Corporate Communications - Vodafone UK

This report discusses the corporate communication function of Vodafone UK, including a SWOT analysis, communication integrity, CSR communication, and barriers to communication. The report also evaluates Vodafone's communication through Lasswell's model and provides recommendations for enhancing corporate communication.

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CORPORATE COMMUNICATIONS
(student name)
12-6-2018

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Executive Summary
This report discussed the corporate communication, which is the flow of information within and
outside the organization effectively, to all the stakeholders. For this discussion, Vodafone UK
was considered for better understanding of corporate communication. In the report, the relevant
communication function of the Vodafone was described.
The major strengths of the communication of company observed, were renowned brand name
worldwide, providing a high level of infrastructure of networking, innovation through ringtone,
chats, video messages, customer-focused strategy, total communication strategy, and new
product development. Weakness included lack of rural communication, and opportunities were
conquering emerging markets, personal relationships with customers, and research and
development. Lastly, the threats were a competitive industry, competitor’s communication
strategy.
Vodafone communication through CSR included the power of connectivity, technology for
society, championing equality, digital future, youth skills, employment, transparency, and ethical
behavior. For Vodafone, the barriers to the communications were language issue, use of jargons,
clarity in the message, many transfer stations, under or over communication, negative tendencies,
superior influence, inappropriate media, wrong assumptions, varied perception, resistance to
change, prejudiced views, communication selectivity, cultural difference, poor listening and
retaining skills, and conflicting information.
For analysis and evaluating the communication of Vodafone, a campaign was considered to be
analyzed, the campaign was “More than Mobile campaign” while using Lasswell communication

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model. Moreover, some recommendations were provided to enhance the corporate
communication of Vodafone.

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Contents
Executive Summary.........................................................................................................................1
Introduction/ organization overview................................................................................................3
Communication function of Vodafone UK.....................................................................................5
A SWOT analysis of communication..........................................................................................5
Communication integrity through consistency of messages across media..................................6
Communication of corporate social responsibility......................................................................7
Barriers to communication..............................................................................................................8
Communication analysis................................................................................................................10
Recommendations..........................................................................................................................13
References......................................................................................................................................16
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Introduction/ organization overview
For an effective understanding of corporate communication, its function, and barriers, of an
organization will be taken for discussion that is “Vodafone UK.” Vodafone is considered one of
the leading mobile communication provider worldwide, which is serving twenty-six nations.
The company has initiated this organization in 1985 from London. Considering the employees,
there are more than 13000 individuals working across the UK (Vodafone, 2018). The mission of
the company is to create and gain new opportunities each day using communication as a key, for
which the company stands for. The company wishes to provide a positive contribution to the
nation and society by making mobile network possible with a certain degree of freedom and
flexibility to the customer that they have not experienced yet. The goals and objectives of the
company includes customer-oriented working from the company’s employees and are ambitious,
competitive, and innovative to achieve the vision and mission of the company. The values that
company shares include simplicity, trust, and speed (vodafoneintegratedreport, 2014).
The company major focus includes creating recognition, positive awareness, and reputation of
the company, achievement of distinctive, memorable, and relevant differentiation, facilitate
trustworthy relationships between the companies, are its external and internal key audience.
Moreover, the company considers building future asset value, brand equity, and bridge to new
customers. In addition, the company believes that the brand must not be the outward expression
of the inside commitment. The company sees, “Branding as communication, not decoration”
(vodafoneintegratedreport, 2014).
Companies major concern is customers, which the company feels is a most important aspect.
Corporate communication is a function of management like finance, operations, and marketing,

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involved in the dissemination of important information to key constituents. Moreover, it includes
the execution of the strategy of the corporate and messages are developed for conveying it
outside and inside the organization (vodafoneintegratedreport, 2014).

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Communication function of Vodafone UK
For analysis the communication function of the company, the strengths, opportunities, weakness
and threats must be well known, which are as follows:
A SWOT analysis of communication
1. Strengths
 Renowned brand name worldwide
 Integration of subsidiaries
 Providing a high level of infrastructure of networking
 Innovation through ringtone, chats, video messages
 High geographical exposure
 Customer focused strategy
 Total communication strategy
 New product development
 Advertisement with new brand ambassador
 Adding value through services
 Magazines promotions
 Good brand image
2. Weakness
 Lack of rural communication
3. Opportunities
 Conquering emerging markets
 Research and development
 Personal relationships with customers

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4. Threats
 Competitive industry
 Competitors communication strategy
Communication integrity through consistency of messages across media
Vodafone through its marketing messages, conveyed a strong brand image and influence
customers to enhance recognition of the brand, and increase brand loyalty. The messages
include:
 Female appealing – through its messages and advertisements the company focuses to
attract female customers. This will create a positive image of the company to influence
people for women empowerment
 Fashion icon – through its campaign like Beckham campaign, the company focuses to
change customer perception, as to use mobile with the best network as a fashion icon.
This will influence people to use the network as a symbol status
 Empathetic and caring family man – through its campaign the company portrayed an
empathetic and caring man of the family
 Brand migration – through its Beckham campaign, the support gained was to drive
Vodafone for brand migration
 Enhanced internet browser – through its messages the company focuses to convey the
enhanced browsing internet for mobile phones
 Small business approach - My campaign was to influence small business to established
and run in a more cost-effective manner.
 Ease of use – the message through media is generally conveyed that the service is
provided to become quick, simple, and easy to use (Griffiths & McLean, 2014).

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Communication of corporate social responsibility of Vodafone
Through its sustainability and corporate social responsibility, the message that the company
coveys are:
 Power of connectivity – the company, is providing connectivity to millions of customers.
Good connectivity is the heart of what the company is delivering to open up new
opportunities for people, helping society in prosperity and response to major
environmental and social issues.
 Technology for society – some of the environmental and social challenges are faced by
the society, by enhancing technology for the society and enhancing the customer
experience of connecting people, things and places to help to create a safer, healthier,
and low carbon society
 Championing equality – the message of equality conveys through the sustainable
business of the company. The company believes in equality and drive forces to do so.
For this, the company uses its products, people, and brand to perceive a meaningful
change for society. This will enhance women empowerment, and change customer
perception as a positive brand image
 Digital future – in today’s world, where the digitalization is playing an important role in
the society, the company through its CSR, and for suitability is encouraging digital
future through kick-start bringing a revolution for mobile in the UK. The company
focuses on helping people in operating organizations and unlocking government
opportunities for a digital-focused future (vodafone, 2018).
 Youth skills and employment – for maximum jobs in near future, digital skill would be
required, and the majority of school going children has indulged the digital skills through

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education itself. The company wishes to become the employer for youth and helping
youth to build such skills. Therefore, the company is conveying a message to youth for
employment and brand recognition.
 Transparency and ethical behavior – the company through its activities, covey the ethical
behavior that is adopted by the company, and transparency within and outside the
company. As the company is committed towards responsible behavior, and strive to
work lawfully, with integrity, and ethically, in whichever country it is operating
(n.vodafone, 2018).
Barriers to communication
Barriers to communication are responsible for conveying the message to the receiver either in a
disrupted form or conveying different meaning or do not reach to the customers. These barriers
to Vodafone include:
1. Semantic barriers
 Language issue – the major issue is language because the company is
international, the meaning of a statement in one language is different in another
language
 Use of jargons – too many uses of jargons, make the message unclear, or not
understandable to the receiver, and acting as a barrier
 Clarity in the message – the message has to be clear enough to reach to the
customers or another stakeholder in a similar way the company or management
wishes to convey (Chung, 2015)
2. Organizational barriers

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 Many transfer station – in case the communication is transferred through a long
chain, it becomes difficult to transfer the same message from every level of the
chain, it is the issue within the organization, and for outsiders as well
 Under or over communication – the information must be disseminated in the
perfect quantity, the more of information, or lack of information, leads to the
misleading and wrong message is conveyed.
 Negative tendencies – this depends on the work teams in an organization that
leads to negative tendencies, like having similar values, opinion, attitude, and
believes in the same team.
 Superior influence – the influence of superior for providing a different point of
views can exist within the organization
 Inappropriate media – if the message is not conveyed through an appropriate
channel of media, it may end up with non-delivery of a message to most of the
customers or stakeholders (Gabriel, 2016)
3. Psychological barriers
 Wrong assumptions – the assumptions to convey message has to be right to an
extent, in case it conducted to be wrong, it may lead to wrong delivery of
messages
 Varied perception – the perception of every individual is different within the
organization, and also to the customer, the messages are conveyed
 Resistance to change – this is the biggest barrier, as people within and outside the
company are not ready to accept any change, and resist to adapt to something new

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 Prejudiced views – these barriers are about making a judgment about a thing or
some individual, and then want to see a similar impression.
 Communication selectivity – the selection of communication is also important, as
it the combination of words and meaning of those words must be clear to the
receiver, to make a message reachable to the stakeholders or customers (Hargie,
2016)
4. Other barriers
 Cultural difference – this is another major barriers, the company with numerous
employees and serving to various countries, the culture is the major factor that can
change the message meaning and relevance to the receiver
 Poor listening and retaining skills
 Conflicting information – the information that has been shared verbally or non-
verbally, should not have a different meaning that conflict for their statement, as
this can be a barrier (Libert & Gibon, 2015)
Communication analysis
For analyzing and evaluating the communication of Vodafone, the relevant theory to study
includes the Lasswell’s model of communication. This model was propounded in 1948 by
Lasswell, according to which the mass communication process was explained and justified using
a model. The model includes the combination of four factors that are a communicator, message,
medium, and audience, that results into an Impact. According to his perception, the impact of an
communication, whether it is positive or negative, depends on who is the speaker, what message
is being sent by the speaker, what the media through which the message is been conveyed, and
who is your target audience or who is the receiver of the message (Soranno, 2014).

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Considering this model, one of the Vodafone communication strategy, through the campaign can
be evaluated, and analyzed. The latest campaign conducted by Vodafone in 2018 for this
discussion was “More than Mobile” (digitalstrategyconsulting, 2018).
 Communicator - in this case, the communicators is the company itself, that is Vodafone
 Message – this part plays the most important role in communication, it is the words or a
thing that creates meaning to the communication. According to this campaign, the key
message includes the offering that the company is providing that is more than a cell
phone, this message is to create awareness about the plans offered by the company.
Through this campaign, the customer’s viewpoint or reviews regarding Vodafone was
circulated, which majorly includes LifesKitchen, Moocall, CareTech and various other
business operators. The perception about the company is that it is offering mobile
networks and internet facilities, the awareness about the other than mobile service for
low for the customers, which is to be aware. Moreover, the message includes the
embraced innovation that the company is offering for day-to-day business. The message
conveys the expertise of the company, in a range of industries, and blueprint for the
working of digital technology, and the benefits are conveyed through the message. This
includes building relationship of a business with its clients or customers and bringing
them closer, and make them understand that how business challenges can have a solution
through the products of Vodafone (Balmer & Abratt, 2016).
 Media – the source through this message or campaign has been reaching to the audience
or customers are radio, social media platforms, print. The media also plays a vital role in
effective communication, as the availability of the source will is important to reach out
to the target audience (Kim & Edelson, 2015)

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 Audience – the audience for this campaign is business decision makers, whom the
company wants to influence to be connected to the brand for networking and
communication purposes (Yen, 2017).

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Recommendations
 Training and development – training of skills of the employees of the company may help
the firm to enhance the communication skills of the employees. Moreover, the skills to
create the best message and the appropriate use of words and language, for employees
training can help to a large extent. This is especially recommended when customers are
involved. For example, if the communication has to take place between the company and
the customer, training could play a vital role while building a relationship and creating
the campaign (Wang, 2016)
 Controlling – controlling is necessary for every aspect. considering controlling over the
flow of information, it can be check if the proper and accurate information is flowing the
organization, and in case of any deviations, the corrective action can be taken
immediately
 Assessment of existing communication strategy – the internal communication strategy of
the company must be assessed and check if it is as per the requirement or not
 Social intranet software implementation – through implementing the software through
which the organization can interact easily with each other is a helpful tool to maintain
effective communication across the organization
 Open door policy for the company – according to this policy, every individual of the
organization has the right to speak and suggest whatever they wish to think is going right
or wrong
 Take social media advantage – social media has provided an excellent platform to be
connected to people. Through this, the personal relationship can also be maintained
within the organization

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 Dissemination of goals effectively – the goals of the company and individuals need to be
shared with everyone, to understand the role of the person in achieving those goals.
 Internal newsletter – Vodafone must include the internal newsletter, through which all
the information can be effectively shared with the organization’s employees altogether
 Company culture focused – the culture of the company must be shared to the employees
of the company so that they know in what environment they are working and existing so
that the communication can be improved and are according to the organizational culture.
For example, if the innovation is part of the culture of the organization like in the case of
Vodafone, then the communication takes a more relevant role.
 Relationship building – the management must try to build a relationship with the
subordinates. This will lead the superior and subordinate relationship to a more
comfortable level. That will eventually lead to enhance communication among the
organization
 Encourage two-way communication – the two-way communication must be encouraged
with the employees and with the customers. There should not be a single person
commanding and the Vodafone’s top management must license communicating with the
employees and the customer, another party point of view.
 CRM platform usage – customer relationship management platform, is advisable to build
a relationship with customers and communicate well with the customer to inform them
about the offered products as per their requirement (Neil, 2015).
 Suggestions box – the suggestion box must be there at the company so that the ides or
change requirement can get from the employees and customer, who is unable to share
their thought face to face

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 Celebrating achievements – this enhances the motivation and communication within the
organization, by providing recognition to the employees performing more than they are
expected by the management (Zerfass, 2015)

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References
Balmer, J. & Abratt, R., 2016. Corporate brands and corporate marketing: Emerging trends in the
big five eco-system. Journal of Brand Management, 23(1), p. 3.
Chung, T., 2015. The role of listening in e-contact center customer relationship management..
Journal of services marketing, 29(1), pp. 49-58.
digitalstrategyconsulting, 2018. Vodafone targets business with ‘More than Mobile’ campaign.
[Online]
Available at:
http://www.digitalstrategyconsulting.com/intelligence/2018/09/vodafone_targets_business_with_
more_than_mobile_campaign.php
Gabriel, A., 2016. Enhancing emotional performance and customer service through human
resources practices: A systems perspective. Human Resource Management Review, 26(1), pp.
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Available at: http://www.vodafone.co.uk/about-us/company-history/index.htm
vodafone, 2018. sustainable-business. [Online]
Available at: https://www.vodafone.co.uk/mobile/sustainable-business
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Available at:
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