Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Guide to
Internal
Communications
Strategy
1
The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
Table of
Contents
Some Pre-Strategy 3
Essentials
The Four Stages of a Successful Internal Comms 6
Strategy
Vision: Lead the 8
Way
Align: The Secret to 1
Success 1
Research & Insights: Removing the 1
Guesswork 3
Creation: Building Your Internal Communications 1
Strategy 8
The Next 24
Steps
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
Some Pre-Strategy
Essentials
The way we work, where we work, and how we work have
fundamentally changed. Organizations have more distributed
workforces…hybrid work is kind of a thing now. This presents great
opportunities—primarily the fact that the talent pool just got a lot
bigger, as geography and proximity are no longer the main things
impacting hiring. But it also poses great challenges, especially in relation
to culture, employee experience, attrition, and retention.
From leaders driving home their vision and ambitions and setting the
tone for the culture and values of the business, to managers leading
dispersed teams, and employees giving feedback and being
listened to – everything revolves around internal communication.
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
What do we Mean
by Omnichannel
Communication and
Why is it so Essential?
Omnichannel communications is the only way to
overcome one of the biggest challenges in workplace
communication today: cutting down distracting
comms noise and reducing information overload for
employees. Just imagine relevant, targeted content,
delivered to your workforce, on the channel and
device of their choice. That’s what they want. And
you can give it to them.
“
for employees what Marketing has done for
customer experience (CX). Essentially, CX puts the
customer front and center, and internally in
an organization, the employee is the customer.
This is how former Time Warner SVP of Customer It’s all about
Care, John Bowden, explains it: “Omnichannel is
viewing the experience through the eyes of your communications
that are aimed at a
customer, orchestrating experience across all specific
“somebody” rather than a
channels so that it is seamless, integrated, and
consistent.” This omnichannel strategic approach
generic “everybody.” This
has been key to successful customer experience for encourages people to tune in
decades, and it’s been proven time and again that
companies who excel at CX outperform those
to workplace communications
who don’t. instead of tuning out.
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
“
Now that we’ve set out the essential foundation
on which any employee communications strategy
must be based, let’s move on to the four stages of a
successful IC strategy.
From an employee
comms
standpoint, an
omnichannel
approach requires
communicators to view every
communication through the
eyes of the employee.
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
The Four
Stages to a
Successful IC
Strategy
Tactics Are Not Finding Your Focus
Strategy Start by exploring the various business objectives your
internal communications strategy must support.
The first order of business in developing an internal
communications strategy is to clearly define what it is It is difficult not to overstate how imperative it is to
not. A strategy is a carefully chosen plan that is created have your internal communications strategies aligned
to bring about a future state of operations. Tactics, on to business goals.
the other hand, are the actual means used to achieve
the goals defined in the strategy. The confusion That said, one strategy may not achieve every
between the two is a common mistake within the objective. And a company may need more than
Internal Communications & HR community. one strategy to reach a desired future state. Your
objectives can range from changing employee
In some cases, tactics are applied from other behaviors to educating employees on benefits to
companies or competitors without any consideration driving productivity—and a lot more.
as to whether they are an appropriate fit. The
essential rule is that tactics are most effective when Sometimes you need to communicate with
aligned with an overall strategy. thousands of employees to provide guidance across
different locations. There are some objectives that
For example, let’s say you are asked to communicate present great challenges such as transforming the
an important message to all employees. Do you global culture of the entire organization. Whatever
choose to create a poster that will hang near the your objectives may be, it is important to clearly
elevators, or do you post it on your company’s define them before developing your strategy.
intranet? Or both? How do you know which approach
is best? How do you measure and report results? Is Once you’ve identified your objectives, you can use
your content sending the right message to the right these four stages to craft a foundational internal
audience? Are employees taking action? So many communications strategy that wins over leaders and
questions. Without a strategy, you cannot answer employees alike.
these questions.
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
The Four
Stages to a
Successful
Strategy Are:
01 02 03 04
The IC profession attracts a variety of people At the end of the day, it will be up to you to take your
from different backgrounds. Most are passionate organization into the future with a powerful and
and empathetic and, of course, very good modern approach to enable effective and efficient
communicators. But currently “change management” internal communications.
and “business acumen” are not core skillsets. This
must change. As your business grows, you need to FWI and Poppulo offers advanced analytics,
revisit your strategy. You must keep your finger on employee polls and surveys, and real-time, two-
the pulse of your company and use more data-driven way feedback to help leaders assess their impact.
approaches to advance your strategy over time. Analyze which content and channels perform best
and which audience segments are most and least
If you are not comfortable implementing a engaged to ensure your messages resonate and your
strategic vision built to evolve, then find a change communications strategy is optimized.
management resource within your company or seek
help from outside your organization. Ideally, you
should acquire the skills yourself to become adept
in working this way and become the subject matter
expert. Creating the strategy is only the beginning of
the process. You need to make it live and breathe.
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
Step 1:
Vision Lead
the Way
Vision Do’s
Answer these questions to hone your vision. And let
your vision inform your next steps.
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
Why is it begins to turn your vision into a reality. This gives you
the opportunity to inspire, inform, and defend your
Important to ideas.
Remember, you are always selling this vision so make
Your
Find a North Vision?
business strategy, you now need to be able to envision
Star: A good practice for all internal what success looks like. Again, you aren’t looking for
communications practitioners is to seek out inspiration perfection, but you must achieve important milestones.
and success stories from other industry leaders. Find Identify key performance indicators (KPIs) that are
a LinkedIn group such as IABC or The Institute of relevant to your business. These may include lower
Internal Communications (IoIC) to gain insights on turnover, increased trust, employer brand perception,
best practices. And dive into industry reports from a change of behavior or habit, learning, or productivity.
leaders such as Gallup, Edelman, Deloitte, McKinsey
and Harvard Business Review.
Beyond KPIs, there are other aspects that are less
Documentation Shows Commitment: Putting your tangible but are equally important to measure.
vision down into words gives the idea credibility and These include answering questions such as: What
increases the chance of it actually happening. In fact, are the best channels to use to reach employees?
research shows goals are more often met when they Are employees getting the information they want
are documented. or need? Is the information timely and transparent
enough? How does the company guide employees
Facilitate Alignment: You need people to buy into the through their journeys? Do employees have a channel
vision. By documenting it (providing examples and to provide feedback?
using data and insights), you will start a discussion
that
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
Elements of
Your IC Vision
Along with these vital questions, there are outcomes
to consider such as sentiment, behavior, and return on
investment. Poppulo offers the only communications
and workplace experience platform that lets you
deploy content across digital signage, mobile, email,
Teams, and more—plus manage room and desk
booking, all from one platform.
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
Step 2: Align
The Secret to Success
Support for your internal communications strategy Finally, there is your own team, who will be part of
beyond your department is vital. That makes finding creating and sustaining the strategy. Having their
alignment with the key people in your organization support will make it easier to move forward, and they
essential to win the support you need. can provide useful insight along the way.
But who are these people? As the IC Kollectif It is important to keep in mind that internal
puts it, “Internal communicators need to have the communications cuts across every part of your
confidence to engage with senior management and organization, touching employees and job seekers
to educate them on how to achieve effective internal too. Success will be determined by your effective
communications.” So, to begin this stage, you need to alignment and participation throughout the different
know who to align with to move your vision forward. departments or office locations.
First, consider the stakeholders or executive So, it is also helpful to seek out specific people
committee who own the responsibility of developing leaders throughout your organization. They’ll know
the strategy and its outcome. Without their the most engaged employees and can recommend
participation and buy-in, there will not be any a short list of people who can champion your
strategy or the one you create will not be as effective. strategy. This will help you validate your plans and will
play an important role in the execution of your vision.
Second, look at the executive leadership or C-Suite.
They are ultimate decision-makers and will review
what you and the other stakeholders present. Some
may also sit on your executive committee as well.
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
“
personal lives.
• Measurement: Everything is quantifiable today,
from your steps to your individual productivity,
so measurement needs to be a top priority for
all internal communicators if they are to A vision is only as strong
stay relevant.
as your commitment to
Next, you will begin aligning these important people it.
around your strategic vision. But you must be ready
to present it with confidence and, at the same time, Help leadership and your
be open to feedback and be willing to fine-tune your stakeholders align on what it
vision based on their likes or dislikes.
will take to achieve
You also need to assess what parts of your vision
are culturally relevant. And be honest with yourself
success.
about how much change (and how quickly) your
organization can adopt. It is crucial that you manage
the expectations of your leadership and
stakeholders.
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
“
• Capacity: Capacity is one of the most overlooked,
yet crucial factors in creating an internal
communications strategy. It is rare to find any
company that has enough people with the time
to execute the work that needs to be done.
Regardless of the size of your team (large or The more you know about
small) don’t make plans you can’t support. your
audience’s preferences, the
Honestly assess the capabilities of your team and
ensure everyone (full-time, contracted, or agency) more you can create and
has the capacity to plan, implement, measure and deliver targeted content they
iterate your internal communications.
are ready to consume and
activate around. Spend the time
to find out what will drive them
to take the action being asked
of them.
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
15
The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
Now, let’s review what to look for in your surveys and • What behaviors need to change?
interviews. Go back and recall the assumptions you • What new habits need to form?
made when you created your vision and craft questions • Does culture need to transform or not? If so, how?
that help you validate or invalidate each one. From
• What are the capabilities and capacity of my
there, you can get the information you need to move
current team?
forward. Consider how you could craft survey
questions to answer any assumption made for • How does my team need to grow to support
the following questions: my vision?
• How are our leaders perceived? What you take away from the research process will
• How can I get leaders to participate in internal be your raw data. It’s critical to spend time crafting
communications? your survey questions so you get the most useful data
• What channels and vehicles do employees prefer possible. From there, you will begin to analyze the data
and why? in order to extract meaningful insights. One approach
• What are the best times of day/week to send we use is a gap analysis, where you compare your
communications? future state vision with the discoveries you made in
your audits, surveys, and interviews.
• How frequently should communications be sent
before an employee feels like it is too much?
• What issues and frustrations do they have?
• How do they consume communications and
learn best?
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
Find the areas of strength and weakness and identify The workshop offers you an opportunity to step-up
the gaps between where you are and where you and make a powerful business case for your vision.
want to be. You may already have some early Make it count. Create a roadmap of key milestones
thoughts on how to take action on these gaps. Now over a 1-3 year time span, using visual
consolidate your findings. representations of actions, owners, and timing.
These are the insights that are born out of your data During the workshop, seek to align with leadership
analysis. Document each insight in a clear and and stakeholders in order to prioritize the actions
concise manner and include notes on potential actions taken in order to achieve the vision. The types of
you can take in response to what you have found. actions vary from company to company. They can
focus on your people, such as activating employees
Once you feel confident you have thoroughly around your employer brand or refining your
researched, extracted, and documented valuable recruitment marketing.
and game-changing insights, it is time to present
your findings to your stakeholders. The most effective Maybe it is more about your culture like updating the
way to do this is to conduct a workshop with key company’s purpose and values or creating content
stakeholders and executive leadership. about the company’s heritage or history. Regardless
of the specific actions you and your stakeholders
Here you will review the insights, align on the decide to include, an action list should be the output of
objectives and prioritize the actions you need to the workshop. This is the moment when your strategy
take. Before you present, take one last look at your begins to take shape.
findings. As objectively as you can, ask yourself what
the insights tell you. Are they clear enough to help
you decide what actions you need to take? Does
the research go deep enough to allow you and the
stakeholders to understand the issues and realize
the solutions?
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
Step 4: Creation
Building Your
Internal
Communications
Your prioritized objectives and actions are now
finalized and fully supported by your stakeholders and
This is based on what they do, their preferences, the
challenges they face, and other relevant information. If
Strategy
executive leaders. Good work. you are using personas, you usually create three to
five to start with. Audience segmentation is a process
Now you are ready to get to work on applying your of dividing employees into subgroups based upon
vision, alignment, and insights to build your internal defined criteria.
communications strategy. To begin this process, you
will first need to create two important foundational These include demographics, psychographics,
tools that you will use going forward. communication behaviors, media consumption use,
and learning styles. Audience segmentation can go as
deep as you need it to. Regardless of which direction
Create a Profile you take, the point is to create a profile that allows
you to know your audience.
of Your Audience Armed with this tool, you will be able to create targeted
content across your organization, where the messages
The first tool is a profile of your employee audience. are heard and followed through with action.
This can be either in the form of personas or a more
robust segmentation. Think of a persona as a high-level
summary of the key behaviors and characteristics of
an employee.
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
Brand
Another critical toolset is the employer brand, and to
Play off your brand and culture to find visual styles that
can help connect with employees more easily. Also
start is made up of two components: A narrative and a using the power of design, you can drive excitement
style guide. Few companies today have an established around your brand and communications.
employer brand, but many are starting to jump on
The style guide will also be used to police the brand.
the bandwagon.
It should include lightweight direction on what to do
It’s becoming clear they understand that an employer and not do to make it easier for employees to stay
brand plays an important role in managing the on brand.
perception employees have of what it is like to work for
the company.
“
To create the employee value proposition, find the
aspects of your company, brand, culture, and total
rewards that excite and inspire your employees.
It is also helpful to assess the connection and/or To create the employee value
disconnect between your brand and its perception
among your employees. Use this knowledge to create
proposition, find the aspects
a narrative that clearly and concisely describes what of your company, brand,
value the company offers employees
beyond compensation.
culture, and total rewards
that excite and inspire your
Tone of voice is important here too. Make sure you find
an appropriate employee-centric tone that fits your
employees.
brand and culture. Ideally, you should create a tone that
feels personalized, just like marketers do for you as
a consumer.
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
Create Your
Internal
Communications
Strategy
You might not realize it, but by this point in the
process you are almost finished creating your internal
communications strategy. You now have:
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
Strategy
Document
Your strategy document should include the
following content:
• Overview: Summarize the communication
objectives and how they help serve the overall
business strategy
• Insights: Summarize what you learned about your
leaders and employees, such as their preferences,
learning styles, and channels use
• Employer Brand: Include the employee value
proposition and style guide
• Audience Profile: Provide the personas
or segmentation
• Channels: Map audience profile to preferred
channels and vehicles
• Actions: Summarize the prioritized actions your
internal communications strategy will focus on
• Resources: Detail the resources you need including
(but not limited to) recruiting, staffing, and training
people, tools, and technology, tactical creative
planning and execution, content creation, agency
support, etc.
• Change Management: Include a summary of
your change management plan
• Measurement: Include a measurement plan—
what you plan to measure; how frequently you
will share results with stakeholders and executive
leaders; how you will share the results; and what
you will do with the results
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
Once you know the types of content and Finally, you will need to report back to leadership and
channels you want to leverage, you can begin to align on insights and next steps. What will you change,
assess what to measure and how to measure it. optimize, or delete. With these newfound insights, you
Through now have the opportunity to fine-tune your content for
effective measurement, you will overcome the gap of your audience and channel, so you are better able to
investment and influence many IC and HR reach your objective.
professionals experience when they don’t have a
measurement plan. The following is a recommended flow:
Part of your process must include planning of content • Create the content/communications and
and channels to achieve maximum effectiveness. promotional content. These people/disciplines
Create an editorial calendar to help you manage the should be working together as a team to ideate,
cadence of your message against all other scheduled create, iterate, and finalize content
communications. And lastly, don’t forget about your • Copywriting
promotional plan. This is how you will create • Design
awareness of your communications, so they are seen
• Production
and
acted upon. • QA
• Publish
Now you are ready to execute your tactical plan
• Content promotion
and create the content for your communications
(this includes any promotional material as well). • Measure the effectiveness of your content
Tactical execution has many distinct parts and • Report on the effectiveness of your approach
deserves a quick review. • Present reports back to team/leadership
The process requires a team of creators in a variety • Align on what to iterate/optimize/create/delete
of disciplines that will produce and finalize your • Republish
content. This includes different components such as
copywriting, design, production (video, design, digital,
and more) and quality assurance.
Aside from the publishing and promotion of content,
there’s also the job of measuring the impact and
effectiveness of the content you publish.
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
The Next
Steps
We’ve taken you through the process of creating
an effective internal communications strategy so
that each communication your business sends has
a measurable impact.
Once you have completed a strategy and moved
into the tactical action stage of communications, it is
important to recognize your role as content creator
and internal marketer. And while your strategy will
be built on a strong foundation of your company’s
brand and culture, it is imperative to often revisit your
approach as your company grows or changes
over time.
This whitepaper is an updated version of the Understand your audience
original created for Poppulo by Vignette, the
Employee Experience Company, and written by and culture through research
Gregg Apirian and Mike Lepis. and insight.
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The Ultimate Guide to Internal Communications Strategy
About
Poppul
o
In a scattered world, we bridge
the gaps. We connect people,
systems, and ways of working to
• Communicate effectively with
your entire workforce via the
channels they prefer
deepen relationships and help • Create content once and publish it
organizations move forward. to all your key channels for greater
workflow efficiency
At Poppulo, we connect the people you need to reach
• Foster engagement and
—from employees to customers—with the right
productivity by communicating
message at just the right moment in time. Imagine
employee achievements,
easily delivering communications across email, digital
company innovations, KPIs and
signage, mobile, Intranet, collaboration tools, and the
performance dashboards, health
other channels your employees and customers rely
and safety info, and so much more
on, all from one platform. Then imagine that same
• Understand and improve the
platform powering your workplace experience and
impact of communications
simplifying space reservation and management. That’s
through detailed analytics and AI-
the reality the Poppulo Harmony communications
driven content insights
and workplace experience platform provides.
• Maximize the value of your
And that’s the reality over 6,000 customers across physical space with desk and
80 countries enjoy every day. Backed by Vista Equity meeting room booking, digital
Partners, a market-leading investment firm focused wayfinding, interactive kiosks
on enterprise software, data, and technology- and directories, location-aware
enablement organizations, Poppulo is positioned to messaging, space analytics, and
help your business achieve more—across employee more
communications, customer communications, and • Improve your customer
workplace management use cases. experience at every turn with
applications for menu and promo
Interested in learning more? Give us a call. Send us boards, event displays, virtual
an email. Whichever communication style you prefer, concierge applications, digital
we’re here for you. wayfinding, flight information, and
so much more
www.poppulo.com
• Leverage hundreds of integrations
with key tools and data sources
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Poppulo is prohibited. 25