My name is Chuck Gose and I'm a MediaTile employee -- and a former customer. Companies are discovering every day that it's critical to keep employees informed and up to date. An engaged and educated workforce is a productive workforce. And with the challenge of competing messages adding to the clutter, how do your employee communications rise above it?
In this blog I will discuss how to install your very own MediaTile digital signage network for your company and how to integrate digital signage into your communication tool belt. We hope to help you understand how to best use the technology, including hardware and software, to engage your workforce and enhance your internal communications and corporate communications activities. If the blog helps, great. If it doesn't, let me know. You're free to use the comment sections after each posting to contribute your own ideas.
Think about the last time you entered a fast food establishment
or quick service restaurant. Were they using digital signage as
menu boards?
Being the health nut that I am (or lack thereof), I'm seeing
more and more of them. To me, they make a ton of sense. Restaurants
are able to dynamically change content based on seasonal offerings
or time of day. Even adjust pricing from a central area.
But who cares if they make sense to me. Do they make sense to
the restaurants? Check out this Digital Signage Today infographic
on the top 12 benefits of...
In
the digital signage world, the retail industry is a clear focus for
many looking to launch networks to support customer marketing. The
primary driver is to communicate messages to drive customer
behavior.
But what about the concerns of the retail employees (not
customers)? We are working with several retailers who are using
digital signage to just that, support internal communications to a
very disconnected and dispersed workforce.
If
you're launching a new digital signage network from scratch, it can
be a bit messy. As Digital Signage Connection points out in this
article, there are a lot of "ingredients" that
go into a new network. You can go read their thoughts on each of
the ingredients, but I've added mine in the following:
Hardware. This is a big decision and arguably
the most visible one. As THIS is what people see as "digital
signage." Our hardware is simple and we mean it to be that way. You
can either purchase our Digital Sign in a Box, which includes a...
So often when companies have good news to share, they spend
valuable time and resources to develop a solid public relations
campaign to let the public and media know.
But often they also neglect the most important audience of any
campaign - the employees.
The internal
stakeholders, especially your employees, are a business's greatest
asset; therefore it is important to ensure they are informed of
good and bad news.
Health and safety videos are a dime a dozen. So many companies
have them and just go through the motions when creating them. And
by not putting extra thought into them, they will largely go
ignored, which is not the point of safety videos.
But check out what Air New Zealand did with what normally would
be a stereotypical safety announcement during take-off. The key is
to find who your corporate Richard Simmons is. . . if you
dare.
Employees love to be recognized. I just read a study that showed
67% of employees said their performance improved due to
recognition. That's amazing. (But also kind of sad that a
simple thank you is all it takes and managers struggle with
that.)
But the biggest key for managers is determining how employees
want to be recognized because each is unique. Some like a simple
"thank you" and a pat on the back. Others might want to be
mentioned in a meeting. And for some (though less than you'd
think), money is the ultimate recognition.
I know a lot of companies are struggling instituting social
media-like tools and features INSIDE the company. As we all know,
companies tend to be very risk averse and there is a "risky" side
of social media. The horror stories scream louder than the
successes.
But if your organization is launching social tools or is
thinking about it, watch this video. I'm curious if you had the
same thoughts I did.
We hear amazing examples of customer service, as well as truly
awful ones. But I believe that most companies and people do strive
to provide great service to their customers, whether in retail,
banking, hospitality or any other markets where we interact face to
face with businesses.
But what about those times when we aren't face to face, maybe
stuck on hold waiting for "the next available agent." Companies can
still provide great service, but you lose that value of seeing the
person. Sometimes all it takes is a smile.
Every now and then, we like
to feature posts on our blog from guest authors who are outside of
the digital signage world, but who have expertise that can impact
content strategies for internal communication
networks.
We hope you enjoy this post
fromRocky
Walls, CEO of12 Stars Media. He works with businesses to create video
that's so real and simple it changes audiences into
relationships.