Recently I was invited by Intranet Management (Italy) to talk about my video collection. I decided to choose “The Intranet Demo video” as my topic. This video type may be not as spectacular as some of the teaser videos in my collection, but the Intranet Demo video (where someone shows what the new intranet looks like, what content you can find and how to use it) is much more valuable, in my opinion.
Some reasons to create a Demo video for your new intranet
There are more benefits to the Demo Video. Not only does it create awareness (as does a teaser) for the new intranet, but it will also help people with actually using the intranet. When someone shows them how to work with the new intranet, it may help to lower the threshold to try it. Remember, not everyone is as computer literate as yourself!
A good demo can therefore save the training departments (often HR, Communications and/or IT) some support time and effort. And its lifespan is much longer than that of the teaser, because it can also be used to introduce new employees to the intranet.
A teaser is fun, and often very entertaining, but it is obsolete once the intranet has been launched. The teaser certainly has its uses, but as I have been at the IT-side of things, I think the Demo is more value for money.
If you have time or budget for only one intranet launch video, make it a Demo!
Do you really have to create a Demo video?
Someone asked whether an intranet should not be so intuitive that a demo is not needed?
Well, a new intranet may be intuitive for some people, but you can not expect it to be intuitive for all. Some people simply need more help, or are coming in as a new employee who has been used to a different intranet platform. And especially when you have changed the design, layout, navigation and/or the platform all colleagues may benefit from an instruction on what has changed, and why and how. And where they can find their relevant content.
The Demo video is just ONE adoption tool
I think a Demo video should not be the only way to increase trial and adoption of your intranet. For some colleagues having a demo that explains the whereabouts of important content and the benefits of completing your profile will be sufficient, others will still need more help. This also depends on your organization: when I was working for multinational marketing & production companies, most people were pretty computer literate. In my last job however, which was in a mental health care organization, colleagues were “working with people, not with computers”. Some of them panicked when they had to store documents on their OneDrive instead of on the Downloads drive. So we had to spend more time and effort making things easy for them.
So, you will always need more tools: webinars or other online sessions as well as classroom training or personal help.
Please share your Demo video
I have seen many nice Demo videos, but have not seen the perfect one yet.
Have you created a Demo video when your intranet was (re)launched? Please let me know where it can be seen…or upload it to YouTube or Vimeo.
Ellen's Digital Workplace 