Using Infographics for Internal Communication

Be honest – does your heart break a bit when you publish an awesome piece of content that you’ve spent ages working on, only for a measly 10% of employees to engage with it?

You’re not alone.  

It’s a competitive content environment. Employees are drowning in a sea of updates and information, so much so that 43% report completely missing important company messages.

Enter the internal communicator’s secret weapon… infographics!

Infographics not only offer a visually engaging way to present complex messages, but they also reduce the amount of text-heavy comms landing with employees.

What is an infographic?

An infographic is a visual way to present information, using elements like imagery, icons, and symbols. It’s a merging of the words ‘information’ and ‘graphic’, and it pretty much does what it says on the tin by offering a much more visual representation of information or data.

Infographics can be shared across different internal channels, including intranets, email, and digital signage. 
Why are infographics helpful?

While infographics are pretty awesome for all different kinds of content, there are a few reasons that make them particularly valuable for internal communications (IC).

Let’s unpack a few of those reasons…

• Impact 

Visuals are much better at grabbing – and holding – attention than text alone. And attention is worth its weight in gold when our internal messaging is up against such stiff competition. The brain processes visual content such as images and infographics much faster than text, so infographics will naturally have a more immediate and lasting impact than a paragraph of text or a lengthy article. Neuroscientists at MIT found that humans are able to identify an image they’ve seen for just 13 milliseconds, which is literally the blink of an eye.    

• Understanding 

Internal communicators need to ensure that their audiences truly understand the content they share. And according to Microsoft, 65% of all humans are ‘visual learners’, who learn and retain information best when they physically see it rather than hear it or read it. So on top of the initial impact of an infographic, seeing it will help build a more thorough understanding of the content being presented.  

• Information retention 

Now this is where we get even more sciencey, but indulge me for one more minute. The ‘picture superiority effect’ (or PSE, for the real geeks) describes a phenomenon where people are more likely to retain information they’ve consumed in the form of pictures and images than plain text. And this makes total sense when you consider that an infographic has way more distinctive visual features than a paragraph of text. The impact and understanding that we just explored also help to create initial engagement, which is shown to boost remembering.

Alright, I’m done with the science stuff. It’s time to talk tactics and explore what makes a great infographic. 

Four elements of a great infographic

We’ve established that infographics are great to have in your IC toolbox due to their ability to create impact, build understanding, and aid information retention. So how do we go about creating a great infographic for an internal audience?

I’ve broken it down into four elements, presented in – you guessed it – an infographic.      

An infographic about infographics? Things are getting a little infographic-ception around here!

Why not take a screen grab and save it to your desktop to provide you with some inspo next time you need to find a creative way to communicate a key message?  

Share all your great infographics on Workvivo!

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