The best intranets with the strongest content typically have content authors contributing information from all around the organization. Rather than providing a centralized view of information from the perspective of headquarters or the Corporate Communications team, intranets with decentralized content authorship benefit from showcasing a variety of ideas and expertise, as well as from offering information relevant to specific audiences around the organization.

Simply asking employees to be contributors or assigning the role to individuals around the organization is not enough to foster strong content. Here are 3 tips to encourage, support, and inspire contributors to create the best content possible.

1. Help Them Create, not Just Upload

Few intranet content authors are trained writers or editors, and even fewer are trained web writers. Intranet teams commonly train content authors on how to enter information into a content-management system (CMS), but that just covers the mechanics of getting words onto the server, not what those words should be. The world has enough poor content already: don’t contribute further to information pollution, but instead work with the authors to support good content and good writing.

Good content. Help content creators understand not just the system used to present content, but also the process behind creating it. When new authors start working on the intranet, brainstorm with them to come up with ideas for appropriate, engaging, and interesting content. Content authors bring insider knowledge and expertise to the conversation, and intranet team members know the content strategy for the site and can add insights into what content is most successful. Talk about successful content from other areas of the site, unique additions the author can bring, useful information that should be added, or even ideas for new forms of content, such as video interviews with experts or photographs from projects.

Remember that good content comes in many forms. It might be posting updates about a team or sharing insights from the group intended for a larger audience around the organization. It might be writing profiles on employees or projects.

Good writing. Help authors understand what it means to write for the web. Even trained writers have trouble translating information for the intranet. Provide guidelines and tips on how to write concisely for the web, and give content authors easy access to that information. For each guideline, show before and after examples of how to apply it. Post those guidelines on an easy to access spot on the intranet, and update them regularly as needs shift or new examples are encountered. For responsive intranets, more detailed writing guidance may be required. Two of the winners of the 2016 Intranet Design Annual provided writing guidelines focused on the details of writing content that can effectively be used across different device types.

Intermountain Healthcare worked closely with site owners and content contributors, and provided guidelines for writing, which were posted on the intranet. The team knew that it needed to make brevity an overarching theme in content guidelines — not just because web readers scan content, but also because the content could be consumed across a variety of devices, including smartphones, tablets, or desktops.

Similarly, the Swedish Parliament advised their authors to avoid phrases such as “the image on the right” or “the menu on the left” in instructional text because layouts would shift in the responsive designs as the screen size changed. This recommendation was in addition to their move toward writing in “plain Swedish” to make information easier to understand.

Intermountain Healthcare, a winner of the 2016 Intranet Design Annual, included information about writing for the web on the intranet. The page itself was nicely written for the web, with bulleted lists, bolded keywords, and short sentences.

Good processes. Frequent contributors should know how to publish their own content, so they can add information to the intranet in a timely manner. Go beyond training people to use your content-management system and take a look at the complexity and the usability of the system being used.

The content-publishing process, as well as the associated training materials, should be as easy as possible. Enbridge, another 2016 Intranet Design Annual winner, succeeded at both simplifying the publishing process and updating the instructions. Users no longer had to interact with the back-end of the CMS to add or edit content, and the approval process was streamlined. Online learning videos provided instructions for content authors. The training materials were designed with change and scalability in mind: the intranet team divided the videos in modules, to make it easy to make small modifications to the instructions without having to update the whole video.

These improvements resulted in a great success for the Enbridge team: even with the addition of 50 new content authors, the new system and instructions practically eliminated support calls about content publishing, and authors reported satisfaction with the new, efficient process.

The Enbridge intranet included a section of resources for content authors, including links to training, to style guides, and to an author community.

2. Give Feedback and Foster a Community of Support

When employees volunteer or are assigned to be content authors, intranet teams may be reluctant to provide feedback to those authors, either for fear of discouraging them or simply because the intranet team does not have adequate time to work with authors. However, even the most motivated authors can be demotivated if they never get any feedback about the value of their writings — that is, about whether their content is helpful and visited by other intranet users.

Many teams contact content authors only when content is out-of-date or up for automated review. Refreshing or reviewing content, while important, should not be the only point of contact with contributors. In our intranet field studies at a wide variety of organizations, we often hear that contributors feel isolated in their roles, either because the intranet team only contacts them occasionally, or because they have no close peer writers to communicate with.

Give authors analytics information about the readership of their content. Be sure to give authors a comparative point of reference – having 100 readers could be a great success or a great failure depending on the site, the content, and the intended audience. Writers with many readers will be proud and motivated. Writers with fewer readers may be motivated to work harder to meet their coworkers’ needs. To turn the latter scenario into a success, be sure to provide support materials giving authors the tips they need to improve.

It is important to build a community of support for writers. The community should include the intranet team as well as other content authors around the organization. Do not assume that authors will naturally talk to each other — they may be scattered throughout different groups, teams, departments, offices or even countries and they may not know each other. They may not even know who else contributes information to the site.

A space for authors to connect, either digital or physical, can help them support each another and give them opportunities to bounce ideas or ask technical questions. The authors’ space could take the form of lunch-and-learn meetings for content authors who are in a single office location. It could be a community area on the intranet dedicated to authors and editors, with active contributions (e.g., feedback about site traffic, analytics, and successful or popular content) by the intranet team to keep it going. It could be a regular newsletter with information and the opportunity to ask questions. It could be a monthly online meeting highlighting successful content and new initiatives or opportunities. Inspire by example and give praise where it is due. A little feedback can go a long way, even if it’s not directly about that author’s content.

It also can’t hurt to show respect for the writers by referring to them respectfully or even reverently. For instance, dorma+kaba, a Design Annual winner, refers to content authors as “communication heroes.” These heroes are brought together monthly in an online meeting where they share best practices and lessons learned. Contributors also participate in a Community of Practice site on the intranet.

A community of creators encourages peers to support each other. They can conduct community reviews, acknowledging good work by their colleagues. They can share and brainstorm new content ideas. And they can trade tricks for creating effective content efficiently.

3. Make Authors Accountable

Creating content is often a job assigned to an employee, rather than asked for. Even inspired content authors or those who enjoy writing and volunteer to do it may feel (at least occasionally) that they do not have the time to create intranet content because they are busy doing their “real” jobs.

Over time, add the creation of intranet content as a responsibility in job descriptions. See that responsibility not as a reason to chastise people for not producing content, but, instead, as a way to help recognize the importance of being an author to the organization, create adequate time for writing quality content, and give recognition for well done work. If creators are held accountable for writing content as part of their job function, incentive to create good content will increase, and authors will receive recognition for the work that they do.

Also, give content authors freedom. Encourage content creators to be responsible for their own content, rather than requiring lengthy or cumbersome review processes. While some areas of the site may need to be more carefully edited, trust authors to create accurate and appropriate content. If content controls are needed, allow readers to review the content, with a way to mark content as inappropriate if needed. A simple way to hold writers accountable is to add their names and contact information to any content they post. Lack of anonymity can naturally help quality control, as employees who come across incorrect or unclear information can easily reach out directly to the author for clarification.

Better Support, Better Content

When content creators are adequately supported, encouraged, and acknowledged, content is better prioritized at organizations. Better content can create stronger intranets, increase site usage, and help the intranet remain a business-critical tool.

Learn more about supporting intranet content authors in our day-long courses on Writing Compelling Digital Copy and Intranet Design Trends and Best Practices.