Your channel strategy is the deliberate decision about where you’ll show up, what you’ll do there, and why.

It starts with your audience segment – the specific people with disability you’re trying to reach – and works outward from there.

The channel strategy framework

For each channel in your strategy, define:

Purpose: what role does this channel play? (Awareness, engagement, conversion, retention?)

Audience segment: which specific group of people with disability – or people in their immediate orbit – is primarily here?

Content type: what kind of content performs on this platform for this audience?

Tone: how does your voice adapt to this channel’s culture?

Frequency: how often will you post? Be honest and sustainable.

Goal metric: how will you measure success for this channel?

Channel roles in the journey toward your organisation

Think about how the person with disability – or someone supporting them – moves from not knowing you exist to choosing to work with you.

Awareness: where people first discover you. Often search, peer recommendations, community groups.

Consideration: where people evaluate you. Your website, your Google reviews, your social presence.

Connection: where the relationship begins. A direct message, an enquiry form, a phone call.

Ongoing relationship: where you stay connected with participants, families and referrers. Email, private community groups, newsletters.

A complete channel strategy covers all four stages. If you’re only present for awareness and disappear at consideration, you’re losing people at the critical moment.

The secondary audience question

Once you’ve built your channel strategy for the person with disability, ask: are there any secondary audiences – support coordinators, allied health professionals, partners – where additional channel presence would create value?

The answer is often yes. LinkedIn for support coordinators. Sector events and newsletters for allied health. But these are additions to your primary audience strategy, not substitutes for it.

Exercise

Build a one-page channel strategy for your organisation. Two primary channels based on where your specific audience segment actually is. For each one, define the purpose, audience segment, content type, tone, frequency and goal metric.