STAGE 4: PLANNING

How to communicate
and disseminate public engagement


This guide covers how to communicate to various audiences during your engagement process. It also looks at how to disseminate the outcomes of your engagement at the end of your engagement process.

Why?

Communicating and dissemination
of a project is vital to ensuring the work
you do is successful.

Let’s define some
of the words we use in
this process.

Dissemination means the targeted distribution of information and materials about an activity to a defined audience.

A communication plan is a strategic blueprint that outlines how information will be shared with partners ensuring clarity and consistency in message delivery. It typically includes components such as target audiences, communication objectives, messaging tactics, timelines and a list of any visuals needed, all designed to enhance engagement and understanding.

Your communication plan should cover the entire engagement process. It should explain why the engagement is needed and what decision it will influence. It should also set the context for the issue and outline how you will share information about your work. This includes promoting engagement activities, sharing key updates as they happen, and communicating findings and recommendations to partners, participants, the public, and any other audiences you want to reach.

It is important to connect with your comms team from the start to enable you to develop your communications plan at the planning stage in the engagement process. You can find more information on putting together your team here.

Communicating public engagement

Why communicating is so important

Communicating and disseminating are vital tools for effectively engaging with people on climate change. Communicating outcomes of public engagement shows politicians, policy makers and the general public the importance of engaging people in climate policy making. Effective communication showcases the work you have done in your engagement and helps to influence decisions on climate policy but also allows others to see where high quality public engagement is being done.It builds trust to be transparent, and communicating well and often will ensure that your work is seen positively by all involved. 

The findings from your engagement help people to consider different perspectives and to listen to the views of others they may not have considered. This can help to develop a common understanding of climate and engagement issues. You also have a responsibility to feedback to the participants in your engagement, but to others more generally. This closes the ‘feedback loop’ and helps to counteract public mistrust around having their voices heard and acted upon.

Planning your communication and dissemination strategy

By considering your approach to dissemination and communication while planning your engagement project, you will be able to maximise the reach of your messaging and ultimately make more inclusive and representative decisions for your community.

Preparation and continuity are vital for any good communications and dissemination plan. Your communications plan should cover the whole of the engagement process and include regular updates to your key audiences. Finding ambassadors, both internal and external, can help to achieve impact from your communication.

The table below takes you through the key questions you need to ask when developing your communications plan.

📩 Download a printable version here and complete this with your team.

Table of Contents

Your communications plan

Your communications plan should contain:

  • A summary of the project
  • A communications risk register
  • A communications schedule

Your project summary should include an overview of the project, including who is involved, who the participants and partners are and what the aims of the project are. This information may not necessarily be used for external comms but provides essential background for anyone disseminating or producing communications messages.

Your communications risk register should be used to record potential risks for communication on your project not only for your organisation, but also from external comms teams, funders, partners and anyone else attached to the project. Any partners should be consulted and any risks or sensitivities should be flagged at an early stage.

Your communications schedule should outline the activity you want to communicate about, what the key message is, who you are targeting, where and when you will share the message and who is responsible. We’ve created a basic communications schedule for you to use below.

Lastly, it’s important to know of any sign off procedures in this process.

When developing any plans, please identify who has final signoff on any copy, visuals or collateral before it goes out.

📩 Download a printable template here.

Types of Communications and approaches

There are a number of different types of communications you can incorporate into your engagement. We’ve created some simple guidance around the types of communications we see regularly in our engagement work.

Press Release and Media Pitch

Depending on the scope, topic and nature of the project, there may be potential for press or media interest. Securing media coverage can be beneficial as it allows you to share your work and mission with a wider audience.

A press release might be sent out at the start of a project to announce the news, at the end of the project to share learnings, or both. 📩 A template including guidance for writing a press release can be found here.

The media outlets that you choose to pitch to will depend on the project. Your comms team and partners may have an existing list of media contacts (such as local outlets or topic specific journalists) that they can pitch to.

Make your comms team aware of any plans to pitch to the media so they can advise and provide support. Ensure that any copy written for press is signed off by the appropriate parties internally and externally.

Photography and videography

Having high quality photography is useful for reports, digital communications as well as follow up press releases. Video content can help to capture participants’ experience of the engagement and can allow the public to see that participants are reflective of their communities.

In order to capture photography and video that effectively tells the story of your work, the following steps should be taken:

• Create consent forms for participants, speakers, observers and anyone else who will be featured.

• Create a brief that indicates the type of photos you would like and how the files will be sent afterwards

• Identify who has the skills to create content, or commission this externally

• After the shoot, review outputs with your comms team or other experts and provide feedback

• Once the content is delivered, work with your comms team or other experts to ensure that content is uploaded to the appropriate channels.

Live posting on social media during public engagement

Posting ‘live’ during an engagement event is an effective way for external audiences to form a more immediate connection with your work. Images and video (even taken with a phone) that show what is currently happening are perfect for this type of content. You may choose to capture:

• A wide photo of the entire room
• A selection of images showing a variety of activity across the room
• A video snippet of a speaker
• Quick and simple vox pops from participants or project partners. 

Remember if you’re live posting to tag any relevant partners. This significantly helps the content to reach more people. To help save time on the day, It’s a good idea to have a rough idea of what you’re going to post about ahead of time. You might even draft social media text to go alongside the photo or video you take on the day.

You may also choose to record video content during the event that can be edited together and posted at a later date. 


As with all photography and video ensure you have permission to post content, and review your sign off procedures as needed beforehand, with external and internal stakeholders.

Creating and sending to a dissemination list

Once a project report (or other key project output) is complete, it can be useful to share the news about publication to a curated list of contacts via email. 

Who you send to will depend on the project and the specific output you are sharing, but the list should include anyone who may have an interest in your engagement project, and who could help share further with their own networks.

Host a virtual or in-person ‘learning event’

After a project is complete, you may want to share insights into the process, outputs and impacts via a learning event. 

A learning event could be as simple as a 1 hour ‘Lunch and Learn’ style event, as scaled up as an in-person event, or anywhere in between.In it, you could invite guest speakers including partners, speakers and participants to share their experience and insights. 

The event can also be recorded to create further comms content, and for other purposes, such as internal learning and use on future bids. 

It is important that there is value in these events, so when planning them, consider yourself as a dis-engaged stakeholder and work with your comms team to make this an impactful storytelling event.

Thought leadership blog or vlog about the project, sharing key insights and learning

At any point during a project, but largely after a project is complete, you may choose to write a blog, sharing insights about the process, outputs or impacts. A blog’s focus might be on a specific aspect of a project, the project overall, or how the project connects to your wider vision and mission. It could also be about a series of engagement events, connected by topic, location, or decision.

Visual collateral

While we haven’t explicitly covered visual materials, they play a key role in engagement. People often judge whether to engage with something based on its visuals, so having images, graphics, or branding that reflect your event or organisation can help build interest, identity, and exposure.

Thoughtfully designed visuals not only make your communications more appealing but also reinforce your message and reach. It’s also important to ensure that your visuals are accessible, considering factors like dyslexia, color blindness, and other potential barriers. To get the best results, work with a graphic specialist or your internal comms team as early as possible.

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