With the start of a new year, it’s a opportunity to reflect on your firm’s communications tactics, to evaluate what is working, to discard what isn’t and to identify new activities to reach your key audiences. Dust off last year’s plan and communications audit and look at it through fresh eyes.

What do you want people to think, say and do? Who influences their choices and actions?

When was the last time you asked how your customers make purchasing decisions for goods and services? What are you doing to provide timely and accurate information when and where they need it?

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Do your employees have a solid understanding of your company’s vision and how their work supports it? What information do they need to work more effectively and to provide better customer support?

When you ask the questions and do the homework, a foundation is created to evaluate and identify the best, most cost-effective communications tools and strategies. This is especially important today when the opportunities and methods to reach target audiences have grown.

Jerry Swerling, director of the University of Southern California’s Annenberg Strategic Communication and Public Relations Center, spoke recently to Southern Arizona communications professionals about how and where the general public wants to receive credible information. He has led national surveys for the past three years exploring the types of media consumers find most credible, how they want the information delivered and how their opinions are shaped.

Since 2006, personal preference for social and digital media continues to grow. These trends are growing across all demographics, including age, educational and economic status. The desire to access and evaluate information instantly from a variety of sources is the prime motive, especially for consumers who are making decisions – whether they are evaluating personal, lifestyle or professional options. The full survey results are available online at www.prsatucson.com.

For the cost of lunch, Southern Arizonans had an outstanding opportunity to meet one of the nation’s leading experts on communications and better understand how to blend traditional and non-traditional communications tactics to reach audiences and influence their behaviors and decisions.

Each month, educational programs are available throughout Tucson by dozens of professional associations. For the cost of a college credit, joining a professional group opens the door to life-long learning and benefit s both your professional success and the future of your business.

Having access to national experts and the opportunity locally to learn about new communications tactics and how they fit into your company’s communications strategies is one of the great reasons to become involved in a professional group like the Southern Arizona chapter of the Public Relations Society of America.

This month, the group will host Chris Baker, senior research associate of Marketing Intelligence, who will explain how to craft questions when conducting a research survey. Details of the program are on the website www.prsatucson.com. It’s scheduled for 11:45 a.m., Jan. 27, at the Arizona Inn, 2200 E. Elm St.

Whether you revisit your communications plan, audit your current strategy or join a professional association to invigorate your ideas and efforts, the new year is an ideal time to focus on your company’s communications efforts.

Is improved communications in your company’s resolutions for 2009? How will you achieve these goals in the new year?

Contact Jan Howard, communications director at Strongpoint, at jan@strongpointpr.com or (520) 795-1566. Howard, APR (Accredited in Public Relations), has more than 25 years of experience in public relations, integrated marketing, news, legislative advocacy, fund raising, risk management communications, employees communications and consumer relations. She is also currently the professional development chair for the Southern Arizona Chapter of the Public Relations Society of America. PR Corner appears the second week of each month and is written by members of the Public Relations Society of America Southern Arizona Chapter.