What Makes a Good Intranet Portal?

[kitesurfing42]

There is a lot of enthusiasm (and work!) when you first set up your Intranet Features. Customizing and branding the site, deciding on structure and navigation, adding content and planning the "go-live" date. The first few months are a critical time for any intranet, and often organizations run internal marketing campaigns to announce the intranet and get employees onto the site. It's an exciting time, where the intranet is fresh in everyone's mind.

Fast forward into the future and you may find your intranet site has gone stale. Perhaps the original intranet champion has moved on and no one has really taken over the project. Enthusiasm has waned and your intranet is not living up to its potential.

Here are some compelling reasons to get your intranet back on track. Market statistics show that implementation of an enterprise-wide intranet can lead to increased accessibility to current information, the ability to work off-site, prestige, competitive advantage, reduced maintenance expenses, increased employee satisfaction, and a return on investment (ROI) that can top 1000 percent.

A key component to ensuring your intranet does not lose its way is to assign a capable champion, and a succession plan for when champions and key contributors move on. Training should be included as a regular promotional activity - use the training/registration module to promote intranet workshops. When talking to a new intranet author or helping a staff member locate information, take the opportunity to show them around the intranet. Create an intranet video showing the cool and innovative ways users can benefit from the site (Camtasia is a good tool for this). Increasing intranet awareness can go a long way to encourage users to get on board.

Some other ideas if your intranet has gone stale

Re-design your site. Create a new theme. Use fresh but muted colors
Give your intranet a name and treat it like a "personality" in the company
Studies show employee directories are the most popular on an intranet, so ensure that this app is full of information, both corporate and personal
Make use of the employee birthday/anniversary feature
Create home page widgets to feature employees doing exceptional work
Create fun & regular polls for the home page that users can answer
Ask your CEO to write entries on an intranet blog - great tool for employees to learn more about the CEO, to read about their vision for the company