In Nigeria’s development sector, especially in public health and behaviour change campaigns, communication often becomes the scapegoat when programmes fall short.

Take a meningitis immunisation campaign with a target of 95% coverage. If the goal isn’t met, you’ll hear:

• “Awareness was poor.”
• “Mobilisation didn’t reach the right people.”
• “The radio jingles missed choosing the right audience.”

But was communication given a specific, measurable behaviour target to begin with?

Consider the example of a meningitis prevention campaign. Health teams aim to vaccinate 95% of eligible people, but not everyone who shows up will receive the jab—some may be turned away for medical reasons, vaccine stock-outs, or even long queues and delays which can make people genuinely have to go away. Imagine a breastfeeding mother, a person taking care of the sick, or a petty trader; they cannot stay away for too long without needing to leave at some point. Therefore, communication must aim to mobilise at least 100% turnout to achieve the 95% coverage, if the 5% has fallen through the cracks.

Communication might also need to involve health workers whose attitudes and behaviours are often known to be sometimes repulsive to clients, or just responsible for unnecessary delays.

So what is the missing link in all this? Behavioural monitoring.

Most M&E frameworks in communication stop at outputs like:

1. Number of radio spots aired
2. Number of social media impressions
3. Quantity of flyers distributed

That’s not enough. We must go deeper and ask:

• How many people took action after hearing the messages in our communication materials?
• If they got the message, did they show up at the right place, at the right time for the vaccination?
• Can we trace or link their turnout action to our specific messages? How? For example, did our social mobilisations record the names of persons they contacted during house to house visits? Did any of those persons show up?

Practical Solutions

So, for you having these challenges, here are one or two things that should work.

1. Set clear communication objectives tied to desired behaviours (e.g., turnout at vaccination points, number of calls to helplines, etc.). Set behavioural targets, not just media goals.

2. Design communication M&E frameworks that include behavioural indicators. Behaviours are things people do. Of course, taking one action does not fully count as behaviour but, in this case, one action in the desired direction counts in tracking behavioural indicators. Such data are needles pointing that something is working. Use the data gotten from this to prove what works—and fix what doesn’t. This is the advantage of the Emergency Operations Center (EOC) concept that Nigeria deployed for polio, Ebola, COVID-19 and other health emergency campaigns.

3. Collect data at multiple levels—not just on message dissemination, but on how people engage with and respond to the message. Just note: Track action, not just attention. This way you can say exactly what worked and for what proportion of beneficiaries or clients. Always ensure you bridge the data gap that often makes it difficult for even the most conscientious comms expert to assert what they know. We can bridge the data gap.

Two ways we have bridged data gap, which communication teams can adopt for smart tracking are as follows:

A. Tally Cards: Distribute simple cards during community mobilisation with details of the vaccination date, time, and location. When people turn up with these cards, we can link their attendance directly to the communication effort.

B. Message-Based Codes: Embed short codes or phrases in jingles or posters. For example, “Say Healthy95 at the health centre.” Those who use this code at the service point can be directed to a faster queue. This not only improves service experience but also helps track which message moved them to act.

These tools help us track real-time behaviour—not just media reach. They also provide evidence of communication’s contribution to campaign outcomes.

Have you tried any of these strategies in your programmes?

Or would you like us to share how we used them in our own campaigns?

Comment “Yes” to hear more. Or share your own approach below.

Let’s stop guessing. Let’s measure what really matters.