Communications Manager Journey

Public relations (PR) has always been a balance of persuasion, information, and communication - but these terms imply a one-sided relationship. The rise of social media and lightning-fast news cycles requires that modern public relation professionals engage more with their audiences and build and maintain relationships. In this course, you'll learn the fundamentals of modern PR, including new research and marketing methods, how to create and maintain relationships with your influencers, and how to react to negative news stories. You'll also learn how to build and monitor a successful PR campaign.

The ability to write well is an essential skill and responsibility for all public relations (PR) professionals. Good writing is often time consuming and doesn't always come easy, but it's vital for connecting with your target audience and conveying your key brand messages in a clear and engaging manner. In this course, you'll learn how to develop written messages for your public relation initiative. You'll explore how to create and distribute attention-grabbing press and social media releases. You'll also learn techniques for managing an effective social media marketing campaign.

People don't buy products. They buy brands. Who creates brands? People. How do they do it? Through proper marketing research and planning. The traditional marketing mix emphasizes the four P's: product, price, place, and promotion. However, this fails to address two other important aspects of marketing: planning and people. Planning and people are vital to any marketing effort. Marketing planning guides how marketing is carried out, so it's imperative that it is informed and comprehensive. And because employees impact the marketing mix so strongly, it's equally important to ensure they understand and support the company's marketing actions. In this course, you'll learn about the types of people needed to create and support strong brands. You'll become familiar with internal branding and the importance of engaging employees as brand ambassadors. You'll also learn about how strategic and tactical planning are employed for conducting effective and cohesive marketing research that will inform digital marketing efforts. Finally, you'll learn about the factors that contribute to an integrated marketing communication plan.

Marketing isn't just about making your product look good; it's also about building customer trust. When you plan for the four Ps of marketing, it's helpful to consider the ethical ramifications of each. In this course, you will learn about ethical choices in the marketing mix. From products and placement to pricing and promotion, you will learn about ethical marketing for each element.

Effective business leadership is never more needed than during the difficult times of a company crisis. The way you handle tough conversations or deliver a difficult message can make or break the situation. It's essential to have crisis management strategies to improve outcomes. In this course, you'll discover ways of managing in a crisis, including how to manage difficult conversations and crisis communications.

There is a science behind communication, including how we react neuro-physiologically to others - through verbal communication such as their words and tone, as well as the non-verbal communication of their actions and body language. There's also an art to communication, allowing your authentic self to shine through and allowing the exchange with another person to unfold naturally. In this course, you'll learn about the art and science of communication. You'll explore techniques for connecting with your audience and building trust with them so that your communication intention is clear and understood. You'll also learn the basic principles of assertive communication that is positive and not aggressive.

Building relationships with the people you want to communicate with is key to making communication effective. And building trust is essential to forging meaningful working relationships. In this course, you'll explore the necessity of clearly presenting your information and intentions as the basis of effective communication. You'll see how understanding your audience ensures that your message is delivered in such a way so to maximize its impact and how managing your emotions allows you to adapt to the emotional needs of others to build trust. Finally, you'll learn how verbal communication combines with body language and vocal tone to better convey your message effectively.

Do you ever feel that a lack of email productivity is frustrating the effectiveness of your written communication? Are poor verbal communication skills holding you back? Choosing the right communication method for the situation has a huge impact on how your message is received. This course explores the importance of choosing the right communication method to best convey your message. You'll learn how to select the proper methods for building trust, conveying your ideas, and targeting your method to your intended audience. The right communication method improves the odds of getting your point across and communicating effectively, leaving your audience informed, enlightened, and engaged.

Communicating effectively can be challenging when having difficult conversations. Because these challenges typically involve emotions such as hurt, anger, or confusion, it's not uncommon for people to avoid one another or shut down, preventing what could be a productive exchange at many levels. In this course, you'll examine some common communication challenges and how you can successfully navigate them. By showing patience, perseverance, and accountability, you can effectively deal with tough conversations, communicate your message, and reach mutual understanding and agreement.

Communication is a two-way process - while one person provides information, another must not only understand what is meant, but also show that they're being receptive to that information. This requires strong listening skills - a vital asset in any business environment. In this course, you'll work on sharpening your listening skills and getting yourself in the right receptive mindset for communicating. You'll learn how to recognize the behaviors that indicate receptivity, as well as to identify the different types of listener. You'll also learn how to ask the right questions to ensure that you understand what is being communicated.

Communicating with confidence is critical to your message being successfully received. Feeling confident in a high stakes situation is not always easy but with effort, confidence can be cultivated and improved. In this course, you'll learn about being an effective speaker. You'll discover ways to prepare, techniques to avoid being nervous and how to use your voice and body language to communicate with self-confidence.

Communicating with self-confidence is critical for success in both your personal and professional life. When the people you communicate with in daily life sense that you're nervous and don't feel confident in yourself, they may not feel confident in you either. In this course, you'll learn what's meant by "self-confidence," and the behavioral indicators of low and healthy self-confidence levels. You'll also learn how to perform a personal analysis of your current self-confidence levels, so you know which areas to work on. Finally, you'll discover some self-development techniques you can use for building and maintaining confidence in yourself.

Most people find the task of public speaking daunting. But with enough practice and preparation, anyone can be effective at delivering a speech. Being a competent public speaker allows you to showcase your work and deliver an effective presentation. However, you won't convey your message if you fail to engage your audience, handle audience challenges that arise, and tackle your nerves and anxiety. In this course, you'll learn about the basics of good speech delivery and dealing with some of the most common challenges of public speaking, such as handling difficult questions or hecklers in your audience. You'll also find out methods of overcoming public speaking anxiety.

In business, one of the oldest communication tools is still among the most important - the telephone. However, although it so common and widespread, many people lack the verbal communication skills needed to create a positive impression when using the phone. In this course, you'll learn about some basic rules of etiquette that will help improve your phone skills and keep your business calls professional. You'll explore general best practices, and how to make and receive calls professionally. You'll also learn some best practices for using a cell or smart phone, and how to record and leave effective voicemail messages.

Have you ever read a piece of business writing and found the message unclear? Writing well, like other communication skills, can be cultivated and improved. To write an effective business message, you need to first know and understand your audience and your purpose for choosing written communication to convey it. In this course, you'll discover how improving your written communication aids in creating messages that convey the appropriate tone for different readers throughout the organizational hierarchy. You'll also explore how better writing can effectively fulfil its three most common purposes: to inform, respond, or persuade.

Being clear and concise in business writing isn't always easy. But writing well is essential in the workplace if you want what you write to be read, understood, and acted upon. In this course, you'll learn how improving your communication skills through better writing techniques can make your message clear and comprehensible. You'll learn how your written communication is more effective when you understand the importance of using familiar, concrete, and specific language. You'll also explore tips for being more concise in your writing and best practices for organizing content.

All of us can think of a piece of business writing that's lacking a key point or contains an embarrassing typo or spelling error. From that point on, it becomes difficult to take it seriously, whatever it's topic or content. In business, solid, professional written communication is essential to the clarity and credibility of your message. In this course, you'll learn how improving your communication skills through better writing will help you produce more focused, polished, and effective business documents. It offers guidance on how to edit and proofread effectively, covering key areas, such as tone, structure, clarity, and accuracy, as well as common grammar, punctuation, and spelling mistakes to watch out for.

Effective business writing is one of the most important communication skills in the workplace today. By writing well, using clear sentences and correct grammar, you can ensure your message is communicated to and understood by your intended audience. Unfortunately, the opposite is also true - poorly structured sentences can not only cause confusion, but may also damage your reputation. In this course, you'll learn about the fundamental elements for better writing - the parts of speech. These are the building blocks of sentences, so learning about them can help you skillfully combine words into meaningful sentences. This course describes the eight parts of speech and shows how to use them effectively and correctly.

Spelling errors are all too common, and are one of the main culprits behind poor business writing. A wrong letter here, an extra letter there, and your reader may lose confidence in your communication skills and overall competence as a professional. That's why writing well doesn't just mean writing persuasively - it also means knowing the rules, as well as the exceptions, of spelling. In this course, you'll learn how to spell words with prefixes and suffixes, and how to form the plural and possessive forms of words. You'll also learn general rules on how to spell correctly, as well as some handy tips for better writing in general.

Writing well is not just about constructing logical sentences. It also involves the correct use of abbreviations, capital letters, and numbers in your business writing. Knowing how to use them consistently is a strong asset to have as part of your communication skills. In this course, you'll learn the basic rules of capital letters, abbreviations, and numbers. You'll learn how to correctly abbreviate titles, names, locations, and countries, as well as how to capitalize direct quotes, titles, names of organizations, and product names, among other elements. In addition, you'll explore other key elements for better writing - the forms and uses of numbers with dates and time, money, fractions, and symbols.

Punctuation is the collection of marks used to separate sentences and their parts. Although appropriate punctuation is an undervalued part of your communication skills, it can make your business writing clear and less likely to be misinterpreted. In this course, you'll learn the standard rules and guidelines for using punctuation marks, including the correct use of periods, question marks, and exclamation points. You'll learn a crucial aspect of better writing that often causes much confusion - how to correctly use commas. The course includes rules for better writing such how to use different connecting and separating marks, like colons, semicolons, dashes, and hyphens. In addition, it shows how to properly use apostrophes, parentheses, brackets, and quotation marks.

Syntax is the grammatical term for arranging words to create logical phrases, clauses, and sentences. Well-constructed sentences express an idea by using the parts of speech in a logical order, and are essential for effective business writing. A misplaced modifier might get a chuckle out of the reader, but it reflects poorly on your communication skills. In this course, you'll learn some of the fundamentals for better writing - the parts of a sentence, such as the subject and predicate, as well as phrases and clauses. You'll examine subject-verb agreement, as well as agreement between pronouns and their antecedents. You'll also discover some techniques for writing well, such as how to identify and fix common types of sentence errors.

The many nuances and conventions in the English language make it diverse and interesting; however, when it comes to writing well, they can also cause some difficulties. For better writing skills, you must familiarize yourself with some of the most common errors of usage. In this course, you'll learn how to use commonly confused words correctly, including word pairs that sound alike and those that have related meanings. You'll explore often misused verbs - for example, affect and effect or apprise and appraise - that can impede professional business writing. You'll also learn some idiomatic combinations of verbs and prepositions that can be confusing and will put your communication skills to the test.

Email has become an indispensable communication tool for organizations, and plays a vital role in how they conduct business and maintain their operations. As a result, one of the most important communication skills to have in the workplace today is email etiquette. It can help ensure you get messages across quickly, appropriately, and concisely. In this course, you'll learn some tried and tested guidelines for writing emails. You'll explore the fundamental elements of written communication that every email should contain, and the importance of keeping emails concise. The course also covers the etiquette associated with using instant messaging programs as an extension of email.

The growth of mobile devices and social media have dramatically changed how consumers interact online. This has had a profound effect on how businesses market services and products to their customers. The facts about Digital are compelling. People prefer to interact online, mobile devices now account for over 50 percent of web page views, the current worldwide total number of Internet users is 4.5 billion, and social media users worldwide represent 3.2 billion people. In this course, you'll learn how digital provides opportunities for understanding the customer journey, creating sustainable business growth, and fostering more highly functioning organizations, teams, and individuals. You'll also learn how organizations can benefit from applying digital technologies and practices to their marketing plans and strategies. This course was developed in partnership with the Digital Marketing Institute. (www.digitalmarketinginstitute.com) For those who are interested in pursuing a certification, please contact the Digital Marketing Institute directly via this website: https://digitalmarketinginstitute.com/lp/skillsoft

According to recent research, over 90% of business-to-business customers carry out online research before they make a purchase decision. It's clear that it's important for every business to have an online presence. Today, when customers have a need or a problem to solve, the first step is to search for an answer online. In this course, you'll learn about how customers search for solutions to their needs and how businesses can match those searches with the right online presence. You'll also learn how an online presence can be designed to engage and connect with customers, building strong relationships to support your business, as well as how you can increase conversion by optimizing your website content for searches. Finally, you'll examine the role of email marketing, which continues to provide one of the highest returns on investment of any digital channel by examining the key elements of compelling email communications, including how they align to your customer's journey, and how they can help you to achieve your business objectives. This course was developed in partnership with the Digital Marketing Institute. (www.digitalmarketinginstitute.com) For those who are interested in pursuing a certification, please contact the Digital Marketing Institute directly via this website: https://digitalmarketinginstitute.com/lp/skillsoft

More than ever, people are using social media. They aren't just interacting with friends, but with businesses as well. Today, customers expect businesses to reach them on social media. As a result, social media not only gives businesses invaluable customer data, it provides an effective way to promote products and services to grow the business as well. In this course, you'll learn the key features and benefits of social media for businesses, and become familiar with its key concepts and terminology, essential to understanding the role it can play in engaging with customers, providing support, advertising, and generating business. You'll also learn about the most popular social media tools, and how personal branding and an active community can be a real differentiator for your organization, and how it can support your overall business objectives. This course was developed in partnership with the Digital Marketing Institute. (www.digitalmarketinginstitute.com For those who are interested in pursuing a certification, please contact the Digital Marketing Institute directly via this website: https://digitalmarketinginstitute.com/lp/skillsoft

Social media and mobile use are closely linked, which means customers are more likely to connect with businesses for customer service when it suits them. Customers prefer social media for contacting businesses because they can multi-task while waiting for a response. This gives customers more control over the communication channel, so businesses must have a plan to manage expectations and engage with customers on their terms and in the social media platforms they frequent. In this course, you'll learn about the importance of using social media for customer service, the changes brought about by social customer services, and how companies are adapting to this new way of addressing customer issues. You'll also learn how changes in the behavior and expectations of customers have impacted customer service and become familiar with the advantages of social customer service for businesses, gaining an understanding of the importance of other digital tools to support your customers. Finally, you'll explore the challenges of social customer care and the strategic approaches that you can implement to improve customer service. This course was developed in partnership with the Digital Marketing Institute. (www.digitalmarketinginstitute.com) For those who are interested in pursuing a certification, please contact the Digital Marketing Institute directly via this website: https://digitalmarketinginstitute.com/lp/skillsoft

With the rise in Digital, businesses are challenged to carefully consider how customer and employee data are captured, stored, and retained. Because data security risks such as data breaches and cyber threats regularly affect organizations, businesses do well to plan, manage, and mitigate against these internal and external risks. Without careful management, risks can easily get out of hand, especially in a social media environment. This can cause serious damage to a business or its brand. In this course, you'll learn about the risks that can affect organizations online, how, without careful management, they can grow beyond control, and ways to manage and mitigate against them. You'll also review the potential impacts of various risks related to Digital, such as a data breaches and cyber threats, and how proper planning can prevent them. You'll explore how the rise in social media increases the likelihood that small events can quickly become a global issue for a company, and how issues that arise must be treated with care, using pre-defined guidelines. In addition to these risks, you'll examine various business challenges associated with Digital, such as lack of digital skills faced by many companies, the need for innovation, and difficulties related to an organization's structure. Finally, you‘ll review evolving regulations around the use of Digital, and how to ensure that your approach is aligned with local market requirements. This course was developed in partnership with the Digital Marketing Institute. (www.digitalmarketinginstitute.com) For those who are interested in pursuing a certification, please contact the Digital Marketing Institute directly via this website: https://digitalmarketinginstitute.com/lp/skillsoft

Social media is one of the most vital technologies companies can use to attract, connect with, and retain customers. If you want to meet customers where they are, that's the place to be. In this course, you'll learn why social media is such an important tool of persuasion for businesses. You'll explore how companies use social media today as a key component of a persuasive communication strategy. You'll also learn how to analyze your organization's social media channels and marketing strategies to strengthen and maintain your relationship with your customers.

In this course, you will learn techniques for developing a team of "creative gurus" - team members who excel at generating innovative ideas. You will learn ways to assemble your team, generate creative ideas, overcome barriers to team creativity, and foster a creative workplace.

Believe it or not, everyone has the potential to be creative. If you're struggling to express your ideas, then something is getting in the way. But with the right approach and techniques, team leaders can provide a safe space that encourages brainstorming, innovating, and creative thinking. In this course, you'll learn about characteristics of creative people, how to overcome personal barriers, and how to foster team innovation in a work environment. It describes personal barriers to creativity and how to overcome them and provides strategies for enhancing creativity in the workplace. It also outlines key requirements for promoting creativity and explores techniques for fostering creativity in teams.

You might not describe yourself as a creative person, but everyday activities - like problem solving or spotting opportunities - rely on your creative thinking and innovation. Originality is key, but your ideas also have to work within real-world constraints. In this course, you'll learn about the different stages of innovating and techniques for verifying the workability of your ideas. You'll also discover guidelines and techniques for building on and testing an idea, such as brainstorming. The course outlines when to use research and simulations to check the workability of an idea, and it discusses ways to build on ideas effectively.

Everyone could benefit from a boost in creativity. Whether you're in marketing and advertising, management, or software development, all professionals need to be able to come up with original ideas and think outside the box every now and then. But sometimes the pressure to think creatively is the very thing that blocks the flow of fresh ideas and results in the type of procrastination that is an obstacle to efficient time management. This course focuses on the relationship between procrastinating and creativity. You'll learn about how the optimal amount of procrastination actually boosts creativity and efficiency. You'll also learn how to use creativity boosters to help you past those times when you procrastinate a little too much.