When it comes to internal communication, the power of knowledge lies in its capacity to generate impactful and well-informed messages. However, what exactly is at stake?
Good Internal Communication Boosts Employee Engagement
According to Gallup’s survey, organizations that achieved a high level of employee engagement witnessed:
- + 18% Productivity (sales)
- – 64% Safety Incidents (accidents)
- – 81% Absenteeism
- + 23% Profitability
These findings strongly imply that effective internal communication plays a pivotal role in enhancing employee engagement. Organizations prioritizing effective internal communication foster engagement, trust, and collaboration. This inclusive environment nurtures accountability and motivates employees to contribute their best, resulting in improved performance, teamwork, innovation, and a competitive advantage.
The Importance of Data-Led Communication
Data-led communication is crucial as it meets employees’ need for personalized and timely information. By leveraging data-driven insights, organizations can deliver relevant information through preferred channels, enhancing engagement and empowering employees. This tailored approach ensures employees receive the right information in a format that resonates with them, fostering a culture of transparency and open communication. Additionally, data-led communication enables organizations to measure effectiveness, make data-driven improvements, and adapt strategies accordingly.
Choosing the Right Communication Channel for Your Needs
In today’s digital age, communication channels have multiplied, enabling organizations to share information across platforms. However, this abundance can lead to information overload. With multiple channels like emails, messaging apps, and social media, employees face a deluge of data, making prioritization challenging. Streamlined communication strategies are crucial to deliver the right information at the right time, minimizing overload and promoting clarity.
In 2022, the ROI agency questioned 100 senior communication leaders in its survey on trends, challenges and impact of employee communication:
Source: https://roico.com/resources/roi-benchmark-findings/
As shown above, emails and intranets continue to serve as the primary means of communication with employees. The popularity of digital newsletters is also growing: over 50% of respondents use a messaging platform to send newsletters that is separate from Outlook or Gmail.
Mere Channel Presence Falls Short
In the internal communication department, it is crucial to acknowledge that merely having users subscribed to a channel does not guarantee their engagement with the communications. For instance, while email is a widely used platform, it’s observed that less than half of the recipients open the communication newsletters. Therefore, it is essential to focus on strategies that not only attract users to the channel but also motivate them to actively engage with the communicated content.
Back to Basics
Effective internal communication starts by understanding your target audiences, allowing you to create customized content and messaging that connects with different employee groups. By recognizing and addressing their challenges, organizations can cultivate internal communication that drives engagement, collaboration, and overall success. But how can this be achieved?
1. Know your audiences: Do you have personas?
Understanding your target audiences is crucial for effective internal communication. Develop personas to create tailored content that resonates with different employee groups, considering their needs, preferences, and communication styles. This targeted approach fosters better engagement and understanding.
2. Measure your performance: Start somewhere
To enhance internal communication, establish a baseline and track performance over time. Identify key metrics aligned with communication goals, like email open rates, survey response rates, or intranet engagement. Consistently measure and analyze these metrics to identify trends, improve areas, and track communication impact.
3. Go beyond metrics: User feedbacks, surveys
Don’t overlook qualitative feedback. Surveys, focus groups, and conversations offer valuable insights into employees’ perceptions and improvement suggestions. Qualitative data complements metrics, enhancing understanding and enhancing communication strategies.
4. Iterate
Internal communication is iterative. Continuously evaluate and refine strategies based on data, feedback, and evolving needs. Regularly assess channel effectiveness, messaging, and tactics. Embrace experimentation, learn from successes and failures, and make adjustments. Adopt an iterative approach for relevant and impactful internal communication.
The Future of Insights
In Gallagher’s State of the Sector 2022/23 report, a survey was conducted among over 2,000 communication and HR managers to determine the anticipated impact of various factors on internal communication within the next five years.
Source: https://www.ajg.com/employeeexperience/state-of-the-sector-2023/
The future of internal communication shows promising advancements. According to the survey, hyper personnalization emerged as the most anticipated trend, with 55% of respondents recognizing its potential (total of “Most impactful” and “Somewhat impactful” answers). Artificial intelligence closely followed, with 40% foreseeing its influence, while gamification garnered attention from 32% of participants. These findings underscore the growing recognition of innovative technologies and their potential to revolutionize internal communication strategies in the years ahead.
In conclusion, the future of internal communication is promising as organizations embrace emerging trends. As technology evolves, the future of internal communication looks bright, offering limitless possibilities for enhanced connectivity and effective information dissemination within organizations.
About Tryane Analytics
Tryane Analytics was established in 2008 with the mission of empowering internal communications with actionable insights allowing them to be more efficient. Communication Insights is the latest and most comprehensive solution of Tryane Analytics. It is an all-in-one analytics solution to connect all your internal communication channels (email newsletter, intranet/digital workplace, enterprise social network) and access a holistic view of all your KPIs in one place.
Our cross-channel analytics platform helps internal communication professionals to be more efficient and gain valuable insights including two of our most popular features: Best Time to Post, which optimizes communication timing for maximum reach, and Monthly Reports that helps you provide accurate data effortlessly, in just one click. Increase your chances of reaching your target audience effectively and access comprehensive data to make informed decisions instantly. Streamline your performance tracking, adapt your strategies, and make data-driven decisions with Communication Insights:
Communication Insights by Tryane Analytics
Contact us today to learn more about our all-in-one analytics solution for internal communications. Get an understanding of the best ways to use your data to optimize your company’s internal communications and better engage employees.