Launching your new intranet requires more than just providing your users with the link! Communicating the changes, updates, ways of working etc. to your staff throughout development of your intranet is important to ensure users engage with your new intranet.
Launch Plan
SMLWRLD can with your Communications Team to construct a launch plan, covering areas such as:
- Comms objectives, e.g.
- Ensure widespread knowledge about the coming intranet
- Allow staff to provide feedback and ensure their feedback is responded to
- Get a high rate of people completing their staff profiles in the first two weeks
- Phased launches
- Engagement
- Content calendars
Engagement Ideas
We can discuss ideas to engage your target users, as best suited to your organisation's culture. For example:
- Prior to launch / day of launch
- teaser posters
- branded treats in common rooms / coffee stall in foyers
- promotional stickers g. "I the intranet"
- Intranet activities
- staff booth in the common rooms / staff meetings - laptop and camera to assist with profile completion
- prize draw for staff who fill out their profile (see below)
- Scavenger hunt competition / onboarding - completing key tasks
- Add your biography to your profile
- Add a document or page to your favourites
- Submit a news story or event
- Create a forum post or comment on someone else’s
- Senior management engagement
- ensuring all senior management have completed profiles ahead of launch
- are active on the site at launch (e.g. commenting, posting)
- Content Calendar Post-Launch:
- Create content schedule for first month. What will be published each day?
- For example:
- Summaries of feedback and the Project Team's responses
- Launch of new features, OR advertise existing features
- Summary of engagement e.g. number of comments / likes / posts
- Summary of profile completion
- Competition winners
- Success stories (unrelated to intranet) from sites outside the centre
- Encourage shout-outs (accolades of other staff and/or teams in the Staff forum)
Focus on User Profile Completion
What do you want users to do when they first arrive at the intranet?
For the first days after launch it can be beneficial to focus on key parts of the site which require user input, such as user profile completion or getting to grips with the directory.
Engagement can include:
- Enforced user profile completion (where users must fill out the mandatory fields in their profile before continuing to browse the site)
- User profile completion notification reminders
- A temporary homepage takeover to advertise profile completion with prize incentives
- A short onboarding video to highlight key features and functionality of the site