The Local Offer (LO) Marketing Plan 2024 to 2025 reflected a coordinated commitment across internal services, local community organisations and co-production groups to promote the LO. This includes:
Promotion through council teams
- Council staff used a Family Hub email banner and QR code for email signatures for 4 months, directing stakeholders to the website.
- Education and SEND services continue to include LO information and website links to their standard email signatures ensuring information was shared with each outgoing email.
Digital promotion on various newsletters
- Fortnightly newsletter from Parentsactive: Edition 115: Sent to parents of SEND
- H&F Early years newsletter for April 2024: Sent to childcare providers
- H&F School Staff Zone 25 November 2024: Sent to schools
Promotional materials
- 2,000 Family Hubs 3-way leafletswere distributed across community centres, education, and health providers including GPs and health visitors.
- 500 LO business cards were shared with SEND families and professionals to increase its awareness and use.
Outreach
The LO information officer attended over 20 events including health, education and community fairs, co-production sessions with residents, coffee mornings and Family Hubs launch events. This allowed the LO team to speak directly with families, young people and other professionals to promote the service, and signpost services to support their needs.
Outreach sessions were very well received by the community:
"Thanks so much for all the information on the day and for taking the time to speak to some of us individually. The website is very helpful and easy to navigate"
"The event was well attended, and parents felt that it was useful to navigate the website with the LO officer and to suggest any additions to it on the day"
In response, the LO expanded its outreach plans on the 2025–2026 marketing plan.
Promotional outcomes and reflections
The 2025 Annual SEND Survey results showed that awareness of the LO reached 47.1%, progressing well toward the 60% target and achieving 78.5% of the goal set in the marketing plan. Additionally, the marketing campaign exceeded its usage target of 30%, reaching 33%.
Progress toward awareness and usage targets tends to grow steadily reflecting the time and effort needed to build trust and reach targeted audiences.
Based on these experiences and the progress made from 2024 the LO is working towards achieving 60% awareness by March 2026.
Distribute co-produced LO poster (created in March 2025) and the use of social media to boost awareness and engagement.