Use Content Series to Optimize Your Internal Communications Strategy
Part four of a six-part series
- Part one of this series: Six Steps to Develop an Editorial Strategy for Internal Communications
- Part two: Editorial Strategies Must Incorporate Business and Team Goals
- Part three: How Do You Categorize Your Employees? Try Psychographics.
Creating content that rings true to your audience is one of five pillars of a strong editorial strategy. Yet anyone who has written or produced for internal comms knows how difficult it can be to keep feeding the content beast.
A content series (or editorial series) can make your life easier. A series allows you to:
- Plan ahead
- Create consistency in quality, timing, and voice
- Build a brand that employees anticipate
- Increase relevancy for targeted groups
- Include others in the editorial process
- Measure success (or failure) across time
- Innovate and iterate content
Most importantly, content series align with business outcomes. They give you focus and regular deliverables that support the company’s strategic goals.
In short, a content series is an efficiency play.
It doesn’t mean every article should be part of an editorial series. Your editorial calendar must allow for ad hoc opportunities and requests that can’t be denied (e.g., a randomly issued blog piece from the c-suite).
What does an editorial series look like?
Let me provide an example.
At one company I worked for, members of the Talent Development team in Human Resources were writing blog posts on leadership for external sources — professional and industry websites. The content was right and relevant for the emerging leaders within the company, so I suggested they publish the articles on the intranet in an editorial series first, then they could publish to external sites.
We created an editorial series (a dedicated column, if you will) that had the following attributes:
- A catchy name (The Lead)
- A unique graphic (logo)
- HR Talent Development decided on the topics
- Once per month publication
- Cross-promotion across several internal channels (e.g., newsletters, digital signs)
You can read in-depth about this case study, including eye-popping metrics here.
By many measures the series was successful, but what it boils down to:
- HR scaled its teaching without much extra effort
- IC gained subject matter experts, contributors, and content
The ability of both teams to collaborate in this way increased their optimization.
Over time, you’ll be able to tell what’s working, allowing you to
- Do more of what your audience (employees) love
- Adjust items that are underperforming
- Kill ideas that are bombing
- Experiment with new content
Three examples of editorial series:
- Tips for retailers selling clothes: Try This On
- For interviewing airline pilots: This Is Your Captain Speaking
- A blog about work-life balance at a pharmaceutical company: The Chill Pill
Keep in mind: the media for your content series can be anything — stories, videos, podcasts, digital, photography, gifs, etc.
In part five of this series, I’ll explain why you should publish to a platform, not just a channel.
If you want help with creating an editorial strategy for your team, reach out. I’d be happy to provide some advice and consultation. Email me at editorshaun@gmail.com.
