Effective internal communications are, and always will be, at the heart of any successful organisation. Whether it’s sharing key updates and training information or promoting company events and announcements, keeping employees informed about what’s going on across the business is crucial to maintaining productivity and sustaining a positive, aligned culture.
However, despite its importance, internal communications all too often rely on methods that are increasingly ineffective. The past decade has seen teams and workforces become more dispersed than ever before, with employees working on hybrid schedules and different times throughout the same day. At the same time, we’re all consuming content in excess, with inboxes overflowing with emails and important messages harder to pick out.
If any of this resonates with you, you’re probably starting to rethink how internal communications are delivered within your organisation. Where solutions are concerned, one really starts to pull ahead of the rest: digital signage.
By using strategically placed screens and a cloud-based platform like the solutions we offer, you can deliver important messages in a way that is engaging and easy to manage. We’ve put together this guide to explain how digital signage for internal communications works in more detail and help you understand the impact it could have on your business.
Why Internal Communications Need Rethinking
Before we discuss the solution, allow us to quickly take a step back and understand the challenge businesses are facing in more detail. If you think back a few years, particularly to a pre-COVID working environment, internal communications felt pretty straightforward. Emails, posters, printed notices, intranet posts and team meetings were all pretty standard and effective ways of communicating with employees.
However, workplaces have changed significantly. 28% of adults in Great Britain are working on a hybrid basis, splitting their time between home and the office. This means employees are often not in the same location at the same time, making consistent communication a growing challenge.
At the same time, email fatigue is a genuine problem. The average person receives 121 business-related emails every single day. Between newsletters, spam, automated notifications, meeting invites, operational updates, and more, it’s pretty easy to see how even the most important internal communications can get buried before they’ve even been opened.
This might be creating a significant challenge for you to overcome. When traditional communication channels are ever so overcrowded, how can you feel confident that key messages are not only being shared but also seen and understood?
Where Digital Signage Comes In
Digital signage can overcome the hurdles we’ve just discussed, providing a highly visible and centralised way to communicate with employees.
In short, digital signage is a network of screens/displays that share visual content across a business. Unlike noticeboards, printed posters or displays updated manually, digital signage stands out because it is updated through a cloud-based platform (we use the fantastic NowSignage platform), allowing you to update content remotely in real time and across one or multiple locations at once.
Rather than praying that important emails are opened or that everybody actually reads the lengthy SharePoint update, using digital signage for internal communications means that key messages are placed directly in front of your teams throughout the day. It can be deployed pretty much anywhere, including reception areas, staff rooms, meeting spaces, and other communal areas, providing a highly visible channel for communicating important information.
Ways Digital Signage Can Be Used For Internal Comms
One of the main reasons why digital signage is becoming such a popular internal communications tool is that it’s incredibly flexible. The type of content that can be shared ranges from simple announcements and notices through to videos, social media feeds, and live dashboards. Through NowSignage, it’s also possible to schedule content in advance, ensuring that the right messages appear at the right time without requiring a manual press to go live.
This versatility means that digital signage for internal communications can be used in a variety of ways, including for:
- Company news and announcements
- Health and safety communications, such as safety reminders, emergency procedures, or site-specific notices that need to be communicated quickly and consistently
- Employee recognition, including work anniversaries, milestones, and awards
- Live operational updates and dashboards
- Events, training, and workplace initiatives
Benefits Of Using Digital Signage For Internal Communications
While the flexibility of digital signage is one of the main reasons why it’s becoming such a valuable tool for internal communications, the benefits go far beyond simply displaying a variety of content types on a screen.
For both the employees receiving communications and those responsible for sharing them, digital signage offers a range of advantages over traditional communication methods.
Centralised Control
One of the major advantages of digital signage is its cloud-based nature. Because content can be managed centrally and deployed instantly, it’s not a chore or a manual process to share new messages. Instead, a single screen, a specific location, or the entire network of displays can be managed in a matter of seconds. No more sending USB sticks out to individual offices or relying on individuals to update communications locally, as everything can be managed quickly and consistently from just one platform.
Faster Communications
Priorities change quickly, and internal communications have to keep pace. In fact, for some businesses, like those operating under strict health and safety regulations, it can even be dangerous not to communicate the latest updates in a timely manner.
Fortunately, digital signage allows messages to be updated immediately (unlike printed materials or emails that can be easily missed). Whether you’re communicating a last-minute event or an urgent operational update, this comms solution gives you peace of mind that the right message will be displayed at the right time.
Greater Visibility
Even the most carefully written email has little impact if it’s never opened. This is obviously very frustrating, but an unfortunate reality for most internal comms professionals or IT managers just trying their best to keep wider teams updated. However, digital signage is a great way to overcome these frustrations. By carefully choosing the right screens and placing them strategically, using digital signage for internal communications places information directly in front of employees throughout the working day, making it far more likely that your messages will be seen and absorbed.
More Engaging Content
As a visual tool, digital signage allows for internal communications to not only be physically in front of your teams, but also be more eye-catching and engaging. Unlike a text-heavy email, as an example, digital signage supports a wide range of content formats, including images and videos, helping you to ensure that you’re capturing attention and that your messaging is being retained.
Reduced Administrative Burden
If you’re the one responsible for internal communications, using digital signage can dramatically simplify day-to-day management. It’s easy to schedule content in advance, roll out to multiple locations simultaneously, and reuse where applicable across multiple campaigns. The result is a reduction in the time you need to spend on manually distributing updates, freeing up valuable resources to really focus on creating effective messaging.
Implementing Digital Signage For Internal Communications
So, how can digital signage be implemented? It’s important to bear in mind that this process requires more than just installing a screen. You need the right hardware, the right cloud-based platform, and a strategy that keeps your internal comms relevant and easy to manage.
That’s why, at Agile Comms, we provide complete digital signage solutions tailored to your requirements. We utilise the powerful NowSignage platform, and can specify, install and support digital signage for internal communications across a wide range of locations and business types. Whether you’re looking to introduce a single display or implement a network of screens across multiple locations, we’re able to design a solution that works flexibly around you.
If you’d like to find out more about how digital signage can fit into your internal communications strategy, please get in touch with us. We’ll have a quick chat about your requirements and provide you with a solution that works for you.
