Escape the vicious internal comms cycle

As you try to plan your communication strategy, a comms request comes down from the exec team – stopping you in your tracks. You get to work on creating the content. You work with HR and IT to get the contact list. Once the right people have reviewed the draft, it’s finally time to manually share via email and other communication channels. The comms has been sent and now you’re flying blind from here – no data on who is viewing and responding. 

Without analytics to inform your comms strategy and the time to plan an intentional action plan, your comms end up half-hazard and reactive. 

Does this sound like you? Are you trapped in the vicious internal comms cycle? We’ve seen this all too often. It’s understandable to get caught up in the weeds. We’re here to help you get out. 

How does this cycle sound instead?

The difference here is how content analytics will drive your comms strategy and allow you take control of the communication cycle, while also fielding executive requests. Once content is shared, there will be data on who did and didn’t view, who did and didn’t take action, etc. You can use this information to re-share and target unengaged employees. Having the numbers from campaign performance can give internal comms leaders the confidence to make informed recommendations for new content. In this cycle, the internal comms leader is driving the comms strategy and doing the job he or she wanted to do all along.  

Break the vicious cycle with data

Move from being on the back-foot and feeling like you’re constantly fielding requests and filling out orders. Instead think about how you can proactively take control of the internal communications strategy. An internal tool can help you streamline creating and sharing content and tracking its performance.  

Real-time data and numbers can help pinpoint which employees are feeling disconnected and unengaged. According to research, there are a lot of – only about 13% of the workforce is highly engaged. This is a huge area internal comms teams can help solve for since, less than 50% of executives know how to address the issue. A return on investment from employee engagement alone would greatly improve any company.  

With a tool, like Cleary, the internal comms team can filter out unengaged employees and run a campaign and target them as a specific audience and make sure they are reading and responding to the content. The comms analytics can also reveal which campaigns have been the most successful and which ones need improvement. Overall, the data derived from an internal comms tool can help create more intentional and direct messaging and give comms leaders the confidence to take-charge of the content cycle. 

And at a time when budgets have tightened and fewer people are doing more, tools can help maintain a comms process and easily scale – when the time comes. An internal tool that’s able to integrate several softwares – HRIS systems, messaging apps, and shared documents – puts many key components for the comms team in one place to seamlessly share content to a select few or a wide audience. 

Everything is happening so fast these days and in our hyperconnected world it’s somehow getting harder to communicate clearly. To be an effective internal communication leader, you will need data and content analytics to be proactive and get your message across.