Internal Communications Strategy: Key Steps & Best Practices

17.5.2023
Read time: 13 min
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Internal Communications Strategy: Key Steps & Best Practices
Try Publicate For Free Today
02.03.2022
Read time: 13 min

If you want your organization to thrive, having an effective internal communications strategy is vital. And when it comes to internal communication tools, newsletters can be a game-changer.

In this article, we'll explore why effective employee communication is important, how newsletters can help you achieve success with internal communication, and how that leads to company improvements overall.

Guide Index

What is an Internal Communications Strategy?

Creating an effective internal communication plan is essential for constructing a prosperous company culture.

There are several types of communication strategies available to encourage the sharing and comprehension of information, aid collaboration amongst workers, and promote workplace transparency.

Internal email newsletters are always highly recommended by organizations that have achieved success in this department.

Ultimately, these internal communication tools - such as internal newsletters - should keep staff informed on what's going on in the organization. Another focus of the messaging is to cultivate staff involvement with company objectives – making it important that your approach is tailored to your employees and your business' individual needs.

With open communication and collaboration, you can foster engagement between employees that goes beyond just workplace goals. It can nurture a culture based on the unique values of your organization. This connection to their work is what drives them forward and helps transform ambitious plans into successes.

Why is an Internal Communications Strategy Important?

Internal communications are vital for any business hoping to build success. Without it, employees can feel disconnected and lack motivation in their work, leading to decreased productivity and increased turnover rates.

However, when there's an effective internal communication strategy in place that promotes engagement among staff members, job satisfaction skyrockets. In turn, the business benefits from higher productivity levels and reduced employee turnover.

An effective internal communication plan keeps everyone in the loop and eliminates guesswork when it comes to decision-making. Everyone has the necessary information they need at their fingertips, allowing staff to make sound calls that can propel organizational progress.

Thoughtful communication promotes unity, clarity and coherence along the entire organizational chain. By ensuring consistent messaging throughout all departments, it prevents misinformation from spreading and minimizes potential misunderstandings or conflicts within company boundaries, leading to a successful collective pursuit of shared goals that are in line with corporate vision, mission and values.

Moreover, strong messaging is pivotal for a successful transition when change is occurring. It will help minimize surprises and provide employees with time to prepare, ensuring everyone adapts with less hiccups, which means smoother sailing during those turbulent times!

Man and woman coworkers high-five each other in an office meeting
Picture from Unsplash

What are the Benefits of an Internal Communications Strategy?

An optimized internal communications strategy brings employees together, aligning them with company goals and boosting productivity.

By offering easy access to vital information for every employee, decision-making capability significantly increases; this leads to greater growth for the company as a whole.

Additionally, effective communication can result in unity among co-workers - creating trust and collaboration which builds upon itself resulting in a friendly work environment that all can be proud of.

A great way to reach your internal communication goals is through email newsletters. They’re easy to personalize with convenient email builders that require no coding or designers.

This way, you can share any type of message in little time as you can leverage the hundreds of pre-built templates and drag-and-drop functionality to customize your content.

With newsletters, you can maintain timely dialogue throughout the organization. Plus you dont need any coders or designers. An email builder does all the work for you, and integrates directly with your existing email service provider like Gmail and Outlook.

What are the Steps for Creating an Internal Communications Strategy?

In this section, we will explore the essential steps for creating an effective internal communications strategy. Take a look:

1. Define Objectives and Goals

Developing an effective internal communication plan starts with a strong foundation. Include clearly defined goals that align with your mission and vision. Having both short-term objectives (e.g., boosting employee engagement) as well as long-term ambitions (like encouraging collaboration or spreading culture knowledge), will foster employee growth.

2. Identify Target Audience and Communication Channels

A crucial step in developing your messaging strategy is understanding your target audience. You need to take into account factors like employee demographics, job roles, and communication preferences.

Once you have a clear understanding of your audience, identify the most suitable communication channels to reach them specifically, such as email newsletters and team collaboration tools.

Email newsletters should be at the heart of any internal messaging strategy – they allow for consistent and effective messaging, and email newsletter builders make it easier than ever to stay on top of internal communication.

By utilizing newsletter templates and catering the newsletters to different teams, locations, sorority levels etc, you can feel confident that your messaging is effectively delivered, resonates and supports internal communications’ best practices.

3. Develop Key Messages and Content

Crafting a successful internal newsletter requires nailing the perfect message that resonates with your audience.

Take some time to tailor it specifically for their unique needs and interests by incorporating visuals, such as engaging infographics or videos. If you need some inspiration, check out these 7 creative ideas for your employee newsletter.

Doing this will not only ensure your content is optimally delivered, but it also strengthens alignment of company values and desired outcomes in employee engagement.

4. Establish a Communication Calendar

On a mission to make sure employees stay informed and engaged? Crafting a communication calendar is the key! This ensures consistency in your organization's content distribution, outlines all deadlines and responsibilities, as well as regulates how often you communicate.

By doing so, you can stop information overload before it starts. It'll prove invaluable for creating an organized flow of information that everyone can easily keep up with.

5. Monitor and Evaluate the Strategy

To ensure that your internal communication plan is successful in the long run, regularly assess its effectiveness through employee feedback, key performance indicators (KPIs), and engagement metrics.

The data you collect can help inform decisive changes to optimize results for maximum impact on organizational goals. Email newsletter tools also come with analytics which make it easier to identify areas needing improvement from one iteration of a message or campaign to another.

What are Best Practices for Internal Communication?

Regardless of what you choose to share in your internal communications, here are some best practices to keep in mind:

1. Foster Two-Way Communication

Internal communication should be a two-way street, with both employees and management opening up channels for dialogue to exchange ideas.

Creating an environment of trust through frequent feedback opportunities shows your team that their voices are being heard, which in turn helps cultivate a positive work atmosphere where everyone feels supported.

From team meetings to suggestion boxes or digital communication platforms, there's plenty of creative ways you can ensure meaningful conversations and valuable exchanges among colleagues and from staff to management.

2. Personalize Communications for Relevance

By tailoring content based on job roles, locations, or interests of each individual employee group, as well as utilizing segmentation tools in email newsletters, everyone gets information that's relevant and special for them which leads to increased engagement.

3. Leverage Technology to Enhance Communication

Leveraging technology can provide your organization with an enormous advantage when it comes to internal communication.

With tools like email newsletter builders, collaboration software and mobile apps at your disposal, you'll be able to quickly streamline the process of getting important messages out in a timely manner.

Plus, having access to the latest tech lets you keep pace with industry-leading trends that will help attract top talent and maintain a competitive edge.

How to Develop Your Internal Communications Strategy?

When developing your internal communication plan, it’s important to gather feedback, encourage collaboration, and commit to continual improvement. Let’s dive into some tips for developing your strategy.

1. Assess Current Communication Efforts

Before making a change in internal communications, analyze the current conversation climate. Take into account how cleanly your messages are understood and if employees have been engaging - this assessment will help shape potential areas of improvement for you to focus on.

It will also serve as an effective marker for success with any new strategies put in place thereafter.

2. Gather Feedback from Employees

To ensure your internal communications strategy is effective, tap into the wisdom of those it will affect most - employees.

By involving them in its development process through surveys, focus groups, or interviews they'll be able to provide invaluable feedback on communication preferences and challenges as well as suggestions for improvement which may prove invaluable.

Doing so not only strengthens the success of the company's plan but also creates an atmosphere where staff feels empowered with ownership over any new initiatives implemented!

A woman points at varying colored sticky notes on a white board as coworkers look on from the conference table in a team meeting
Picture from Unsplash

3. Implement, Monitor, and Adjust Your Strategy

Internal communication is an ever-evolving process, so it's vital to keep your strategy up-to-date. To stay ahead of the game, make use of KPIs, such as engagement metrics and employee feedback to evaluate success rates.

Don’t be afraid to adjust course either; incorporating lessons learned along the way will help make sure strategies are relevant and on course with organizational objectives.

Fortunately, email newsletter builders make it super easy to review your analytics. Email builders also come equipped with tools like pre-built templates and A/B testing – streamlining both implementation and testing in one fell swoop!

Wrap Up

An effective internal communications strategy, including a strong employee newsletter cadence, can transform your organization's culture and productivity.

Following the strategies laid out in this article will help you implement an approach that encourages collaboration, transparency, and mutual understanding. In order to put your strategy in motion, consider using a newsletter builder tool to help your create, customize, and export to send your email newsletters within your organization.

With the best practices built-in, you’ll be able to up your internal communications game and help ensure that your staff members remain engaged. As a result, you’ll support a workforce that genuinely cares about their output!