This morning on one of our workplace channels, we hosted the CEO of the company who had come on to give some important business updates.
As they run a large company, the CEO has many internal platforms from which to choose to deliver this update. Why did he select his own radio station?
There are the factors that are in our control. We have an excellent team to deliver this. From the tech guys ensuring the CEO can go live from wherever he is in the country, through to a presenter who makes sure she gets the very best from “the boss”.
We’ve worked with this CEO on many previous updates and they trust our expertise in making sure he delivers his updates with impact. His company trust us every day to deliver vital company news and updates, while also keeping the staff entertained and connected.
However, he could deliver his updates via email or webcasts . Why do it in audio?
Firstly, people, including his colleagues and yours, love radio. 50 million adults listen to the radio each week in the UK, according to the latest figures. Delivering updates in audio is a much less formal way of doing it compared to a cold email or sitting in front of a screen watching a webcast.
One of the reasons that people love radio is the intimacy it creates, there’s no distracting images or hard to read words, just the listener and the speaker. It’s creates a much more human connection.
We won’t build a workplace channel for a partner that doesn’t have that human element. Without it involving real people, both on the company’s side and on our side, it will be soulless and corporate. To put it bluntly, it won’t work.
However, if you build it full of real people, having honest and informal conversations, you create a hugely flexible and popular internal comms channel. One that is seen as a perk of the job rather than something you have a duty to listen to.
Delivering live updates via our workplace channels makes them easier to consume too. People could listen to this live update in countless ways, on their smart speaker at home, at their desk, over the head office PA system and on their phones as they commuted.
All of this happened with the full privacy and security you’d expect of workplace communications. Although the CEO wasn’t delivering any sensitive information, they knew no competitor was able to access it.
The result is that thousands of people feel like the CEO has spoken directly to them one-on-one. How many businesses can say that today?
Written by Euan McMorrow, Content Director at AVC Immedia.