Developing Awareness Campaign For Life Risks Created Due To The Emissions Of Carbon Monoxide At UK Festival Market

Importance of Public Relations in Communicating Information

Public relation is one of the most efficient sources of communication between the company and individuals through public and media. The effective communicational transparency is essential for the PR specialists to communicate with the target audience through direct or indirect mediums (Lowenthal and Dunlap 2014). The public relation method becomes essential even when any issues are needed to be communicated through mediums or any awareness program is to be established. The report derived from the PR Census 2016 highlights that the industry is widely focusing on establishing the media relations, appropriate strategy planning, and communication through social media (Spence et al. 2015). The study would thus develop the effective public relations by communicating via online media channels. The identification of the issues, planning, and scheduled activities would be discussed further.

The study deals with the online communication marketing for creating awareness for the festival goers in UK Festival Market. This festival market welcomes the young visitors for spending the vacation and cheerful time with their closed ones. The festival goers are aware of the risks of drugs, drinks, and unprotected sex, but they are little less aware of the risks created due to the emission of carbon monoxide (Festivalinsights.com 2018). However, it has been observed that almost 25 people died due to the emitted carbon monoxide gas in the last year festival market (BBC News 2018). Even many of the people were taken to the hospital for rescue. It is noticed that almost 60% of the people going to this festival are under the age group of 30 among which some of are the first timers (Campingandcaravanningclub.co.uk 2018). The source of the emissions of carbon monoxide is the nearby barbecues brought by the campers and the fuel burning heaters into the tents. In fact, many people brought generators that were running near the tents. The carbon monoxide emitted from these sources was creating the fatal consequences for the campers (Festivalinsights.com 2018). Camping and Caravanning Club arranged a generic campaign for making the campers aware of the dangerous effects created due to the emissions of carbon monoxide. Carbon monoxide is the odourless and colourless gas that has the poisonous effects on human body by giving them the symptoms of vomiting, nausea, drowsiness, weakness and headaches. The report of these festival campaigns provide the instances of the fatal accidents caused due to CO consumptions. 

The public relation plan is scheduled to develop an awareness program by establishing the concerns regarding the fatal consequences created due to the CO emissions. This campaign development is quite effective for the people who are attending such festivals and spending times with their friends or families. The PR planning would include the industry convention, justification of the strategy, and the tactics applied to meet the objectives. In order to develop a sequential plan, it is essential to identify the target audience, key messages, and the online communication channels. The systematic activities would be performed to schedule the plan in an effective way. The social media tools and social networking sites, such as Twitter, Facebook, Bespoke Social networks, and LinkedIn would be used for sharing the information regarding the life risks caused due to the excessive consumptions of Carbon Monoxide. The videos including the shared experienced of the victims would be presented through YouTube, Vine, and Keek. In order to make this awareness plan more effective, the messaging services via SnapChat, Whatsapp, and Telegram will also be included.

Developing an Awareness Campaign

The objective of this public relation plan is to develop the awareness regarding the effects of CO emissions on human body. The severe accidental reports are already presented in this festival market. Therefore, it is now essential to develop a suitable strategy that can make people aware of the issues that may create life risks for the campers. We shall conduct an industry convention in every weekend from 1^st March, 2018 to 25^th April, 2018. In this meeting, we will discuss the subject of this awareness campaign that will be promoted through the online media. In this meeting, we will discuss about the following aspect:

• The social media use for posting pictures of the devastated scenario due to the accident occurred by CO emissions.
• Collecting the videos of the interviewees sharing their experiences.
• Creating the pages of social media and daily monitoring the reviews.
• Discussion on the progress report.

The strategy used in this program is to communicate with the public by creating the Facebook page. Majority of the people spend the quality time in browsing internet and surfing the social media sites. Therefore, creating a social media page and sending the invitation of this page to the target audience would be much beneficial in such context. The posts would contain the safety tips, list of do’s and don’ts, precautions, and disclaimers. The audiences are free to present their concerns and reviews on the posts. These reviews and discussions through online sources would influence the cautiousness among the target audiences. 

It is reported that almost 60% of the campers are under the age of 30 (Campingandcaravanningclub.co.uk. 2018). They spend quality time by enjoying this market festival with their friends and families. Therefore, the people between the ages of 18 to 45 are the target audience for this awareness campaign. The key message of this specific campaign is to develop the safety concern around the tents for preventing the risks of consuming carbon monoxide. This campaign development is quite effective for the people who are attending such festivals and spending times with their friends or families. The PR planning would include the industry convention, justification of the strategy, and the tactics applied to meet the objectives. The following safety tips are needed to be followed:

• Do not take the barbeque into a tent, caravan, awning, or motorhome. In fact, the cooling barbeque emits more CO gas, which is dangerous to the respiratory system.
• Do not use a fuel-burning appliance for heating your awning or tent.
• You should not run a gas, diesel-powered generator, or petrol inside a motorhome, caravan, awning, or tent.
• Do not cook inside your awning or tent.
• Do not use any charcoal, gas, solid fuel, or liquid fuel appliances inside the tent. 

 The online communication channels used for this campaign are as follows:

• Twitter (Social Media Tool)
• Facebook, Bespoke Social Networks (Social Networking sites)
• Instagram, Fickr (Photo sharing sites)
• YouTube, Vine, Keek (Video Sharing Sites)

These social networking sites will be used for creating the buzz among the target audience to present the concerns regarding the safety maintenance at the UK festival market. 

The entire plan will be formulated in a systematic format by availing the coherent timing. The schedule of the activities is presented below:

Time Schedule
Activities	Start Date	End Date	Week (s)
1. Arranging PR Plan Meeting	1st March, 2018	25th April	5 weeks
2. Creating Accounts in different online channels	2nd April	1st May	4 weeks
3. Gathering the lists of the target audiences	5th April	1st June	7 weeks
4. Sending Invitation for the social media pages	3rd June	30th June	2 weeks
5. Sharing pictures, blogs, articles, and contents in different social media	1st July	18th August	5 weeks
6. Posting video links on the pages	7th August	6th September	6 weeks
7. Reviewing and Replying to the comments and queries of the audience	7th September	1st October	4 weeks

Table: Activity Schedule

(Source: Created by Author)

The public relation method is chosen by developing the awareness campaign through social media. This festival market welcomes the young visitors for spending the vacation and cheerful time with their closed ones. The festival goers are aware of the risks of drugs, drinks, and unprotected sex, but they are little less aware of the risks created due to the emission of carbon monoxide. The social media sites provide the continuous information regarding the risks created for carbon monoxide emissions. The carbon monoxide emitted from these sources was creating the fatal consequences for the campers (Campingandcaravanningclub.co.uk 2018). The experiences of the sufferers are also shared through videos and articles. This campaign development is quite effective for the people who are attending such festivals and spending times with their friends or families. The PR planning would include the industry convention, justification of the strategy, and the tactics applied to meet the objectives. These reviews and discussions through online sources would influence the cautiousness among the target audiences. The reviews and replies are monitored, but it lacked the proper measurement process. It was necessary to measure the progress report whether the target audiences were convinced with such safety tips. In fact, it was also necessary to measure whether the audiences took such advice before they visit the festival market. Hence, the method of using this social media communication method was quite limited. 

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