Making the most of our 15-minute advantage
Katie Macaulay
A leading voice in employee communication. Managing Director, AB; host of The Internal Comms Podcast; guest lecturer at Cranfield University’s Management Development School.
How much time do employees spend consuming content from their employer?
According to research conducted by Audacity , employees typically allocate around five minutes a day for 'capital C' communication. “This is the type of content created by Internal Communication teams," says Jason Anthoine , founder of Audacity, on a recent episode of The Internal Comms Podcast .
Last week, the Institute of Internal Communication unveiled its IC Index 23 – research among 3,000 UK employees. It asked how much time they spend consuming news and updates about their organisation and its priorities. Nearly half said "up to 15 minutes a day," while a quarter responded "none – hardly any time at all."
Regardless of the exact figure, one thing is clear – our time is short.
If you are an Internal Comms practitioner assessing the volume of content published each day across your channels, you might be forgiven for thinking most of it has been created in vain.
But I would urge you to think again.
Imagine you are a marketing manager at one of the world's largest fast-moving consumer goods companies – Unilever, Nestle, Procter & Gamble or Pepsico, for example. You know people typically spend an average of 45 seconds consuming branded content. Fifteen minutes represents a staggering 95% increase in your potential engagement rate.
You have just been gifted an abundance of extra time to connect with the world.?
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As the initial excitement subsides, you embark on a plan. You revisit your audience personas, diving deep into demographic and psychographic data, pain points, preferences and motivations. Armed with this insight, you create hyper-personalised, immersive content to resonate deeply with each segment of your audience. You create stories with room to breathe. The knowledge and information you share with consumers can now become more comprehensive and valuable.
It should be no surprise employees are willing to invest more time engaging with content from their employer than general branded content. The Edelman Trust Barometer confirms communication from ‘my employer’ is seen as more credible and trustworthy than information from businesses in general, governments, mainstream media and non-governmental organisations.
People want to hear from their employers and most believe what they hear.
As internal communication practitioners, we must not be disheartened about our five to 15 minutes of engagement time. We need simply to use it wisely. The answer lies in creating a personalised experience – beautifully crafted content highly attuned to the differing interests, motivations and preferences of our employees.
As Mohammed Ali almost said – don't count the minutes; make the minutes count.
For a free content creation consultation with AB's creative team, please contact us at [email protected] . Share your aspirations and we'll share our approach.
Katie Macaulay is a leading voice in employee communication. She is an international public speaker, managing director of AB , author of From Cascade to Conversation , and host of The Internal Comms Podcast .
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Chief Communications and Events Officer, Senior Vice President | Chair International Assoc. of Business Communicators Professional Development and Content Committee
1 年This is good to hear. We can share important, relevant information in 5-15 minutes. Thanks Katie!
Helping you shape inspirational organisations through purposeful communication | Internal Communication + Change Communication Consultant | Vice Chair, IABC EMENA | Mentor
1 年Well isn't this encouraging news! You can read a lot in 15 minutes! And we don't need everyone to read everything. We just need them to read the information that is relevant to them. As you say, personalising the comms experience is the key to success - and, actually, that's where a lot of us (despite our best efforts) fall short, normally due to the limitations of the channels we have at our disposal. We should spend more time on making sure we have channels that suit our audiences, rather than pumping out more content. With tight budgets and creaking IT infrastructures (in some organisations, not all!) this can be a challenge. But one worth scaling.
Executive Courage and Counsel | Culture Change and Clarity | Employee Experience and Insights
1 年Thanks for the mention! Also fascinating to note that their 5 mins or 15 mins or whatever amount of time you’ve earned from them usually comes during moments of microboredom, whether they’re at work or away. As it turns out, what employees want at work is pretty much what they already have when they aren’t at work: the freedom to choose if, how and when they interact with content.
Public Speaking & Storytelling Specialist | Global Keynote Speaker | Former TEDx Head Speaker Coach
1 年Terrific article Katie Macaulay! I especially like this, "Fifteen minutes represents a staggering 95% increase in your potential engagement rate." WOW!
Communication Strategist and Consultant; Founder, #WeLeadComms
1 年We should make the minutes count. And for those who are willing to spend 30 or 60 minutes, we need to make those minutes really count. Great piece.