With the world of work turned upside over the past year, internal communications teams are in the spotlight. Employees are remote, business is ever-changing, and it’s your job to keep everyone engaged and informed. It’s your efforts that can keep us all connected through this remote working experience—and video can help you make it happen.

We recently spoke at the virtual Internal Communications Conference (ICC) and have gathered five tips and trends you can take advantage of with video. 

1. Communicate key information proactively

Because the world is changing so fast, there may be lots of new information to communicate to your teams on an ongoing basis. Proactively creating content when you notice a knowledge gap will reduce incoming questions and help to build trust with your employees.

An ICC attendee discussed a concern that their customer service center may be overwhelmed with questions as they adapted their business to the pandemic—so they created a microsite full of FAQs. This type of approach can help to replace the knowledge sharing that would typically occur in person, in the office.

One of our pharma clients uses video to proactively educate their employees on complex products and services. The proactive approach reduced the sales team’s requests for help from subject matter experts by 15-20% (while increasing revenue 16% above analyst’s expectations).

> Webcast highlights video template: from Wochit simulated brand

2. Use engaging content to reduce information fatigue

Most of us regularly face information overload—especially in the form of email and other text. McKinsey reports that the average professional spends 28% of the work day reading and answering about 120 emails, which amounts to about 2.6 hours a day (yikes!). This can be a big problem when you’re trying to communicate with your teams.

You can use video and other visual forms of communication to reduce text fatigue and get your employees engaging more with your content. 

According to Wordstream, 59% of executives say they would rather watch a video than read text. 

And all kinds of viewers retain more of a message when watching it compared to reading it (95% of a video message compared to 10% when reading text).

Our own experience is similar—we regularly hear from our clients that their video content significantly outperforms text when it comes to employee engagement. Plus, employees appreciate that you’re communicating in a way that respects their time and attention.

> Auto-generated achievement video template: from Wochit simulated brand

3. Involve executives in an authentic way

When times are weird, people want to hear from the top. Discussions at ICC showed that lots of employees feel like they haven’t heard from their leaders enough over the past year. 

Video is an ideal channel for executives to connect more personally with the rest of the company. And because we’ve all become so used to seeing informal video content, there’s no need for the pieces to be highly polished. In fact, employees are craving an authentic connection with their leaders. They want transparency and honesty.

So, encourage your C-suite to pick up their smartphone next time there’s a message to get out—and record it informally, from the heart, with plenty of empathy for their audience.

> Business update video template: from Wochit simulated brand

4. Empower managers with tools and training  

In addition to the C-suite, it’s important to also include managers in your internal communications plans. One key learning from the Internal Communications Conference was that when information affects an employee’s day-to-day work, the message should come from their direct manager.

You’ll therefore want to consider how you can empower the whole organization to communicate more effectively through different channels and tools—like video. Look for tools that allow you to create branded templates anyone can use to easily create their own brand-compliant video content.

> Employee onboarding video template: from Wochit simulated brand

5. Find unlikely heroes in your organization

On top of craving communication from their leaders, ICC indicated there’s also massive appetite for peer-to-peer connection. This is unsurprising, considering that many of us are still working alone at home. 

People want to see how others are managing their daily lives in this post-pandemic world. They want to hear from other people facing similar challenges within their organizations. 

The best way to find these non-traditional heroes? Act like a journalist within your organization. You’ll need to unearth personal stories, bring them to life through video, and share them to inspire others within your company. 

Survey your teams to see who has found an innovative way to educate or amuse their children while working. 

Or who has a story about staying physically active from their home office. 

Who was able to solve a customer challenge remotely?

Or just ask who would like to share what life is like at home right now.

You might be surprised how many people want to share.

> Employee highlight video template: from Wochit simulated brand

More takeaways from the Internal Communications Conference

We learned a lot about internal communications through our ICC sponsorship, and what better way to communicate them than a video? Check out a few more of our key takeaways: