Most charities I work with are doing extraordinary things. Their teams are passionate, their programmes are making a real difference – and their communications? Stretched thin, reactive, and running on instinct rather than intention.

Sound familiar?

Here’s the thing: you can have the best communications team in the sector and still have a communications strategy that isn’t pulling its weight. In fact, the two often go hand in hand. The busier you are, the less time there is to step back and ask: is this actually working?

What a Working Strategy Looks Like

A communications strategy that works isn’t just a document that lives on a shared drive. It’s a living framework that shapes every decision, from which stories you tell and who you tell them to, to how you respond when something goes wrong.

It answers three fundamental questions:

• Who are we trying to reach, and what do we need them to think, feel, or do?
• What do we stand for — and can anyone tell that from our comms?
• Are the things we’re producing actually moving us closer to our mission?

The Signs It Isn’t Working

I’ve worked with organisations across the charity and not-for-profit sector for more than 20 years.
Here are the patterns I see most often when a strategy isn’t doing its job:

You’re producing content, but you don’t know if it’s landing.
There’s a difference between being active and being effective. If you can’t point to what your content is achieving — whether that’s building awareness, driving donations, or deepening trust — it might be time to pause.

Your messaging changes depending on who’s in the room.
If your CEO, your fundraising lead, and your social media manager would describe your organisation differently, that’s a brand and messaging problem. Consistency isn’t about being robotic — it’s about being recognisable.

Your communications are reactive rather than planned.
If most of your communications are responses to events that have already happened — a crisis, a funding announcement, a trustee’s request — rather than proactive, planned campaigns, the strategy isn’t doing the heavy lifting it should.

You’re talking about yourself instead of your audience.
This is the most common challenge I see. Organisations naturally want to talk about what they do. But audiences — whether donors, beneficiaries, or policymakers — are primarily interested in what’s in it for them. The best charity communications make the audience the hero, not the organisation.

What to Do About It

You don’t need to overhaul everything overnight. Start with an honest audit of where you are right now:

• Read back through your last three months of content. Does it reflect who you are and what you’re trying to achieve?
• Check your engagement data. Which content got a response, and which disappeared into the void?
• Talk to your team. Can everyone articulate your key messages clearly and consistently?
• Look at your audiences. Are you reaching the people who matter most to your mission?

If the answers make you uncomfortable, that’s not a failure — that’s information. And it’s exactly the kind of information a good communications strategy should help you act on.

Getting Fresh Eyes

Sometimes the hardest part of reviewing your own strategy is that you’re too close to it. You know the history, the internal politics, the reasons why things are the way they are. That context is valuable, but it can also make it very hard to see what an external audience actually sees.

That’s often where a communications consultant can help. Not to come in and tell you everything you’re doing is wrong, but to ask the questions that are difficult to ask from the inside. To bring structure, objectivity, and sector expertise to a process that matters enormously but rarely gets the dedicated time it deserves.

If you’d like to talk about what’s working in your communications — and what might be worth revisiting — I’d love to hear from you.

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