ExterionMedia Places Employees at the Forefront of Internal Communication

Digital transformation is nothing new at ExterionMedia. Three years ago, propelled by a new executive committee, the company launched CAP 2017: a global project designed to instill cultural change.

“Before, our communication was predominantly top-down,” explains Jean-François Curtil, President at ExterionMedia France. “But for us, it was important to allow all employees to play a central role in company communication.”

Two things were required to make this ambition a reality: trust in employees, and a tool that would make it easy for them to share ideas and information. “70% of our employees are spread out all over France,” notes Olivier Cagnac, HR Director at ExterionMedia France. “So finding a tool that would enable everyone to share information in real time was key.”

Before, our communication was predominantly topdown. But for us, it was important to allow all employees to play a central role in company communication.

Jean-François Curtil President ExterionMedia

Sociabble: An Intuitive, Collaborative Internal Communication Platform

ExterionMedia chose to implement Sociabble, a platform that centralizes all internal communication channels, and allows users to create content by importing URLs or drawing up posts from scratch.

Companies can decide whether user-generated content (UGC) is published automatically or preapproved by platform administrators. Users win points for content creation and engagement activity (likes and comments), while administrators can launch campaigns and challenges to promote specific content and drive desired user behavior. “We chose Sociabble for two key reasons,” explains Olivier Cagnac.

Firstly, it’s easy to use because the interface is intuitive and similar to the social networks everybody already knows. And secondly, it’s a highly collaborative tool that makes it easy for employees to share ideas and interact.

The Platform Launch: A Mission of the Utmost Importance

ExterionMedia launched Sociabble in a very original way.

First, a letter was sent to 44 ambassadors in different roles and regions, with a single, mysterious message: “You have been selected for a mission of the utmost importance.”

This was followed by an email inviting the chosen ambassadors to log onto the Sociabble platform. As teams, they were given the challenge of engaging all other employees on Sociabble.

“We really bet on the word of mouth method,” notes Olivier Cagnac. “We were confident in our ambassadors’ ability to spread the message, and the result was that after just two weeks, 83% of employees were Sociabble members.”

Today, just over two months later, almost all ExterionMedia employees are active on the Sociabble platform. During the launch phase, traditional methods of internal communication (intranet and email) were used alongside Sociabble.

But today, the latter is ExterionMedia’s only internal communication tool. “78% of the content on Sociabble is created by our employees,” explains Olivier Cagnac. “This is content we didn’t have before – we have multiplied the amount of information being shared throughout the company by five.” The content posted by ExterionMedia employees is very diverse: from success stories to best practices, insights into daily company life to photos of employees on vacation in front of ExterionMedia billboards.

78% of the content on Sociabble is created by our employees. This is content we didn’t have before – we have multiplied the amount of information being shared throughout the company by five.

Olivier Cagnac HR Director ExterionMedia

Next Steps: Transforming Corporate Communication from the Inside Out

So what next for ExterionMedia?

“The next step is to transform our employees into brand ambassadors on social media,” notes Jean-François Curtil. “The objective is for all employees to share company content on their own social network accounts via Sociabble.” With the chosen tool and a collaborative culture already in place, ExterionMedia has made important strides towards this objective.