Soundbite Thoughts
Leadership update
What is top of mind for you? What is currently important to know about your organization, your industry, your strategy? What changes do you see? What do you think employees want to know from you? OK - now condense it into three minutes or less. Be brief and ask for something at the end (feedback, suggestions, ideas for example).
No meeting team update
Having too many meetings? Are many of them focused on updates and information check-ins? Then record a one minute update on what you are working on and share it with your team. Maybe use something like this format:
Quick review of the past week
Top priorities?
Any blockers / need help?
Test your Marketing
Got a radio, Spotify, podcast ad? Got a marketing jingle? Want to test it out? Share a Soundbite of the audio and have a CTA for feedback. Want to make it more interesting? Ask your employees to make their OWN versions and fire them back in a SB.
Praise / Give Thanks
Had someone offer you some amazing help? Someone on the team gone above and beyond? Send them a short praise - really genuine, authentic thanks. It is so much easier to convey emotion in audio (so they really hear that “thanks” for going above and beyond). You can keep it personal and send thanks 1-1, or share it more widely so everyone can share in your appreciation of a valued employee/colleague.
Recognize achievements and milestones
As well as thanking people, if we want our employees to stick around, we should really recognize their work and commitment as well. Share your gratitude to those who have completed big projects, or who have been at your organization for a milestone timeframe. Recognize large groups for their effort and success. And
Localize content - in different languages
Does it take a long time to translate your content into different languages? Do you have front line employees who have a second language? Then stop having written translations created - time consuming and expensive - instead ask local employees to record a message in their first language. This way you can scale the engagement with multiple languages for a fraction of the cost.
The Why? Explainer
Making business decisions that sound confusing to employees? Or perhaps there is a frustrating policy or process (hello expenses submission) that while not great, is the way it has to be right now. Create a short Soundbite to explain why something is the way it is and ask for feedback. Nothing creates trust between leadership end employees than transparency in decision making processes, even if nothing is going to change for now. Using a Soundbite will enable your employees hear that you share their frustrating/misunderstanding. It will also be cheaper and far faster to deploy than making a video.
Quick training
Imagine a group or department need a quick training update. A new process, or a new way of working. Rather than spend an age creating a classroom session or an elearning module, instead create a short series of microlearning Soundbites to share the new knowledge. Soundbite enables you require acknowledgement of listening to the Soundbite, so you know your employees have participated. Faster to create, more quickly and easily consumed.
Connect to Customers
Oftentimes, employees don’t get to hear directly from customers or clients on the impact of their work. However, our customer teams, call centres, marketers, product managers, researchers, front line workers and more talk to customers every day. Use Soundbites to share customer stories, especially if voiced by those very customers. Short snippets, both positive and negative. But the emotional connection generated by using Soundbites will bring your employees and customers closer together.