Vocabulary 

• Budget: A budget is a table that includes financial plans for personnel, supplies, equipment, and space. Plans for both expenditures and income are shown.

• Health Literacy: The ability to find, understand, and use information and services to inform health-related decisions and actions for themselves and others.

• In-kind Gifts and Contributions: In-kind gifts are non-cash goods or services donated by others. Instead of cash, a group receives a gift that assists in carrying out its mission.

• Social Marketing: Social marketing is used when you are selling a behavior change which positively impacts health, instead of selling a product. A social marketing plan involves the marketing mix, sometimes called the 4 P’s: product, price, place and promotion.
  

Develop a Program Budget

A program budget is vital to ensuring a project has resources to carry out the interventions developed. Funding for a program can be obtained through a variety of methods, such as grants, participant fees, and sponsorships. The application process for grant funds is a competitive process. Some agencies may go to great lengths to write a grant and still not receive the funding to carry out their proposed program. 

Projects need to be fiscally responsible with the funds received. Having a well-planned and accurate budget will help the success of the project. Resources include personnel, supplies, equipment, and space. Planners need to consider the following:

• Who will implement the program? How many hours a week will they work? What will they be expected to accomplish in that time?

• What supplies and equipment are needed to carry out the program as planned?

• Where will program activities be held? Will the project need to purchase space or are there partners who could donate use of their space?

After planners have identified the resource needs, they should have a plan in place to monitor the budget to ensure funds are spent appropriately and continue to meet the eligibility requirements of the funding. When a project receives funds from a grant, they are required to report on how funds are spent. Monitoring the budget provides awareness of how much of  the budget is spent and how the expenses are supporting the program.

In-Kind Contributions  

(Thorne, 2008)

In-kind contributions are non-cash goods or services donated by others. Instead of cash, a group receives a gift that assists in carrying out its mission. Common examples are donated space, office supplies, printing, and shipping. There are generally three categories of contributions.

• Products, supplies, and equipment.

• Use of facilities and services for free or a reduced fee.

• Professional services such as legal, marketing, and tax advice.

Be sure to properly document and account for in-kind contributions. You will need to determine the value of contributions based on fair market value or the cost to the organization if the goods and services were not donated.

The donor should receive a signed receipt that describes the in-kind contribution, its estimated value, the date of donation, and other details. Donors often receive benefits from their in-kind contributions, such as tax deductions and positive recognition.

Elements of a Budget 

(Rabinowitz, n.d.)

• Projected expenses. The amount of money you expect to spend in the coming fiscal year, broken down into categories such as salaries, office expenses, and supplies.

• Projected income. The amount of money you expect to take in for the coming fiscal year, broken down by sources.

• The interaction of expenses and income. What gets funded from which sources?

• Adjustments to reflect reality as the year goes on. Budgets usually begin with estimates. As the year progresses, those estimates will be adjusted to keep track of what's really happening.

Analyzing and Adjusting the Budget 

Lay out your figures in a useful format, such as a spreadsheet. Compare your total expenses to your total income.

• If your projected expenses and income are approximately equal, then your budget is balanced. Make sure you are able to use your money as planned.

• If your projected expenses are significantly less than your projected income, you have a budget surplus. This gives you the possibility of expanding the project or of putting money away for when you need it. Be aware that it may not show up as cash until the end of the coming fiscal year.

• If your projected expenses are significantly greater than your projected income, you have a budget deficit. In this case, you'll either have to find more money or cut expenses. You can explore saving some money by collaborating with another organization to share expenses.

Creating an Actual Budget Document 

The simplest budget document is one that lists projected expenses by category and projected income by source, with totals for each.

Working With Your Budget 

Review your budget on a regular schedule, such as once a month, and revise it to keep it accurate. Your budget will tell you if there are gaps in funding and what you need to do to close those gaps. It will also help you keep careful track of your money, be flexible, and not overspend. You will be able to accurately report to funders and to spend their money as you have promised.

Marketing and Communication Plan

(CTB, n.d.-a)

As part of the planning process, you need to decide how you are going to market your program to the target population. The term social marketing is used when, instead of selling a product, you are selling a behavior change which positively impacts health. A social marketing plan involves the marketing mix, sometimes called the 4 P’s: product, price, place, and promotion.

1. The product can be the behavior change you are trying to encourage, a service you are offering such as skin cancer screenings, or a tangible object, such as a bike helmet.

2. The price means what the individual has to pay. The price can be non-financial, such as the time required to attend a screening.

3. Place is where the product can be accessed. If your product is skin cancer screenings, the place is the location of the screenings.

4. Promotion involves how you will advertise the product to your priority population. To attract the target population to the product, you need to reach them.

When developing the appropriate messaging for your priority population, keep in mind health literacy: providing health information to your population in a way they can understand it and act on it. Use plain language and refrain from using acronyms and scientific terms that the general population may not understand. Ensure that the material is culturally competent and at a reading level all can understand. Pre-test your content ideas and messages with a sample of the priority population to get their feedback. 

Cultural Competence and Health Literacy

While developing communications, keep these guiding principles in mind to assure your messages are culturally competent:

• Messages should reflect health beliefs and practices of the intended audience, as well as the healthcare providers.

• Consider the social, environmental and political context of the target audience

• Recognize the family and community as primary support systems

• Coordinate efforts with existing natural and informal healthcare support systems

• Involve the community members and key stakeholders in planning the messages.

(Choosing and Adapting Culturally and Linguistically Competent Health Promotion Materials, 2023)

Remember that health literacy refers to both individuals and groups: 

(CDC, 2023)

• Personal health literacy is the degree to which individuals have the ability to find, understand, and use information and services to inform health-related decisions and actions for themselves and others.

• Organizational health literacy is the degree to which organizations equitably enable individuals to find, understand, and use information and services to inform health-related decisions and actions for themselves and others.

What is Involved in Social Marketing?

(CTB, n.d.-b)

At the root of all health promotion is one basic principle: change people’s behavior. The difference between commercial marketing and social marketing is summed up in one key point: commercial marketing tries to change people's behavior for the benefit of the marketer; social marketing tries to change people's behavior for the benefit of the consumer, or of society as a whole.

To begin a social marketing campaign you will need the following: 

• Identify what behavior you want to change.

• Identify your audience: Whose behavior do you want to change? 

• Identify the barriers to change: Using interviews, surveys, or focus groups, find out what makes these changes difficult.

• Reduce the barriers to change. Plan ways to make it easier, more accessible, and more attractive.

• Pre-test your ideas on a small number of people, then modify your plan according to your results. Pretesting your ideas is a very important step. Your message might be ineffective for reasons you hadn't thought of, or it could be insulting to members of your target audience. Pretesting stops an organization from embarrassing itself publicly, and lets you run messages with added assurance that they will say what you want them to.

• Publicize both the benefits of change, and also your efforts to make change easier in a way that will draw people to take advantage of your work . Let people know the benefits of the behavior change.

Stages of a Successful Social Marketing Effort 

A social marketing campaign needs to focus on consumers and their motivations. For example, smokers have many motivations to smoke, and they won't go immediately from believing smoking is great to quitting right away. Instead, a social marketing campaign might start them thinking of the health risks, a  later part of the campaign will help them quit, and yet another part will help them remain smoke free.

The following activities need to occur:

• Create awareness and interest

• Change attitudes and conditions

• Motivate people to want to change their behavior

• Empower people to act

• Sustain the change

Segmenting the Market

Your chosen intervention may target different groups to change behavior. For example, if you want to reduce youth violence you may want to help gang members find ways to settle disputes, help teachers change their approaches, and help parents change how they discipline their children. Each of these groups is a separate segment of the target population, and each will need a different approach to be convinced to change in ways that will affect the issue. 

To have an effective marketing campaign you need to decide which segment(s) you will target your marketing materials towards and what is the best strategy for that particular group.

One project that successfully segmented the population was the Vax-A-Nation intervention in Michigan. They identified tribal nations who had low rates of vaccinations, and discovered some of the Native Americans had a historic distrust of governmental agencies. They divided their target population into three segments: Wait-and-Seers, Maybe Nevers and the Nevers. They researched attitudes and values of all three groups and developed strategies with tailored messages. Tribal leaders resulted in the most influential channel for launching the campaign. 

(Seneres, 2023)

References

CDC. (2023, March 31). What Is Health Literacy? Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. https://www.cdc.gov/healthliteracy/learn/index.html

Choosing and Adapting Culturally and Linguistically Competent Health Promotion Materials. (2023). National Center for Cultural Competence. https://nccc.georgetown.edu/documents/Materials_Guide.pdf

CTB (n.d.-a) Chapter 45, Section 1. Understanding Social Marketing: Encouraging Adoption and Use of Valued Products and Practices. Community Tool Box. https://ctb.ku.edu/en/sustain/social-marketing/overview/main

CTB (n.d.-b). Toolkit 13. Implementing Social Marketing. Community Toolbox. https://ctb.ku.edu/en/implement-social-marketing-effort

Rabinowitz, P. (n.d.). Chapter 43, Section 1. Planning and Writing an Annual Budget. Community Tool Box. https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/finances/managing-finances/annual-budget/main