Communication is to a company what blood is to a body, it cannot exist without it. Communication connects all elements of your business, and it should be handled carefully.
Straight away let’s answer the most important question of all. Is it worth the investment?
Your employees are your brand! Digital signage can be used for communication with your employees alongside customer communication, which makes it a great investment on both ends.
For now let’s focus on the employee side and the internal communication, and how digital signage can make saying “hi” easier.
1. Create a strong corporate culture
Productivity of a company can be greatly improved if there is a strong link between the workers and the mission of the company. After all, if you care about something, you’ll put more effort into improving it.
The title employee of the month is one of many examples of a well developed corporate culture. The elementary bond between the mission of the company and the employees can be created simpler and stronger with digital signage.
Here are a few ways digital signage can help improve your company’s corporate culture:
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You can bolster your team feeling valued
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Instead of bombarding them with emails, communicate with your staff in an unostentatious and consistent fashion
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Share reminders and announcements more easily
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Improve morale by awarding accomplishments and displaying encouraging information
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Add some fun into the mix with pictures, videos or sharing information about events in a more creative fashion.
Depending on your team you can even choose to automate birthdays and important personal events to create a more friendly and connected environment.
In other news, according to a study taken in 2012, 45% of companies in UK, America and Australia used digital signage for corporate communications – a number that has been rising since.
2. Manage employee training
A committed employee is the best one you can hope for, but knowledge remains the primary ingredient.
Digital signage can provide a fast and comfortable learning process.
Digital signage networks can be used for training videos and to demonstrate procedures. It’s a lot easier to educate the workers when they are at their stations and can apply the new information immediately. Casual hour-long lessons are mostly forgotten by the time the knowledge can be applied.
Education via digital signage is more convenient and easier for the company as it cuts down excessive time and money which is usually required for printed content and its circulation.
Training can actually be a lot more comfortable for the employee and it can also be scheduled to be displayed at specific times throughout the day, ensuring the most important information is learned.
3. Engage your employees
Employee engagement in any business is a beneficial step, that’s a no brainer. After all everyone wants to be at a workplace they can identify with. Before I go further into digital signage, here’s an interesting article on engagement ideas you can consider, by Benjamin Neupert on the RMG Networks Blog.
According to several studies, organization with high engagement leave low engagement ones in the dust. Digital signage being a tool that makes engagement easier, can mean a noticeable change. But how exactly do you engage an employee with a digital screen?
Recognition is the most effective way of engaging an employee, and digital signage is the easiest way to give recognition.
Being noticed and recognized for your abilities makes you feel appreciated, no matter how meaningless the attention may appear at first. It increases your passion towards the work and you feel inspired to do well, which is one of many advantages for the company:
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The productivity and quality of the work is increased.
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Loyalty of the customers rises.
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The work is more valuable for the employee.
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There are fewer mistakes and the will to learn is greater.
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There is less stress for the employee.
Sadly the majority of employees are not truly engaged as companies tend not to focus on this element of business. You can engage yours easily with digital signage.
4. Communicate more easily
Being bombarded with emails is not a very inspiring sight, not to mention it increases the risk of important information being unnoticed. Instead, sharing certain information over a digital display is a lot more convenient for both sides.
A really easy way to communicate with your employees can be done by making strategic use of their second screens – smartphones and tablets. It’s more personal and direct, provokes a reaction and the content has a greater chance of being noticed and acted upon.
In business, time and money are two factors which are always taken into account when it comes to investment and there is always one common question:
Is it worth the money and will it save me time?
A common misconception about digital signage is that it requires a team or an above-average IT knowledge – it does not. The alleged IT knowledge is packed in the software which saves time and money.
You can share information faster, easier and in a more comfortable way for your company. In recent years digital signage has been viewed as one of the most cost-effective forms of communication.
5. Share performance metrics
You can let your employees measure the company’s and to some extend their own performance by sharing internal analytics.
The progress of the entire company can be monitored by displaying the information through the digital signage network. Depending on the business in question, you can place digital displays at specific locations where employees can see them frequently.
Alongside internal figures and various numeral data, you can display other interesting information that presents the progress made within the company. For example:
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company website and social media
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stock prices
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sales figures
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online feedback from customers
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the state of the competition
6. Use the most important ingredient of all
There is a very important factor when it comes to displaying content relevant to corporate communication, education, communication or literally any other type.
Can you guess what it is? Here’s a hint: If the display is facing the wall, you can’t see what’s on it. Shocking isn’t it?
It’s location! In the world where people cherish their time, attention-grabbing is a skill to have.
As we have seen, it’s vital to place displays for trainees at the workplace to help them learn while they work. The same applies for managers going to a meeting, as well as customers sitting in a restaurant.
Did you know that an average viewer will pay attention to your screen only for 4 seconds unless the content keeps him interested? Check out this detailed infographic with several interesting examples.
7. Increase efficiency and decrease costs
We’ve already discussed the most important advantages for digital signage. Now, let’s see how these advantages affect the one place where you notice even the slightest change – in your wallet!
Once you have the infrastructure up and running, updating information via a digital screen is clearly a lot cheaper and easier than printing out content and putting it up manually every time a minor change occurs. Plus you can share information you ordinarily wouldn’t due to the time and cost it takes to share it.
You can also schedule messages based on time of day or location to get the most out of your digital signage.
They may seem minor but the costs of constantly printing content add up, both in money and time. It’s especially the time required to place the information on every board manually that adds up. With digital signage it’s on all your boards with one click while saving considerable amounts of money at the same time.
Aside from informational value, digital screens give a certain feeling of advancement and professionalism to your corporation. It’s easier, faster and more efficient in every aspect when compared to other methods of sharing information.
8. Use digital signage at the perfect location
Digital signage has a rule of thumb when it comes to location. It is most effective to place your digital screens in places where your employees spend a lot of time.
Conference rooms are an obvious choice. Present plans and ideas more easily and effectively to your team. Reservations for conference rooms can also be updated and displayed more easily from the comfort of the reception, eliminating any needless absences or hassles with papers.
A hallway or a lobby is a great place for a welcoming and inspiring message. You can share some basic information about your business right away, including other information like weather or local news. You can also display vital information in case a meeting is about to begin.
Cafeterias or Break Rooms can also be excellent choices. Sure, you can provide your employees with vital business information, weather and other data, but you can also share interesting events like sports to make your employees feel more at home.
9. Maintain the communication you’ve built
There are many ways communication inside of a company could be distorted and begin to remind the employees of a boring high school lecture.
Lack of trust and honesty between employees and their superiors can slow down the overall efficiency in a business. By keeping communication and interaction on a certain level, it is bound to provoke positive results.
An overly professional environment can sometimes choke the individuals who find themselves in it, and at the same time, you don’t want your company to be a playground. Maintaining a certain balance between the two can provide a certain freedom for the people who work together and ensures that the communication of say a board meeting, runs smoothly.
When used inside the corporation, digital signage guarantees the presence of quality communication, something that can be a very fragile element of a company. From the side of leaders, there are many reasons which cause communication to fail, but digital signage can help to uphold it.
Images by Nguyen Hung Vu, NEC, digitalsignage.net and tiarescott.
