Staffbase is an employee communication platform that unifies the tools internal communicators use to reach, inform and involve every worker—from office staff to frontline teams. It combines a mobile employee app, an intranet, employee email, and measurement into one system so organisations can plan, create, publish, and analyse communications across channels in a coordinated way. Teams use it to ship timely updates, provide a single front door to services, and track impact with clear metrics.
Staffbase helps you reach the right people with the right message, fast, and prove what worked. It reduces channel sprawl by centralising content, targeting, and analytics, so communications stop competing and start compounding. For leaders, it scales executive messaging without relying on cascades. For communicators, it simplifies workflows and shows outcomes, not just outputs. For employees, it puts news, services, and feedback in one place they can access on any device.
- Purpose: Reach non‑desk and desk workers on mobile with news, alerts, resources, and two‑way interactions.
- How it works: Publish posts, videos, and pages; push urgent updates; target content by location, role, or group; enable comments and reactions with configurable moderation.
- Typical use: Safety alerts, shift updates, leadership announcements, policy changes, recognition, and community stories.
- Purpose: Provide a central, searchable hub for company news, navigation, and core services.
- How it works: Build pages with structured templates; manage navigation and governance; surface personalised feeds; integrate search across tools; optionally run on or alongside Microsoft 365 and SharePoint.
- Typical use: Onboarding hubs, departmental sites, policy libraries, benefits centres, and task shortcuts.
- Purpose: Design, target, and measure employee newsletters and announcements from Outlook, Gmail, or the web.
- How it works: Drag‑and‑drop editor, brand‑safe templates, audience lists, dynamic personalisation, UTM management, and detailed analytics including opens, clicks, read time, and device breakdowns. Works with distribution groups and can reflect directory attributes to target segments.
- Typical use: CEO notes, weekly briefings, crisis updates, campaign series, and event invitations.
- Purpose: Make a single destination for news and essential links—the “front door” to the digital workplace.
- How it works: Pin key resources (HR, IT, safety, schedules), surface personalised news tiles, embed micro‑apps and forms, and route users to the systems they need.
- Purpose: Measure reach and resonance across channels to guide decisions.
- How it works: Dashboards show delivery, opens, reads, clicks, active users, and engagement by audience segment. Campaign views roll up multi‑channel performance, so you can compare, for example, email reach versus app push and intranet reads for the same message.
Target by site, department, job family, language, and custom attributes pulled from your directory or HRIS. Personalise greetings, visuals, and links to increase relevance because people act on messages that clearly apply to them.
Plan a single message once, then schedule it across email, app, and intranet with consistent branding and tailored copy per channel. This reduces duplicated effort and avoids mixed messages.
Workers without desks still need news, policies, and schedules. The app uses push notifications for urgent alerts and supports offline reading for areas with patchy coverage.
Set contributor, editor, and approver roles; define who can publish where; and use review workflows for sensitive content. Clear governance prevents accidental sends and keeps the experience consistent.
Build once, reuse often. Use approved colours, fonts, and content blocks in email and page templates to ship faster and stay on brand.
Enable comments, reactions, quick polls, and forms. Configure moderation, profanity filtering, and escalation for safe, constructive dialogue.
Improve findability with structured navigation and search that spans pages, posts, documents, and, where configured, integrated systems. Good IA decreases time‑to‑task and support tickets.
- Identity and user sync: Azure AD/Microsoft Entra ID, Google Workspace, SSO via SAML/OIDC.
- Productivity: Microsoft 365, SharePoint, Teams.
- HRIS and directories: Connect attributes for targeting and lifecycle events.
- Analytics: Export events to BI tools; add UTMs for downstream reporting.
Ship CEO updates that land in inboxes, on the intranet homepage, and in app feeds simultaneously. Track which audiences read and reacted. Follow up segment‑by‑segment where reach lagged.
Coordinate urgent updates across channels with push and email alerts, FAQs, and live pages. Pin the latest guidance to the front door to reduce speculation and mis‑information.
Reach store associates, drivers, field technicians, and plant workers with rota changes, safety reminders, and recognition. Provide a mobile home for SOPs and micro‑learning.
Run multi‑week campaigns for benefits enrolment, security awareness, or culture programmes. Use templated sequences, nudge under‑reached segments, and compare channel lift with A/B tests.
Create guided checklists and resource hubs tied to employee start dates or role moves. Automate welcome emails and app notifications that trigger when directory attributes change.
Pick Staffbase if you need to coordinate comms across email, intranet, and mobile and you care about measurable impact. Choose a point solution only if you need a single channel without broader orchestration.
- Scale: Confirm support for your language set, distribution groups, and content volume.
- Security: Require SSO, data residency options, encryption in transit and at rest, and admin audit logs.
- Governance: Ask for fine‑grained roles, approval flows, and moderation options aligned to your risk profile.
- Integrations: Validate Microsoft 365 and identity integrations in a sandbox with your policies applied.
- Analytics: Ensure you can segment by attributes, export raw data, and measure multi‑channel campaign roll‑ups.
- Mobile deployment: Plan enrolment for BYOD and corporate‑owned devices, including MDM if needed.
- Accessibility: Check adherence to WCAG 2.1 AA and test with real assistive tech.
- Change management: Look for templated launch plans, training paths, and content governance playbooks.
- Pick Staffbase for multi‑channel orchestration, mobile reach, and campaign analytics.
- Pick SharePoint‑only if your need is a document‑centred intranet inside Microsoft 365 and you don’t require a managed mobile app or integrated email analytics.
- Pick Staffbase to plan and measure across app/intranet plus email.
- Pick a standalone email tool if you only send newsletters and don’t need a front door, app, or intranet.
- Pick Staffbase when you need controlled, targeted, on‑brand comms with governance and auditing.
- Pick social tools for open, real‑time collaboration where discovery and chat are the priority.
Front‑load user sync and audience attributes. Map departments, locations, job families, and leadership levels from your identity source. This unlocks targeting, personalisation, and accurate analytics from day one.
Design the intranet front door like a high‑traffic product: clear top‑level nav, a concise set of hubs (News, People, HR, IT, Safety, Locations), and task‑first shortcuts. Eliminate duplicate pages. Assign ownership per section.
Create a small set of email and page templates that cover 80% of sends: leadership memo, programme update, newsletter, urgent alert, event invite, and FAQ page. Lock styles to safeguard brand compliance.
Define who can publish what, where, and when. Require approvals for executive and policy content. Set moderation rules, escalation paths, and archiving schedules. Governance prevents rework and reputational risk.
- Pilot: Start with 1–2 business units and a leadership channel.
- Train: Short task‑based sessions for communicators; micro‑guides for managers.
- Enrol: Roll out SSO, share join codes or managed installs, and run a simple first‑week engagement challenge.
- Measure: Track adoption KPIs and story reach; fix gaps before broad rollout.
Connect Microsoft 365 for search, document previews, and Teams posting where needed. Test SSO with conditional access. If you manage devices, validate MDM profiles for notifications and updates.
Use a shared editorial calendar to plan campaigns across channels. Reserve slots for executive messages and programme deadlines. Add audience targets and success metrics to each item before creation.
Write mobile‑first copy with clear calls to action. Use image alt text and concise headlines. For email, build content blocks that translate well to dark mode and smaller screens. For intranet pages, front‑load answers and provide scannable sections.
Stage content in a test environment. Send proofs to approvers. Schedule releases to match time zones and shift patterns. For urgent alerts, prepare pre‑approved templates so you can ship within minutes.
Set a standard scorecard:
- Reach: delivered email rate, app push delivery, unique visitors.
- Engagement: opens, read time, clicks, reactions, comments.
- Completion: policy acknowledgements, event sign‑ups, task completions.
- Equity: distribution of reach and engagement across roles, locations, and languages.
Rinse and repeat: identify under‑reached segments and follow up on that audience via an alternate channel or simplified message. Archive stale content and update top‑performing pages quarterly.
Use SSO for authentication and role‑based access for administration. Encrypt data in transit and at rest. Apply data retention rules and audit logs to sensitive channels. Confirm data residency options for your regions and perform a DPIA where required. For frontline devices, use MDM to control app versions and enforce screen‑lock policies.
Commit to accessible content and UI:
- Provide alt text for images and transcripts for videos.
- Maintain colour contrast and readable font sizes.
- Structure pages with semantic headings for screen readers.
- Offer language variants and enable right‑to‑left scripts if needed.
- Use plain language. Short sentences reduce cognitive load and improve comprehension.
Plan for high‑traffic events like all‑hands or urgent news. Use CDN‑backed delivery and pre‑publish heavy assets. For email, warm sender domains and manage SPF/DKIM/DMARC to protect deliverability. For push notifications, test platform behaviour on iOS and Android, including focus modes and notification summaries.
Expect pricing to scale with active users and product modules. Budget for:
- Core platform licences (app, intranet, email).
- Add‑ons (advanced analytics or extra environments).
- Implementation services (IA design, migration, template design).
- Ongoing enablement (training, content design support).
Balance cost against the duplication you’ll retire by consolidating tools and the time saved in planning, creation, and reporting. A single platform also reduces compliance and vendor management overhead.
Tie metrics to business outcomes, not vanity numbers.
- Safety: Fewer incidents following targeted campaigns; faster policy acknowledgement rates.
- Operations: Reduced time‑to‑task via front‑door shortcuts; fewer IT and HR tickets about “where to find X.”
- Culture: Broader participation in recognition; increased event RSVPs outside headquarters; improved manager cascade effectiveness when paired with follow‑up nudges.
- Change: Higher completion of training tied to transformation programmes; faster adoption of new tools tracked via embedded CTAs.
- Content ownership: Name an owner for every page and channel; add a review date.
- Publishing windows: Use set send windows per region to avoid overload and improve open rates.
- Sunset policy: Archive or merge pages that underperform or duplicate other content.
- Comment policy: Publish clear rules. Moderate lightly to encourage healthy debate while shutting down toxic behaviour quickly.
- Executive comms: Use an approvals fast‑lane with pre‑approved templates and an on‑call editor.
Connect identity, build audiences, configure SSO, and set admin roles. Draft the IA and create your first five templates.
Run two campaigns and one leadership announcement across all channels. Gather feedback from pilot users, adjust targeting, and fix navigation pain points.
Migrate high‑value pages, launch the front door, and expand contributor training. Introduce engagement features (comments, reactions, polls) with clear guidelines.
Start quarterly content audits. Add A/B testing for subject lines and headlines. Integrate with BI for deeper reporting and share a monthly comms performance pack with stakeholders.
- Too many channels competing: Centralise planning and retire redundant newsletters and sites.
- Weak audience data: Clean directory attributes before launch; missing data undermines targeting and analytics.
- Template sprawl: Lock styles and limit the template set; otherwise brand drift creeps in.
- Launch without governance: Define roles and approvals first; retrofitting rules later causes friction.
- No feedback loop: Make analytics reviews a standing meeting; follow up on under‑reached segments within 72 hours.
- Ignoring managers: Equip managers with shareable posts and quick‑hit decks because they remain a top information source.
- Internal communications teams that manage multi‑site, multi‑language audiences.
- Organisations with large frontline populations that need dependable mobile reach.
- Microsoft‑centric companies that want a managed front door rather than a patchwork of SharePoint sites.
- Executives who expect measurable results and consistent delivery for critical updates.
- A list of must‑reach audiences and critical messages from the last six months.
- Your current channel inventory and sending volumes.
- Sample content to rebuild live in the demo (one executive memo, one campaign, one urgent alert).
- A target scorecard and the metrics you’ll report to leadership.
- Security requirements: SSO, logging, retention, data residency, device policies.
No. It suits medium and large organisations best, especially those with distributed workforces, but smaller organisations use it when they need strong targeting and mobile reach.
Often, yes. Some teams run Staffbase as the primary intranet; others use it as the front door that unifies news and links while keeping document libraries in Microsoft 365.
Not strictly, but the app still helps for urgent alerts, leadership notes, and flexible reading on the go. Many desk‑heavy organisations still enable it.
Email remains a high‑reach channel. Staffbase’s email tool sits alongside the app and intranet so you can orchestrate once, publish everywhere, and see combined analytics.
You’ll get channel‑level and campaign‑level dashboards. Tie these to business outcomes like training completion, policy acknowledgement, and reduced support tickets to show value.
Staffbase is a unified employee communication platform that brings email, intranet, and a mobile app together with targeting and analytics. Use it to coordinate messages, reduce channel noise, and measure impact across your workforce. It helps communicators ship faster, leaders reach farther, and employees find what they need without hunting across systems.
