Internal communication plan: why and how to create it?

The internal communication plan guides the company's communication strategy for its employees, according to the objectives it wishes to achieve. It is an essential monitoring and control tool for communication teams in order to easily manage the various campaigns throughout the year. Discover the 7 steps you need to know to make a internal communication plan effective that maximizes the results of its campaigns.

Interests and challenges of an internal communication plan

The internal communication plan constitutes the essential roadmap for managing the various communication campaigns relating to the life of the company. Its creation is carried out in parallel with a global reflection on the needs of employees and the brand: it makes it possible to determine the main areas of development and the objectives to be pursued, but also to control the deployment and effectiveness of the actions put in place. The internal communication plan establishes a necessary framework for the preparation and dissemination of its campaigns aimed at:

• Facilitate the recruitment and retention of talent
• Improving the quality of life at work for employees
• Develop team cohesion
• Increase the commitment and motivation of teams
• Facilitate communication between managers and employees
• Transfer useful information to everyone
• Enrich corporate culture and enhance the employer brand
• Improving productivity and business results

Today, dispersed teams represent a real challenge for the team cohesion, which a good internal communication strategy can greatly establish. By regulating the dissemination of information and exchanges, it prevents the lack of transmission or, on the contrary, the overflow of information that affects productivity. One internal communication plan well-designed covers numerous benefits and plays an active role in the development of corporate well-being and competitiveness in the face of competition.

How do you develop an internal communication plan?

The realization of a internal communication plan effective and efficient is built in a succession of key steps. From the audit of the initial situation to the definition of the target and the editorial line, including the analysis of performance, these various phases of analysis and execution contribute to the deployment of a concrete and well-structured plan, adapted to its objectives.

1. Analysis of the existing

The development of a internal communication plan optimal cannot do without an initial audit. The aim here is to carry out a concrete inventory of the initial situation, in order to assess the current management of internal communication. This stage of observation and reflection requires taking a step back to understand the needs of employees and the means necessary to deploy — material, human and temporal in particular — to gradually refine the strategy and maximize its results. By identifying the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of the company, communication teams will be in a position to detect actions that can improve the effectiveness of internal communication approaches. Since employees are the main target of various communications, it is important at this stage to inquire about their opinion, expectations and needs about the practices to be put in place, through surveys or interviews.

2. Definition of objectives and budget

One internal communication plan relevant is part of the pursuit of objectives oriented towards the overall success of the company. Whether it is a question of uniting teams, connecting all employees, increasing performance or promoting your corporate culture and employer brand, any approach must be motivated and guided by the achievement of specific, realistic and coherent objectives. In addition to implementing the strategy, they provide a common goal, a collective goal that federates and motivates everyone to participate in their achievement. This reflection on the definition of objectives is also the ideal time to establish a budget, in order to project yourself into the cost that the actions to be implemented may represent. Defining these elements in parallel gives the possibility to visualize the efforts to be made and to release the corresponding budgets. From the start, this work makes it possible to adopt an effective and long-term overview to manage internal communication.

3. Audience targeting

For engaging internal communication, it is necessary to study the target precisely in order to adapt the way you address them. In line with the culture, values, objectives and global vision of the company, effective and adapted messages to the audience will be all the more likely to reach it. Interviewing employees to clearly define their needs, expectations and the supports they like is an essential step in determining and using the means that will best capture their attention. The latter being the object of the actions of internal communication plan, the implementation of polls, surveys and interviews will allow you to get to know them to find the best way to talk to them according to their profile. This will make it easier to adopt the right tone and choose the ideal media for your campaigns.

4. Elaboration of messages

Whatever the nature, purpose and content of the various messages to be communicated to its employees, it is essential that they participate in the achievement of the objectives of the internal communication strategy. The axes, already established thanks to the definition of the objectives, will make it possible to gradually draw up themes and angles to be integrated into the internal communication plan. This exercise will determine a set of messages to be broadcast during the year, grouped together in an editorial schedule. This management calendar, in addition to setting the themes and subjects to be addressed, provides a global view of the company's major projects and the highlights of the year, for which the communicating teams will have to implement a certain number of actions to communicate accordingly.

5. Choice of channels

Depending on the theme, the form of the various messages and their audience, it becomes important at this stage to analyze and opt for the most effective channels in order to transmit them effectively. Some content will be more appropriate orally than in writing or even more impactful electronically. Physical meetings and events facilitate and encourage dialogue and the exchange of opinions between employees, while some ads will be more suitable for communication via newsletter or via the intranet. Video or digital signage are particularly appreciated for their ability to attract and entertain, while CSR is ideal for transmitting information and news in real time.

For its part, the Cenareo solution is part of the company's digital workplace, as close as possible to the daily lives of employees. Directly integrated into their digital workspace, the internal communication software makes it possible to broadcast a multitude of different content to all employees wherever they are. On computers, tablets, screens or smartphones, the digital signage in business allows all employees to receive an impacting and memorable message simultaneously and in real time. This internal communication solution flexible and intuitive increases the performance and engagement generated by campaigns that are ever more contextualized and effective. More than a management software, the Cenareo solution is an innovative and high-performance channel that contributes to the success of its internal communication strategy.

6. Creating the publication schedule

The editorial schedule is a file dedicated to the management of the publication of its various contents, purely operational and intended for the implementation of internal communication plan. It provides an overview of the year's projects and offers a chronological vision of the actions to be implemented. It is organized by dates for effective management of its campaigns and includes a certain number of elements:

• The date and frequency of publication of each of its communications;
• The theme or subject of each publication;
• The format chosen and the choice of the channel used;
• The person (s) in charge of creating and distributing the content.

7. Identification of key performance indicators

Taking stock of the actions of your internal communication strategy makes it possible to measure their effectiveness and relevance. It is thus possible to detect the subjects and the supports that were the most engaging, but also those that were not as successful as expected. This phase of analysis of the actions of his internal communication plan reveals the performance of each campaign and each tool, which should be able to illustrate their ability to create engagement. Their effectiveness is assessed thanks to performance criteria and optimization levers to be defined, but also with surveys for employees. Cenareo also produced the first performance measurement score dedicated to screen communication, based on the evaluation of 4 indicators:

• The attractiveness of the media used;
• The freshness of the campaigns created;
• The contextualization of messages;
• The global balance of communication.

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Example of an internal communication plan

The internal communication plan prioritizes the actions necessary to achieve its internal communication strategy. It is an essential basis for the deployment of coherent, relevant, contextualized and adapted communications. It takes the form of a document organized by themes, an Excel spreadsheet for example, dedicated to the management of its campaigns over the year. It summarizes and in the same place brings together a certain number of data such as:

• The themes of the various subjects to be addressed: events or subjects that require communication action;
• Strategic objectives: the goals and results that the company wishes to achieve through the various communication actions;
• Target (s): the persons concerned, the public targeted by the communication action;
• The methods of publication: is it a unique content, a subject to be developed at a certain frequency, a weekly update...;
• Channels: the media used for each communication action;
• Important dates: the effective date of the event, when should the launch be carried out, the key stages of the project...;
• The allocated budget.

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The Cenareo solution is a internal communication software intuitive, flexible and easy to use multi-channel that adapts to the objectives of corporate internal communication strategies. It makes it possible to transmit the most relevant information at the right time to its employees, and this on various media. The internal communication software integrates directly into the company's digital environment and supports it towards greater productivity and motivation, better team cohesion, but also more engaging communication adapted to the expectations of employees on site or working remotely.