We’re a bi-coastal team, so we presented at Poppulo’s NYC and San Francisco Communicators Forum! We met tons of new folks, saw some old friends and learned a lot along the way. Here were some key learnings from both forums:

1. Newsletters are NOT dead.

Not only are they not dead, they can still be the most engaging tool in your internal comms arsenal. With a little help telling stories your employees WANT to hear, organizing content in digestible chunks, using intriguing subject lines (“Week of September 9” isn’t begging anyone to open that email), and making your newsletter visual (preview text, graphics, blown up stats/data), your open rates will soar.

2. Work smarter, not harder.

Get more eyeballs on your stories by posting them across multiple internal comms channels. With some smart copy and pasting, and a comprehensive channel map, you can make sure you’re reaching employees wherever they might be – your intranet, social media, company blog, walking through the halls, etc.

3. Customize your comms with personas (there are great tools to help you)!

It’s true that all-employee communications are absolutely necessary, but if you are constantly focusing on your entire employee population, messages can end up watered down and uninspired. By taking some time to build personas (fun fact: GE uses just three personas for the entire organization), you’re increasing the likelihood of engaging your people.

Read more about personas – what they are and how to create them – by downloading our free white paper.

4. Treat your employee experience like your customer experience.

Why is only a fraction of your company’s budget dedicated to understanding your people? Why do customers see the sleek, fresh side of your company, and employees are stuck with an intranet from ten years ago? Let’s be the change we want to see—it’s our job to fix this disconnect and uplevel experiences across the board.

5. Connect your work—all of it—back to strategic objectives.

We know that our work makes a difference, but does the C-suite truly see the value of our communications? If you’re not already, it’s time to ensure you’re aligning all of your initiatives (even the small projects) back to the company’s strategy. And gut-check everything you do: If you’re spending a lot of time working on something that you can’t easily tie back to overall company strategy, why are you investing so much time in it?

Communicators are rockstars. Yeah, you are. Keep dreaming big and creating amazing experiences for your people!