CCTV van, t-shirts, beer mats etc etc.
The Safer Harrow Partnership (hereafter known as the Partnership) as a whole will send out a cohesive communications message in line with the priorities of the Crime, Drugs & Disorder Reduction Strategy, Harrow Council’s priorities and the Community
Strategy. This message will be co-ordinated by the Marketing Manager from the Communications Unit at Harrow Council, who will seek approval for all key messages and campaigns from the Partnership.
The Partnership (and all its agencies) will need to approve the Communications Strategy’s aims (detailed in point 3.1 below).
“All crime reduction communication should aim to present an accurate picture of crime, offering crime prevention advice in a way which is non-threatening and designed to reassure.”
• This strategy links in with the one of the council’s key priorities for the forthcoming year, the message being: o Impact through Harrow’s partnerships.
2.
The Community Safety Campaign
The aim is to respond to local people’s concerns about crime, with main focus on:
• reducing crime and disorder
• reducing drug and alcohol misuse
• reducing the fear of crime
• reducing anti-social behaviour and improving the quality of life
Over the past three years, Harrow has had the second lowest crime rate in London. Harrow’s crime rate is also below the national average.
However, 67% of Harrow residents believe that their quality of life has worsened over the previous three years due to crime. The Council’s Best Value Publication survey showed that reducing crime is the top priority of the public. Levels of fear of crime are also disproportionately high, with the Harrow People Crime Audit survey showing that 64% of people feel unsafe walking alone after dark in the town centre, compared to the national average of 18%. Additionally, 39% of people indicated that they did not report a crime to the police, their main reason being that they believed no action would be taken.
There are strong indications from the Harrow People Survey that the types of crime under-reported generally fall into the category of nuisance and anti-social behaviour related crimes. While main priority crimes e.g. robbery, burglary and autocrime fortunately affect only a minority of our residents, low level ‘quality of life’ issues have a huge impact on the daily lives of a large majority of our residents.
The 2005-2008 Safer Harrow Crime and Drugs Strategy will improve the quality of life of residents by focusing on four related priorities that target offenders, hotspot locations and victims. One of the key priorities is tackling anti-social behaviour and other quality of life issues. Already, we have set up an Anti-Social Behaviour Team co-located at South Harrow Police Station; we have started rolling out the Safer Neighbourhoods Policing Reassurance Teams and introduced the New Harrow Project, which focuses on improving the streetenvironment. A focus for the next three years is to ensure that these initiatives are linked together and provide our residents with tangible improvements to their quality of life.
The Safer Harrow Partnership is committed to working together to make Harrow a safer place to live, work and visit. The public has a major role to play in achieving this, as implementing simple crime prevention measures can prevent many crimes from happening in the first place. We look forward to working with all of you as we make Harrow a much safer place in the next three years.
3. Communications
Strategy
The Partnership will develop its joint communications strategy to ensure that positive messages and ‘good news’ about crime reduction are heard. It is about ensuring that people are aware of the measures that are in place to address their concerns and improving their quality of life.
The Partnership will also ensure that the public receives accurate information about crime and disorder problems and also receives key information about sources of advice and assistance.
Communications activities will include:
• Co-ordinated marketing campaigns involving the community for all areas of community safety, according to the campaign plan
• Co-ordinated NHP and Safer Neighbourhoods marketing and publicity
• Development of the Safer Harrow Partnership website
• Media liaison and involvement to highlight the work of the partnership through the local, regional and national press where appropriate
• Events to showcase ‘flagship’ prevention initiatives, including a Safer Harrow month
• Issue community safety news to community groups and members via Harrow People
• Regular meetings with key local stakeholders
• Co-ordinated development of the Home Office sponsored Community Television Initiative
Note: this list is not exhaustive
In order for these communications to work, it is necessary to establish information sharing between the Partnership’s agencies, with all communications being co-ordinated and tasked by the Council’s Marketing Manager.
The Communications Strategy will focus on the key priorities that have arisen from the Crime & Disorder Strategy, which are:
Reduce Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB) on Harrow Residents through the ASB strategy, Liveability agenda and improvements in the public realm.
Property Crime
Violent Crime
Young People and a Safer Harrow
Prolific and Priority Offenders
Drugs and AlcoholSafer Harrow Partnership will implement six key priorities and integrate one crosscutting theme into all of its work areas. These all contribute towards improving the quality of life of Harrow residents.
3.1 Aim: Communications Campaign
• To gain community support and involvement in the Partnership’s work and help the Partnership meet its community goals (reduce the fear of crime)
• To highlight the work that is being done by the Partnership to reduce crime and seek to reassure the community that they are living in a safe(r) environment
• To educate and encourage the community to adopt safe measures in their daily lives
• To raise the Partnership’s profile, it objectives and its work
The overarching campaign will be entitled “Safer Harrow”, with the strapline “Let’s keep Harrow safe”, designed to progress the news that Harrow is the second safer borough in London.
Within the Safer Harrow campaign there are several strands that will focus on the priorities of the Crime, Drugs & Disorder Strategy. This will be discussed in detail in points 6 & 8.
It will be necessary to be proactive in much of the press work aligned to the communications strategy, however reactive press will be needed in response to letters and articles printed. In this instance, the Partnership will need a co-ordinated response, led by the communications unit at the Council in conjunction with the communications officer for Harrow Police.
The communications campaign will follow a year-long (April to March) plan, with key messages being highlighted on a seasonal or topical basis, focusing on the emerging key priorities.
The campaign messages will be communicated via all marketing and communications functions available within the resources available. The campaign plan outlines this process.
4.
The Safer Harrow Partnership and the Community
The majority of local communities to do not know that crime and disorder or community safety partnerships exist, let alone what they do. Buy in from high profile members of the community and opinion formers is essential in order for the communications campaigns to succeed. The community’s support and involvement will, therefore, be needed at all levels.
Improving the current standard, format and style of communications will help to increase public knowledge of what the problems are and manage expectations of what can realistically be done.
Since the Partnership has consulted with the local community as part of the auditing and strategy development process, it is important to communicate back the results of this so that people do not become disillusioned with the process. Feedback and two-way communication are key to the effective implementation of a communications strategy.
A website will be designed and constructed in the Partnership style that will sit within Harrow Council’s website and will have links from/to all the other agencies in the Partnership.
5. Key
Messages
The key messages will emphasise positive messages about local community safety and crime reduction. The primary aim will be to reduce fear of crime and increase feelings of public safety.
Effective communications about what is being done to reduce crime at a local level will help to create a more positive atmosphere, which in turn will lead to local communities valuing the partnership’s work more and thus being more supportive of it.
The key messages will be communicated consistently and coherently, via the Council’s communications unit and the communications officer for Harrow Police.
The campaigns are generally three-fold in their messages. They will:
a) Seek to reassure local communities about positive measures in place and solutions that are being initiated to tackle and reduce crime;
b) Provide information and advice about how different members of the community can be safe in their daily environments; and
c) Seek to highlight to local criminals what is being done to combat crime and disorder and what measures are in place to target the hotspots.
In turn, these messages will:
a) Positively change perceptions of what the Partnership is doing.
c) Subliminally communicate with criminals to highlight crime prevention initiatives and awareness.
6. The
Identity
To ensure that the profile of the Partnership is raised sufficiently so that the local community is aware of the Safer Harrow messages and branding, and that they understand that the crime reduction effort is a collaborative one, all the Partnership’s communications should be designed, under the influence of a Partnership identity.
The Partnership will be developed with a specific logo “Safer Harrow” and will use the strapline “Let’s keep Harrow safe” and will be easily identifiable and consistently placed within all communications material.
(Note that any particular campaign that involves direct reference to a particular partner will feature that partner’s own logo in any imagery, communications and press work to highlight the involvement. For example, anti-social behaviour messages will also carry the Metropolitan Police logo.)
Additionally, it is essential that the identity of the Partnership adopts a particular “style”. This style will feature on all
communications material and will be used to promote all they key campaigns to create a visual identity specifically to enhance and promote the work of Safer Harrow.
The Safer Harrow Partnership identity will be both fresh and distinctive and is in place to define the visual identity of the message across the variety ofdifferent communication channels, conveying a feeling of safety and security to the key audiences. The identity will be represented by a colour scheme, the Safer Harrow logo (which is a sub-logo of the Harrow Council logo brand) and the Safer themes.
Photography should be associated directly with Harrow borough and its community. It should be especially commissioned for use by the Partnership.
6.1 Delivering the Identity/Branding
TimeSensitive Objective
Task Aim Resource Solution Outcome
Adopt a Partnership logo, style and identity
Create
style Ensure style is used by all partners in all Safer Harrow work and on all literature etc Style design and developm-ent and marketing materials Agreeing an identity / style Adoption of style and use by all
partners in all Safer Harrow communicati ons
7.
External Communications Methods/Resources
The key messages will be delivered for the campaigns via follow-up success stories. It is intended that local key messages will be part of local news stories. Should national stories that focus on particular elements of the campaigns come to light over the course of the plan of action, local champions should be sought to carry the key messages for the campaigns externally to the wider communities. These local champions can also be used to promote success stories from the campaigns within the press.
Two-way communication is essential. Thus, the opportunity for feedback and suggestions should be presented to the external audience via the web and through leaflets/surveys/questionnaires.
Recruit a jointly funded Safer Harrow Communications Co-ordinator to co-ordinate external/internal communications and the plan of action.
All detection rates for hotpsot areas will be used in all press success stories and marketing campaigns, following the communications campaigns.
Community perception about the local policing and community safety initiatives can be used to highlight reduction in crime figures as part of the communications campaigns. Targets that have been reached should be a key part of the communications
campaigns.
All PR events and photo opportunities will be set against local landmarks or in hotspot areas to reiterate the initiatives in the target areas. These should also include non-hotspot areas for press events where appropriate to reduce the fear of crime in those areas of the borough.
Much of the work for Safer Harrow can link into the national strategies of the Liveability Fund and Alcohol Harm Reduction. It would also be pertinent to link in with the established Harrow Police and Community Consultative Group to aid communications and feedback. Face to face contact possible at these events means that complex messages can be communicated and explained in detail at an individual level. Focus groups for the Safer Harrow partnership must be implemented in order to ascertain key messages and communications needs.
The CCN TV monitors that will be placed within the borough at key points should be used in a structured way, supporting the campaign plan and promoting key positive messages. The communications unit, Crime Prevention team and the Harrow Police communications officer should co-ordinate these key messages on a quarterly basis. All the messages should be in keeping with the Safer Harrow identity.
8. Key
Campaigns
The over-arching campaign for the Community Safety Partnership will be called Safer Harrow. This will be the main name and philosophy for the entire campaign and will be known as the “style”.
Safer Harrow will have a range of sub-strands from it, which will support the priorities of the Crime & Disorder Act. They will be:
Safer Streets – linked to the reduction of anti-social behaviour, violent crime, prolific and priority offenders and the misuse of drugs and alcohol, reducing crime associated with drug misuse i.e. burglary and motor vehicle crime
Safer Homes – linked to property crime
Safer Youth – liked to young people as victims of crime (link in with Urban Living)Note: this list can be added to if necessary, when key campaigns come to light
Below are examples of what each Safer initiative will focus on:
o reducing/preventing violent crime, street robbery, homophobic/race/hate crime, disorder/anti-social behaviour, criminal damage/graffiti etc
o informing about decrease in crime stats
o reducing trafficking and dealing, drug-related crime
o educating about drug use, harm reduction and prosecution o informing about decrease in crime stats
o engage the borough community in the fight against drug misuse
• Safer Homes
o information about preventing dwelling burglary o information about preventing distraction burglary o information about preventing business related burglary o information about being/feeling safe at home
Also:
information about preventing and reporting domestic violence
• Safer Youth
o educating youth about being safe and staying away from crime
measures to take against street robbery
educating about drugs
measures to take against violence against the person
measures to take against race/hate crime
reporting crime
Also include information to/for youth about what happens to individual when crimes are committed (link to re-offending)
All the Safer campaigns will be backed up with press initiatives and statistics to highlight the falling crime numbers in order to reassure residents/public/communities about positive safety initiatives.
The Partnership’s Safer Harrowwebsitewill include a section that focuses on questions and answers, providing safe solutions to situations.
9. Target
Audiences
Messages about specific initiatives should be targeted at specific audiences. Some sections of the community, such as young people and BME groups, are very distrustful of the police and are therefore unlikely to be receptive to messages perceived as coming from the police. It intended that the branding and Safer Harrow identity should carry the weight and credibility of the message in this respect – the message will then be seen as coming from the Partnership as a whole, not just the police.
Since one of the key messages of the communications strategy is to reduce the fear of crime, one of the key audiences should be those who are disproportionately afraid of crime, such as young people and elderly people.
Harrow Borough’s audience is diverse and audience receptiveness needs to be addressed throughout the communications campaign. Audiences include the youth, elderly people, residents, businesses and tourists.
The communications will also target crime hotspots areas (as well as key residential areas.
Community events and meetings should be used to channel the key messages to the various audiences. Hard to reach groups must also be targeted, as should minority ethnic groups who will need information translated into other languages.
Within target audiences, local champions should be sought to carry the key messages for the campaigns externally to the wider communities. These local champions can also be used to promote success stories from the campaigns within the press.
10. Timeline & Plan of Action
Safer Harrow Campaign Grid
April May June July August Sept October November Dec Jan Feb March
External Safer Street s (ASB) Safer Street s (Violen t Crime) Safer Harrow awarene ss month Safer Youth (bullying) Safer Youth (race/hate crime) Safer Streets (drugs) Safer Streets (alcohol) Safer Homes (domestic violence) Safer Homes (burglary) Safer Harrow – safer new year’s resolutions Safer Streets (criminal damage/AS B) Safer Harrow round up Web • • • • • • • • • • • • Harrow People • • • • • • • • • Council noticeboards • • • • • • • • • • • Press release • • • • • • • • • • • • Press advert • • Leaflets • • • • • • • • • • • • Mobile trailer • • • CCN screen • • • • • • • • • • • • Town centre • • • • • • • • • • • • Tube/buses/shelt er sites • • Internal Poster campaign • • Dept newsletters • Intranet • • • • • • • • • • • • Additional marketing •
11. Communications
Structure
In order to implement this communications strategy effectively it is recommended that the Safer Harrow Partnership employs a communications expert who works directly for them to manage the communications and marketing of the campaigns.
Thus, the Safer Harrow communications co-ordinator will work with the Communications Officer from Harrow Police, council’s marketing manager and departmental communications officers and will liaise with the Crime Reduction team on all marketing and communications work.
The Safer Harrow Partnership’s communications responsibilities include:
• Leading on developing the communications strategy and action plan.
• Writing, editing and proofreading communications material.
• Managing the production and distribution of the Partnership’s communications materials.
• Ensuring that communications materials are accessible to all, including BME groups and disabled people.
• Developing and implementing the Partnership’s style.
• Ensuring a consistent message, which also highlights the full Partnership agencies’ involvement, is put out to all press and media and that it supports the communications campaigns.
• Ensuring all communications is led and approved.
A spokesperson (from the Safer Harrow Partnership) will be available for all media interviews to support and relay the key messages of the campaigns.
The Safer Harrow communications co-ordinator will be responsible for ensuring that all of the campaigns highlighted in the plan of action will be communicated to internal staff members via the intranet and other internal communications methods. This will involve co-ordination across all council directorates to ensure that all staff are aware of the Partnership’s work. Posters from the
campaigns will also be made available for office/department distribution.
An internal briefing paper of key messages should be provided to all members of the Partnership and elected members of the Council at the start/launch of each campaign to ensure a consistent and coherent message.
13. Targets/Reviews/Evaluations
It will be necessary to explore the impact that the communications are having in order to measure their effectiveness. This will be done via surveys, feedback forms, questionnaires, local champions, etc. It may also be pertinent to review the local media and to analyse the positive and negative newsworthiness of Safer Harrow related stories, which have a) had a direct impact from targeted campaigns and b) been followed up or initiated by the press.
It could also be worth recording the level of public enquiries generated by the “information” part of the campaigns. Feedback from the internal audience is also valuable in this instance.
