About
In many Autism Resource Bases – specialist classes within mainstream schools – autistic pupils simply weren’t getting the same access to music as their classmates. Live Music Now had spent three years working in these settings, trying to understand why, and what good, young-person-centred music practice could look like instead.
To take that further, they were awarded a year-long Arts and Humanities Research Council grant, delivered through the AHRC Hub for Public Engagement with Music Research at the University of Southampton, working alongside the University of South Wales.
They asked me to support their communications across the year, building towards the launch of a new practical guide.
See previous work for Live Music Now:
Communications strategies for work in care homes and SEND schools
How I helped
I worked alongside the team from early planning through to launch day, including:
- A mini comms strategy and planning workshop including developing key messages
- Mentoring and advice around communications and copywriting
- Copywriting and editing
- Developing a campaign plan for the launch of the guide
- Guidance/copywriting for: website pages, enewsletters, press releases, social media, and summaries for headteachers and policymakers
The results
Results in the first month after the launch were:
- 246 downloads of the guide
- 183 additions to the mailing list
- 4k visitors to the relevant website pages
- A 5.8% increase of followers on Instagram and Facebook (or 218 followers)
- 5k views, 313 likes and 60 shares/reposts of guide-related content
- 827 non-followers reached
- 560 people visited the LMN LinkedIn profile and 178 clicked the bio link.
- And on LinkedIn 9,044 impressions, 318 reactions, 14 comments and 19 reposts
More than numbers, though, the guide reached the people who could put it into practice – teachers, music leads and policymakers working directly with autistic pupils, ahead of a new school year.