How to attract your workforce to your intranet time and time again.
You’ve invested in a shiny new intranet. You’ve ploughed funds and time into making sure it looks the part and works like a dream for employee engagement.
You know it is going to increase productivity, communication and costs – if only you could get the staff to use it. It takes time to encourage new habits. It will take your employees a little time to adapt to a new way of working. You can give them a helping hand by filling your intranet with content that is interesting and engaging, so they can’t help logging on.
We’ve put together our top tips for making sure that your staff are fully on board with your new investment.
Getting to know you
One of the best ways to engage your staff is to talk about your staff to increase employee engagement.
Help the team get to really know who they are working with day in day out with a series of fun “Team Focus” pieces. Invest in some decent photography. Get your marketing team to create a basic Q&A with some fun questions thrown in.
This has a two-fold approach. It will help staff to gain an insight into other departments and what they do all day long, and it will also humanise the people behind the job titles.
Industry insights
Staff who want to get ahead know that they need to be right up to date with what’s happening in and around the industry. There are no doubt many publications and websites where they can read up on what’s hot – and what’s not – but let’s face it, who has time to trawl through magazines every day?
Use your intranet to become a news hub for the must-read content for your industry. By providing a one-stop-shop for staff wanting to stay in the loop, your new intranet will be top of the reading list every time.
Networking
Networking is one of those things that most people fully intend to do – but they forget, are too busy, don’t like the out of hours work.
Creating a networking calendar on your intranet with all events listed in one place could be a huge help. Staff can plan ahead and have an at a glance guide to all of the options available. You could even task staff with writing reviews after the events to help others decide if they are worth attending.
Local events
While we are talking about calendars – why not make your intranet a central notice board for social activities taking place in your local area? Theatre productions, new restaurant openings, family days – this is a sure-fire way to encourage the staff to check your intranet daily.
Staff incentives and schemes
Everyone likes a freebie, right? Use your intranet to remind staff just how lucky they are to work at your organization by writing about all the cool things that your company can offer. There will probably be the usual things like pensions and training – but how about hobby schemes, gym memberships and discounts at local bars and restaurants?
Introducing a “Deal of the Week” will give staff a reason to regularly check in to see what’s on offer.
Create an office celebrity
We all love reading about people, so make your CEO that star of your organization. Take them out of their ivory tower and give staff the chance to really get to know them. With overviews of their hobbies and interests outside of work.
Position them as a thought leader – write regular columns on their behalf about their take on the latest industry trends or their business trip to another location. Strong leadership gives staff confidence in the stability of the company – as well as providing interesting reading material.
Focus on departments
In most organisations, staff only engage with the departments they work with directly. Chances are, your employees will have little knowledge of precisely what their neighbouring departments are doing all day. Write-ups on other offices, departments and people will only improve your company’s culture – while driving users to your intranet.
Add a picture of the day
To add interest, try a photo of the day feature. This could be anything that is quirky and unusual and doesn’t have to be connected to your business.
You could take it a step further and run a weekly photo competition amongst the staff, or even turn it into a game, with spot the difference or a “what in the office am I” feature.
Company news
Improve employees engagement in your organisation.
People want to hear about your organisation’s successes. So, shout about them with regular news updates and coverage that the company has had in the press or on social media. This is great to boost staff morale and employee engagement. Employees will be very interested in your company’s business performance. Cover everything from customer wins, new product launches, new starters and new customer support systems.
This section could also be used to quell the rumour mill if things are not going too well.
On a final note, it takes time to build up content, so make sure that you post something every day. Remember, content is king.