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Organize Internal Communication Channels for Proper Employee Feedback Management

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Organize Internal Communication Channels for Proper Employee Feedback Management

Whether you have three or 300 team members, internal communications are critical to the success of your company.

Achieving corporate objectives cannot be done without ensuring all of your staff members are on board with what needs to be done and how it should be done; however, conveying pertinent company-wide messages to employees is just one side of the coin.

Employees must know which channels are available to them to relay their opinions, comments, and suggestions to upper management. Likewise, upper management should provide them with consistent support and encouragement in doing so.

Organize your internal communication channels in such a way that they allow for proper management of employee feedback.

Why are Internal Communication Channels Important?

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The focal point of your internal communication plan should be your staff. How they get the information they need to do their jobs, as well as the tools they use to communicate with each other should be in direct connection with gathering and analyzing their feedback.

Internal communication best practices are those that give your employees a voice and make them feel as though you value their ideas. Depending on the size of your organization, you may or may not have an internal communication specialist or department in charge of making this communication happen. However, there should always be a unified action plan that includes employee feedback management, and then oversees its execution.

No matter how you choose to go about it, you will need a solid structure in place for your company’s internal communication channels. Apart from simplifying day-to-day tasks, especially for remote or hybrid teams, these channels should be the main touchpoints for employee feedback and its subsequent management.

At the very least, the tools you choose for your team’s internal communications should include a dedicated platform or space for deliverables, timetables and deadlines, project statuses, and a list of all personnel within the company’s hierarchy. Access to these elements is essential for all employees, regardless of the department or type of work they do.

By interlinking these elements in one place (or platform), you can easily direct people to a feedback section where they can refer to those elements as prompts for any comments or suggestions they may have, at any point during the year.

Audit Your Current Internal Communication Channels

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The goal of all internal communication channels is to facilitate smooth interaction between your workers and your company. To have these channels work to their full potential, you must design them in such a way that employees want to engage with them.

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Doing an audit of your current internal communication channels means taking a look at how your existing channels are doing. Gathering feedback on the channels your workers find useful — or, more markedly, which channels they do not use frequently — is what will inform your internal communication channel audit.

For example, many companies rely on their intranet for the bulk of their internal communication needs. Let’s say your company is one of them — though the following applies to any other channel you may currently use as your main one for internal comms.

The first step is to assess how many workers use the intranet at all. If you discover that only a handful of them do, you’ll need to reconsider how this particular channel fits (or doesn’t fit) into your team’s internal comms environment. Does it feel too outdated to use? Do the people in charge of updating it do so regularly? How easy is it to navigate?

To encourage workers to use the intranet (or your preferred internal comms channel), you may need to take time to redesign it. This redesign cannot happen overnight, so make sure to ask your staff what they would like to see improve.

Emails and newsletters can serve as reminders of where helpful resources can be found on the intranet, how to access personal profiles and give feedback, and other tidbits relevant to your team (more on that later).

Develop a Sound Employee Feedback System

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To foster a work culture based on continuous feedback, you should motivate workers to express their opinions throughout the course of their career at your company.

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Consider the many milestones and phases that each employee goes through during their “tenure.” Then, make a list of instances where their input provides you with relevant and objective insights into your operations.

The following are some recommended times to request feedback from an employee:

  • At the end of the recruitment and onboarding process — which can easily be done through automation of HR processes
  • At yearly or mid-year performance evaluation sessions
  • During one-on-one meetings on a monthly basis
  • Prior to or following company-wide reforms

Of course, you should inform all employees of when and how you will ask for their feedback. For example, consider the differences between a one-on-one session with a manager and a company-wide employee survey.

While the one-on-one meeting is better suited for more candid conversations between line managers and managees, during which you can implement something like the SBI feedback model, you may not be able to access all information given during these conversations.

However, rolling out occasional employee surveys via your company’s productivity or communication tool such as Slack or Teams may provide you with more specific and relevant inputs.

Proper Tools Lead to Employee Advocacy

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Internal communication systems are just one part of a bigger picture. To truly engage, inspire, and motivate your employees, you need to invest in the best possible tools for their type of work. Engaged, inspired, and motivated employees are more likely to leave positive feedback more often, too.

For instance, using a solid internal communication platform like RingCentral App will result in increased productivity and engagement, which is what will drive positive comments across the board.

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To capitalize on this effect, you may consider giving employees the opportunity to become company ambassadors, or even advisors on how to properly reap the benefits of company resources. Their role could be to speak about what works, and motivate others within the company to speak out about what doesn’t work.

Organizing your internal comms strategy around an employee advocacy program demonstrates to employees that you trust them to communicate company messaging and to present a favorable and trustworthy image to people outside of their immediate teams.

Work on Your Internal Newsletters

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Internal newsletters are possibly the most effective way to disseminate the most recent and pertinent news to your entire workforce. Newsletters enable internal communications to include a variety of assets and updates — ranging from how to create a zip file to where and when to receive and send feedback.

Since people don’t have time to read walls of text, make your corporate newsletter more engaging and memorable by including photographs, infographics, or videos. Try to include topics that are actually relevant for your employees instead of tooting your own horn — they know better than anyone what company they work for, so a genuine approach is key.

Again, you can use newsletters to remind people when and where to leave feedback. For example, if you’ve recently distributed a company-wide survey, but didn’t get as many responses as you’d hoped, your newsletter can gently nudge them in that direction.

During requests for feedback, you can also use the newsletter to highlight staff successes or specific project accomplishments. This approach shows your workers you are aware of their contribution to corporate objectives, you commend them for it, and that you are ready to hear their comments as well.  

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Final Thoughts

Internal communications are the backbone of any company; organizing them to drive and manage employee feedback is an excellent approach to increase awareness of what needs to be improved, and where you’re already doing a good job. We hope this article has given you enough material to successfully organize your own internal communication channels for the purposes of proper employee feedback management.

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How To Combine PR and Content Marketing Superpowers To Achieve Business Goals

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A figure pulls open a dress shirt to reveal the term PR on a Superman-like costume, reflecting the superpower resulting from combining content and PR.

A transformative shift is happening, and it’s not AI.

The aisle between public relations and content marketing is rapidly narrowing. If you’re smart about the convergence, you can forever enhance your brand’s storytelling.

The goals and roles of content marketing and PR overlap more and more. The job descriptions look awfully similar. Shrinking budgets and a shrewd eye for efficiency mean you and your PR pals could face the chopping block if you don’t streamline operations and deliver on the company’s goals (because marketing communications is always first to be axed, right?).

Yikes. Let’s take a big, deep breath. This is not a threat. It’s an opportunity.

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Reach across the aisle to PR and streamline content creation, improve distribution strategies, and get back to the heart of what you both are meant to do: Build strong relationships and tell impactful stories.

So, before you panic-post that open-to-work banner on LinkedIn, consider these tips from content marketing, PR, and journalism pros who’ve figured out how to thrive in an increasingly narrowing content ecosystem.

1. See journalists as your audience

Savvy pros know the ability to tell an impactful story — and support it with publish-ready collateral — grounds successful media relationships. And as a content marketer, your skills in storytelling and connecting with audiences, including journalists, naturally support your PR pals’ media outreach.

Strategic storytelling creates content focused on what the audience needs and wants. Sharing content on your blog or social media builds relationships with journalists who source those channels for story ideas, event updates, and subject matter experts.

“Embedding PR strategies in your content marketing pieces informs your audience and can easily be picked up by media,” says Alex Sanchez, chief experience officer at BeWell, New Mexico’s Health Insurance Marketplace. “We have seen reporters do this many times, pulling stories from our blogs and putting them in the nightly news — most of the time without even reaching out to us.”

Acacia James, weekend producer/morning associate producer at WTOP radio in Washington, D.C., says blogs and social media posts are helpful to her work. “If I see a story idea, and I see that they’re willing to share information, it’s easier to contact them — and we can also backlink their content. It’s huge for us to be able to use every avenue.” 

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Kirby Winn, manager of PR at ImpactLife, says reporters and assignment editors are key consumers of their content. “And I don’t mean a news release that just hit their inbox. They’re going to our blog and consuming our stories, just like any other audience member,” he says. “Our organization has put more focus into content marketing in the past few years — it supports a media pitch so well and highlights the stories we have to tell.”

Storytelling attracts earned media that might not pick up the generic news topic. “It’s one thing to pitch a general story about how we help consumers sign up for low-cost health insurance,” Alex says. “Now, imagine a single mom who just got a plan after years of thinking it was too expensive. She had a terrible car accident, and the $60,000 ER bill that would have ruined her financially was covered. Now that’s a story journalists will want to cover, and that will be relatable to their audience and ours.” 

2. Learn the media outlet’s audience

Seventy-three percent of reporters say one-fourth or less of the stories pitched are relevant to their audiences, according to Cision’s 2023 State of the Media Report (registration required).

PR pros are known for building relationships with journalists, while content marketers thrive in building communities around content. Merge these best practices to build desirable content that works for your target audience and the media’s audiences simultaneously.

WTOP’s Acacia James says sources who show they’re ready to share helpful, relevant content often win pitches for coverage. “In radio, we do a lot of research on who is listening to us, and we’re focused on a prototype called ‘Mike and Jen’ — normal, everyday people in Generation X … So when we get press releases and pitches, we ask, ‘How interested will Mike and Jen be in this story?’” 

3. Deliver the full content package (and make journalists’ jobs easier)

Cranking out content to their media outlet’s standards has never been tougher for journalists. Newsrooms are significantly understaffed, and anything you can do to make their lives easier will be appreciated and potentially rewarded with coverage. Content marketers are built to think about all the elements to tell the story through multiple mediums and channels.

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“Today’s content marketing pretty much provides a package to the media outlet,” says So Young Pak, director of media relations at MedStar Washington Hospital Center. “PR is doing a lot of storytelling work in advance of media publication. We (and content marketing) work together to provide the elements to go with each story — photos, subject matter experts, patients, videos, and data points, if needed.”   

At WTOP, the successful content package includes audio. “As a radio station, we are focused on high-quality sound,” Acacia James says. “Savvy sources know to record and send us voice memos, and then we pull cuts from the audio … You will naturally want to do someone a favor if they did you one — like providing helpful soundbites, audio, and newsworthy stories.”  

While production value matters to some media, you shouldn’t stress about it. “In the past decade, how we work with reporters has changed. Back in the day, if they couldn’t be there in person, they weren’t going to interview your expert,” says Jason Carlton, an accredited PR professional and manager of marketing and communications at Intermountain Health. “During COVID, we had to switch to virtual interviewing. Now, many journalists are OK with running a Teams or Zoom interview they’ve done with an expert on the news.”

BeWell’s Alex Sanchez agrees. “I’ve heard old school PR folks cringe at the idea of putting up a Zoom video instead of getting traditional video interviews. It doesn’t really matter to consumers. Focus on the story, on the timeliness, and the relevance. Consumers want authenticity, not super stylized, stiff content.”

4. Unite great minds to maximize efficiency

Everyone needs to set aside the debate about which team — PR or content marketing — gets credit for the resulting media coverage.

At MedStar Washington Hospital Center, So Young and colleagues adopt a collaborative mindset on multichannel stories. “We can get the interview and gather information for all the different pieces — blog, audio, video, press release, internal newsletter, or magazine. That way, we’re not trying to figure things out individually, and the subject matter experts only have to have that conversation once,” she says.

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Regular, cross-team meetings are essential to understand the best channels for reaching key audiences, including the media. A story that began life as a press release might reap SEO and earned media gold if it’s strategized as a blog, video, and media pitch.

“At Intermountain Health, we have individual teams for media relations, marketing, social media, and hospital communications. That setup works well because it allows us to bring in the people who are the given experts in those areas,” says Intermountain’s Jason Carlton. “Together, we decide if a story is best for the blog, a media pitch, or a mix of channels — that way, we avoid duplicating work and the risk of diluting the story’s impact.”

5. Measure what matters

Cutting through the noise to earn media mentions requires keen attention to metrics. Since content marketing and PR metrics overlap, synthesizing the data in your team meetings can save time while streamlining your storytelling efforts.

“For content marketers, using analytical tools such as GA4 can help measure the effectiveness of their content campaigns and landing pages to determine meaningful KPIs such as organic traffic, keyword rankings, lead generation, and conversion rates,” says John Martino, director of digital marketing for Visiting Angels. “PR teams can use media coverage and social interactions to assess user engagement and brand awareness. A unified and omnichannel approach can help both teams demonstrate their value in enhancing brand visibility, engagement, and overall business success.”

To track your shared goals, launch a shared dashboard that helps tell the combined “story of your stories” to internal and executive teams. Among the metrics to monitor:

  • Page views: Obviously, this queen of metrics continues to be important across PR and content marketing. Take your analysis to the next level by evaluating which niche audiences are contributing to these views to further hone your storytelling targets, including media outlets.
  • Earned media mentions: Through a media tracker service or good old Google Alerts, you can tally the echo of your content marketing and PR. Look at your site’s referral traffic report to identify media outlets that send traffic to your blog or other web pages.
  • Organic search queries: Dive into your analytics platform to surface organic search queries that lead to visitors. Build from those questions to develop stories that further resonate with your audience and your targeted media.
  • On-page actions: When visitors show up on your content, what are they doing? What do they click? Where do they go next? Building next-step pathways is your bread and butter in content marketing — and PR can use them as a natural pipeline for media to pick up more stories, angles, and quotes.

But perhaps the biggest metric to track is team satisfaction. Who on the collaborative team had the most fun writing blogs, producing videos, or calling the news stations? Lean into the natural skills and passions of your team members to distribute work properly, maximize the team output, and improve relationships with the media, your audience, and internal teams.

“It’s really trying to understand the problem to solve — the needle to move — and determining a plan that will help them achieve their goal,” Jason says. “If you don’t have those measurable objectives, you’re not going to know whether you made a difference.”

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Don’t fear the merger

Whether you deliberately work together or not, content marketing and public relations are tied together. ImpactLife’s Kirby Winn explains, “As soon as we begin to talk about (ourselves) to a reporter who doesn’t know us, they are certainly going to check out our stories.”

But consciously uniting PR and content marketing will ease the challenges you both face. Working together allows you to save time, eliminate duplicate work, and gain free time to tell more stories and drive them into impactful media placements.

Register to attend Content Marketing World in San Diego. Use the code BLOG100 to save $100. Can’t attend in person this year? Check out the Digital Pass for access to on-demand session recordings from the live event through the end of the year.

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Cover image by Joseph Kalinowski/Content Marketing Institute

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Trends in Content Localization – Moz

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Trends in Content Localization - Moz

Multinational fast food chains are one of the best-known examples of recognizing that product menus may sometimes have to change significantly to serve distinct audiences. The above video is just a short run-through of the same business selling smokehouse burgers, kofta, paneer, and rice bowls in an effort to appeal to people in a variety of places. I can’t personally judge the validity of these representations, but what I can see is that, in such cases, you don’t merely localize your content but the products on which your content is founded.

Sometimes, even the branding of businesses is different around the world; what we call Burger King in America is Hungry Jack’s in Australia, Lays potato chips here are Sabritas in Mexico, and DiGiorno frozen pizza is familiar in the US, but Canada knows it as Delissio.

Tales of product tailoring failures often become famous, likely because some of them may seem humorous from a distance, but cultural sensitivity should always be taken seriously. If a brand you are marketing is on its way to becoming a large global seller, the best insurance against reputation damage and revenue loss as a result of cultural insensitivity is to employ regional and cultural experts whose first-hand and lived experiences can steward the organization in acting with awareness and respect.

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How AI Is Redefining Startup GTM Strategy

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How AI Is Redefining Startup GTM Strategy

AI and startups? It just makes sense.

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