D646 Delivering a Communications Strategy, catalog number COMS 3200, is the three CU course in the WGU School of Business communications sequence that covers creating internal and external communications, including multimedia and press content, to meet business objectives. This is the production course. Where the earlier courses ask what should be said, this one asks you to actually make the things and then defend the way you made them.
Craft and rationale are scored separately
The mistake that costs most in COMS 3200 is assuming that good artefacts speak for themselves. They do not, because the rubric scores the reasoning as well as the output. A well designed internal announcement with no explanation of why it opens where it opens, why it runs to that length, and why it went to that channel, will lose aspects that a plainer piece with a clear rationale would win.
The second thing under examination is register. Internal and external communications are different disciplines and this course deliberately covers both. Internal writing can assume shared context and has to survive being forwarded. External writing assumes nothing, has to compete for attention with everything else in a reader's day, and carries reputational risk. Press content adds a third register again, because it is written for someone who will rewrite it. A submission that uses one voice across all three has missed a distinction the course is built on.
Third, this course tends to reward evidence of iteration. A finished artefact shows the result; a draft, a critique and a revision show the process. Where the directions allow it, including that trail is one of the strongest ways to demonstrate the craft aspects.
Turning scored aspects into a section plan
The rubric lives in your Course of Study rather than the catalog. Count the aspects and use them as headings for the rationale document that accompanies your artefacts. Each aspect is scored independently on a three point scale and each needs a 2, so strong external copy cannot carry a weak internal piece.
The mapping hazard in a production course is severe: much of the evidence is inside the artefacts. Name them explicitly. Refer to the piece, the section and the choice, so that an evaluator scoring an aspect can find the evidence without interpretation.
The word budget, worked. Assume six scored aspects and about 1,700 words of rationale alongside the artefacts. Reserve 130 words for an opening that restates the strategy being delivered and 110 for a close. That leaves near 1,460, about 240 per aspect. Then take 50 words from each of two descriptive aspects and add 100 to the aspect covering channel and format decisions and the remainder to the aspect covering adaptation across audiences. Those two are pure reasoning and cannot be satisfied by the artefacts alone.
A structure that fits a production deliverable
Where your directions specify a structure, follow it exactly. Where they do not, this ordering matches how production aspects tend to be scored.
| Section | What belongs in it | How it gets read |
|---|---|---|
| Strategy recap | The objective, audience and key message these artefacts serve | Anchors every production decision that follows |
| Artefact inventory | What you produced, for whom, in what channel, at what length | Lets the evaluator find evidence quickly |
| Internal communication | The piece plus the reasoning about tone, timing and forwarding risk | Timing relative to other announcements is often overlooked |
| External communication | The piece plus reasoning about attention, competition and reputational risk | Judged against a colder audience than internal work |
| Press or multimedia content | The piece plus reasoning about how a third party will use it | Press writing is scored on usability by a journalist, not on polish |
| Consistency | How the pieces hold one message without being identical | The section that shows a strategy rather than a set of documents |
| Distribution and measurement | Sequence, timing, and what you would look at afterwards | Sequence matters; internal before external is usually deliberate |
Keep one message across every artefact and change everything else. Different audiences need different evidence, different length and different tone, but a strategy where the underlying claim shifts between pieces is not a strategy.
Evidence craft for produced content
In a production course, the strongest evidence is often the working, not the finished piece.
- Keep drafts. A before and after pair with a note on what the revision fixed demonstrates craft directly.
- Cite the conventions you follow. Press release structure, accessibility standards and channel limits are documented, and naming the source converts a habit into a justified choice.
- State the constraints you worked within: character limits, brand rules, legal review, reading level targets.
- Check accessibility explicitly, including alternative text, captions and colour contrast, and say that you did.
- Attribute any statistic used inside an artefact to a real source, including within the artefact itself where the format allows.
- Use APA in the rationale document and keep quotation short.
Add a short note on what you would cut if the channel halved your space. It shows you know which part of the piece is load bearing, which is exactly the judgment the course is developing.
What separates Competent from a submission sent back
Independent aspect scoring means returns are narrow, and here they usually land on the rationale rather than on the artefacts.
- Every artefact has a stated audience, objective and channel, and the rationale names them.
- Internal and external pieces differ in register in ways the rationale explains.
- Press or multimedia content is shaped for how a third party will actually use it.
- The through line message is identical across pieces even where the wording is not.
- Distribution sequence and timing are argued rather than assumed.
Performance assessment work at WGU can be revised and resubmitted without a grade penalty, so a return costs calendar. Terms run six months at a flat rate, and production courses are the easiest place to lose a fortnight to rework that a rationale document would have prevented.
Six mistakes that cost time in D646
- Artefacts with no rationale. The reasoning is scored separately and cannot be inferred from the output.
- One voice for every audience. Internal, external and press are three registers, and using one is a visible miss.
- Press content written as advertising. A journalist needs facts, a quote and contact details, not persuasion.
- Ignoring accessibility. Missing alternative text and captions are easy to fix and easy for an evaluator to notice.
- Inconsistent core claim. Pieces that drift apart in substance undermine the strategy they are supposed to deliver.
- No sequencing plan. Publishing externally before telling staff is a real world failure and a scoreable one here.
Writing the same message in three registers
The clearest way to satisfy the adaptation aspects in D646 is to take one announcement and produce it deliberately three times, noticing what changes.
The internal version can assume context and should be honest about consequences. Staff already know the background, so the value you add is specificity: what changes, when, for whom, and what they should do differently on Monday. The risk to manage is that internal messages get forwarded, so nothing should be written that would embarrass the organisation outside it. Tone can be direct; ambiguity in internal writing is usually read as concealment.
The external version assumes nothing and competes for attention. It has to establish relevance in its first line, because a reader who does not see why this concerns them will not reach the second. Detail that is essential internally becomes noise here, and what matters is the effect on the reader rather than the mechanics of the change. Reputational risk is higher, so claims need evidence attached.
The press version is written for someone who will rewrite it, and that changes everything. The structure front loads the facts because material is cut from the bottom. A quotation is included because journalists need one and will use yours if it is usable, which means it should sound like a person rather than a committee. Contact details and a factual boilerplate matter more than elegant prose, because the piece is raw material rather than a finished statement.
Writing all three and then explaining the differences in a short comparison paragraph answers several aspects at once, and it demonstrates the judgment the course exists to build far better than any single polished artefact.
How support works on this course
Send the rubric from your Course of Study and the task directions. What comes back is aspect mapped: a rationale document structured to the aspects, sample artefacts in each register, accessibility and convention checks, and a consistency review across pieces. Plus a walkthrough so the production choices are yours to defend.
D646 is the heaviest course in the communications sequence for production time. Terms run six months at a flat rate, so planning artefact work around your other courses is worth doing before you start rather than afterwards.
Questions students ask about D646
Is D646 the same course as COMS 3200?
Do I need professional design software for the multimedia work?
Can you produce the artefacts for my submission?
Where D646 sits in WGU's programs
The July 2026 catalog places this code in 1 current WGU program. Open a program page for the complete standard path and term positions. The live Degree Plan remains authoritative after transfer credit, substitutions, and mentor planning.
The assessments, one by one
The public catalog does not publish this course's PA/OA identity or task count. WGU Tutors publishes at most one PA manual per course and only from a WGU-controlled public rubric. Until that source exists, PA help begins from the student's real Course of Study and OA support remains preparation only.