Most companies and industries today are faced with some level of transformation. There are multiple forces that drive this transformation — digital disruption, greater scrutiny of business practices, evolving regulatory requirements and increasingly discerning and well-informed customers.
As someone whose agency has been advising companies for 25 years, I have seen firsthand how many companies are increasingly recognizing the importance of strategic employee communications in helping to deliver evolving business needs during a crisis or significant change. However, most haven’t yet fully embraced or recognized its value in improving customer experience.
The Value Of Strategic Employee Communications
Every Fortune 1000 company we have worked with has dedicated employee communications roles, and some have entire departments and teams focused on generating and publishing content that’s specifically targeted at engaging their workforce.
What sets companies with the most sophisticated approach to employee communications apart from others is that they understand the connections between these four facts:
1. The majority of marketers believe they’re competing on customer experience.
2. A better customer experience results in increased sales.
3. The most engaged employees deliver the best customer experiences.
4. Strategic and effective communications improve employee engagement.
The leading organizations that have embraced the value of employee communications understand that employee engagement is important because it impacts employee retention, commitment, individual performance and, in the end, overall company performance.
The companies that understand these connections put in place thoughtful, strategic communication plans developed to communicate change, align employees to the company’s purpose and brand promise and inspire their teams to believe in leadership’s vision and have confidence in the decisions being made to achieve the company’s aspirations.
The Customer Experience Factor
While many leaders have embraced the value of effective employee communications during times of change, transformation or crisis, most have yet to recognize the full impact that ongoing strategic employee communications can have to improve customer experience and, further, increase sales and strengthen customer loyalty.
This is an interesting disconnect because there’s no debate about the importance of customer experience. Business leaders and marketers across all sectors realize how important it is to any company’s business performance.
A study conducted by Gartner found that 81% of marketers surveyed expected to compete primarily based on customer experience. This is supported by research published by the Harvard Business Review, which found that customers who had the best experiences spent 140% or more on a company’s product or services than those who had poor experiences.
It’s widely accepted that customer experiences are the real moments of truth for any brand. Whether they’re in person, online or by phone, customer experiences are moments of truth driven by people. When you break down who delivers these moments of truth to customers, the linkage to strategic employee communications becomes clear. They’re driven by the employees who are providing the product or service the customer is engaging with. When an employee is fully connected to and engaged with the company’s brand promise, values and supporting behaviors, they’re more likely to deliver differentiating, on-brand moments to customers.
Effective Employee Communications Boost Marketing Communications
It’s been our experience, and argued by others, that one important way employees become more engaged with their work is seeing a clear linkage between their role and the organization’s goals.
This is where employee communications come in. When done right, employee communications can instill and maintain constant awareness and understanding of the organization’s purpose and brand promise across the workforce, and ensure that every employee knows what their role is in achieving the company’s priorities.
Because marketers expect to compete primarily on the basis of customer experience, leading companies approach customer experience with discipline, rigor and strategic thought in order to get the best return on investment out of their outbound message. But the success of that outbound message is dependant on the experience that employees deliver in those moments of truth when the customer is looking for the brand to deliver on the promise it has made. It follows that the same discipline, rigor and strategic thought must go into ensuring that employees think, feel and act in a way that will deliver the optimal moment of truth.
This cannot be accomplished if employees don’t have a strong personal connection to what their role is in bringing that on-brand moment to life. That connection is best instilled through storytelling that employees want to engage with, respond to and share with colleagues and possibly even with friends and family. The stories need to achieve several things simultaneously: They need to be as strategic, creative, engaging and measurable as the messaging that is received by the consumer through marketing communications.
To do that, here are a few tips:
1. Be compelling. Make sure the messages you share are relatable, authentic and easily accessible.
2. Provide context. Be clear about your company’s purpose and vision and provide employees with a clear line of sight to what’s required for each role to support and deliver on the organization’s shared vision and purpose. Remember, people like to feel they are a part of something larger than themselves.
3. Be consistent. Consistency applies not just to the messages that a company is sharing but also to how it incorporates its vision and purpose into expected everyday actions by employees. Recognize engaged employees when they act in ways that align with the company’s purpose and vision.
When done right, effective strategic employee communications help turn employees first into brand ambassadors, and then into advocates. This can have a powerful impact on improving business performance.
