It is essential for every productive team to be able to communicate efficiently and have an easy channel for sharing internal news, updates, and other resources. It is especially important that company management is sharing news and insights with the rest of the team because properly informed people are more productive and oriented to group success. The information flow needs to be dynamic, natural and to keep everyone in the loop if you wish to build a successful business.
To be able to stay in touch with the team, a significant number of companies are still using the employee newsletter.
A newsletter used to be a great communications tool, but that was years back when it was enough just to send out messages without hearing what people had to say about it. Nowadays communication is two-sided (mostly due to social networks).
So, If you wish to run a growing business, you need to share information and get feedback from the team, as soon as you can. And you need a modern tool that will make this job easier.
We have a suggestion for you - try using an internal company blog instead of an employee newsletter. You will be able to spread your messages and to get feedback from the team instantly.
Here's why we believe that an internal blog is a more convenient tool comparing to a company newsletter.
An internal blog is interactive and transparent
When you send a newsletter to your team, no matter how hard you tried to make it personal, you will not get satisfying responses. Newsletters are usually cold and formal, and people don't like to reply. You need to make it more appealing for them to communicate with you.
An internal blog is an excellent tool for growing teams because it helps them interact and stay in the loop. An internal blog serves as a 'virtual bulletin board' enabling you to share news and let the team know what is happening with the company.
At the same time, it is perfect for the team because they can make comments and express their opinion on each blog post. All the comments and replies are visible to all team members so everyone is kept in the loop with what's being discussed.
The internal blog becomes a transparent, two-way communication channel available to your team at any time.
An internal blog is continuous and more engaging
Occasionally newsletters are used to share specific knowledge with the team. In such cases, you can end up with quite a long email that no one would read. The same thing can happen when you send 5-7 different articles for "homework". People will read two or three articles only and ignore all the others.
On the other hand, if you use an internal blog to share the same material you will have a significantly higher engagement. The reason for this is simple - people would rather read one article at the time, at their own pace.
With an internal blog, you can break down the information into smaller pieces and serve it progressively (i.e. one post per day) to reduce the pressure and information overload to the team. Also, you have much better control over the layout and formatting of the content you are presenting, especially with the "rich media content" (i.e. images, videos, embedded tweets, links, charts.., etc.a creative).
Internal blog reduces the email overload
All that an overcrowded inbox needs is another email. And we all have such mailboxes on our computers. The fact that email open rate is decreased by 18.7% if there is a word newsletter in the subject is speaking against company-wide newsletters.
So, why not try a different approach and start using a more convenient communication tool with your team then email. An internal blog is that place - relaxed, almost casual and much less formal than an employee email.
It is more likely that a productive discussion would be started in a modern internal blog tool, like BlogIn, then in the inbox of the company newsletter sender.
An internal blog is easily searchable
Have you ever tried to find an old newsletter and dig up the information you know you had somewhere in there? Or even worse, to find a reply to some newsletter that used to have some info you need? If you have, you know how "fun" it can be.
With an internal blog, it is quite simple to find the data from the past. You can use the search option all the time to explore posts, wiki pages and all the comments ever made. Accessible, searchable archive of internal resources and company knowledge will significantly increase the productivity of your team.
Are you convinced now that an internal blog is a more convenient tool than an employee newsletter is?
Yes, the employee newsletter was a great tool and it served its purpose well. But the time of employee newsletter has passed and new technologies are taking over the team communication filed. One of such tools is BlogIn. We have shown you how the internal blog can help you. Now it is up to you to give it a try and get your team communication up to the next level.
BlogIn is a beautifully simple internal blog and knowledge-sharing platform for teams of all sizes.Start 14-day free trial or get more information