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Workplace helps you drive engagement with a variety of features that power better internal communication, but sustaining engagement after the holiday slowdowns can be a challenge. We’ve pulled together some campaign ideas to help you beat the January blues and have a fast start back to work in the new year.

For a downloadable version of these and other campaign ideas, download this PDF.

Before you get started

Before you get started

Consider some of these best practices when planning your new year campaign:

• Use the campaigns shared here as a baseline
• Think about your audience
• Ensure you’re addressing all the required messaging
• Use a range of communication channels
• Build a succinct timeline against your communication plan
• Have clear calls to action

New year, new start

Connect employees across all regions and job functions on a single platform and hear from everyone!

Week 1: Focusing your business for the new year

• Focus areas:

  Film a welcome back video with one of your executive team members, highlighting the focus areas and goals for the new year. Encourage them to share the video on Workplace.

  Tip: Humanize your leaders by asking them to share one of their personal resolutions as well.

• New year AMA:

  Plan to go live with one of your executives. Collect questions from employees with a Workplace poll and address what’s on their mind heading into the new year.

  Tip: As a follow-up, ask employees which parts of the business they are most interested in hearing from in the new year. Plan spotlights to address those interests.

  
• Decade reflection:

  Draft a post from your executive to talk about how your business has changed in the last decade and what will change in the next 10 years. Invite employees to share their perspective and experience in the comments.

  Tip: Use this as an opportunity to capture institutional knowledge from your employees who have been with the org for 10+ years.

  Tip: Create a quiz with historical questions about your company. Post on Workplace and invite employees to comment with answers.

• Words of intention

  Encourage your leader to choose one word of intention for the new year and share it on Workplace, along with an explanation of why. Ask employees to share their own word of intention for the new year in the comments.

  Tip: Make it fun! Ask employees to post a gif that captures their one word.

  Optional: Ask an executive to share a few words that they believe are critical for the year. Post alongside a poll and invite employees to vote on the word that they think best captures what the business needs to accomplish in the next year.

  
• Career planning:

  Many teams are setting goals at the beginning of the new year and employees often include career milestones as part of their personal resolution setting. Use this time as an opportunity to highlight employees with interesting career paths through video interviews. Share advice, best practices and recommendations for setting and achieving career goals.

  Tip: create 1:1 secret groups for managers and reports to discuss career goals and performance.

Week 2: Creating Community Over Shared Interests & Goals

• Wellness challenge

  Health and wellness is often top of mind for employees at the beginning of a new year. Capitalize on this opportunity by hosting a wellness challenge. Invite employees to post photos of themselves achieving their goals and support others through likes and comments.

  Tip: If you have funds to support a foundation or non-profit organization, offer to donate $1 for each person who participates.

• Reading list

  Many people make resolutions to read more in the new year. Ask your leaders to share their own reading lists. Include favorites from last year and books they are excited to be reading next. You can also include podcasts or other sources of inspiration.

  Tip: Start a book club Workplace group to build community around this resolution. Use Workplace Events to schedule book club meetings.

• Coffee connections:

  Make your company feel smaller and more connected by inviting employees to sign up for a coffee and chat roulette with someone from a different business unit. Pair people randomly and provide thought starters for the conversation to help them learn more about each other’s day-to-day.

  Tip: Explore a simple bot to fully automate this process.

Week 3: Harnessing the Power of Your People Through Challenges

• 20 ideas in the new year

  Great ideas can come from anywhere. Create a group where employees can share suggestions to make business impact in the new year. Encourage employees to like their favorite ideas. At the end of the designated time frame, identify the top 20 ideas to explore, host a live Q&A to discuss, and reward the employees who shared them.

  Tip: Deep dive with business unit leaders to set out the action plan. Report back to employees on how these ideas are progressing throughout the year.

• Business challenge:

  Issue a challenge to your employees and ask them to report back on Workplace. For example, ask them to post a photo when they see a new product in market, a commercial on TV, or when they're engaging with a customer (align this to behaviors that you’re trying to drive internally).

Week 4: Do a Retrospective on the Campaign Results

• Recap best practices from around your Workplace and highlight the top contributors or champions who have successfully engaged their teams. Tip: Use content created to exemplify your employer brand on external channels.

More campaigns to try...

Ignite innovation around efficiency

• Week 1: Share a welcome post from the CEO with a poll to vote on top of mind issues.
• Week 2: Ask a series of questions around ideas on how to save the company money by being more efficient.
• Week 3: Host a live Q&A session with a business unit leader discussing ideas.
• Week 4: Do a deep dive with the business unit leader, setting an action plan.

Make the company seem smaller with a "spotlight on"

• Week 1: Launch with a welcome post from the CPO, inviting people to sign up for a coffee and chat roulette with someone from a different department.
• Week 2: Pair two people who signed up and encourage them to learn about each other's day-to-day.
• Week 3: Encourage your CPO to attend a coffee and chat and share what they learned about the business unit and person.
• Week 4: Create a poll from the communication team asking which department the business would like to hear more about. Run a monthly feature on the team with the highest vote as a “spotlight on” feature.

Start something new

• Week 1: Make a post encouraging people to share their new years resolutions around wellness or work.
• Week 2: Share posts from leaders inviting employees to share their goals and how they plan to tackle them. Have leaders nominate fellow leaders to share.
• Week 3: Share and celebrate goals and plans shared by people around the world.
• Week 4: Inspire employees to meet and exceed their goals, leaning on coworkers for support.

Other helpful resources

• Get to Know Your Execs: An internal campaign to help foster executive authenticity and build trust in leadership.
• Culture Carriers Toolkit: An internal campaign to help you identify and celebrate the people who embody your company values.
• Be the Ally: An internal campaign to spread D&I knowledge and build allieship across the company.
• Fun Friday Challenges: A series of gamified GIFs to help you drive engagement and celebrate the upcoming weekend.