Why you need to get better at marketing to your team

By Tom Mason, Communications Director

Marketing is about winning new work and building your external brand, correct?

If that’s the case, go and ask your staff these questions and see what response you get back:

• Who are we as a brand?
• What do we stand for?
• Why should people work for us?

Are the answers consistent and do team members feel like they truly know your firm?

It’s surprising how few firms take time to truly think about their internal marketing and demonstrating their brand as an employer to exiting staff.

It’s time to take it seriously.

Your brand perception is shaped as much by employee advocacy as by any other marketing or sales tool.

So, the question isn’t should you market to your own staff – it’s how to do it well.

When it makes sense to market internally

Internal marketing is most effective when:

1. Launching a major brand shift – Whether it’s a new positioning, visual identity, or corporate mission, employees need to understand it before customers do. Without internal buy-in, the external launch risks falling flat.
2. Driving cultural alignment – Culture isn’t just HR’s territory. If your values are part of your market proposition, your people need to live them and that requires more than a single email from the CEO once a month.
3. Mobilising staff as advocates – Employees are often a brand’s most credible spokespeople. With the right information and resources, they can amplify messages across their own networks.

Fundamentally, internal marketing should support your key business priorities and create consistency across your organisation that delivers confidence.

From sustainability targets to new product pushes, internal marketing can help focus attention and energy on initiatives that matter the most to the business.

A simple framework for internal marketing

If you want a practical starting point, think in terms of plan, launch, embed and sustain.

1. Plan – Define the goal, audience, and message. Identify the parts of the business need to be engaged first (often senior leaders or frontline teams). Build the assets you need to sustain the campaign.
2. Launch – Create a moment of impact, whether it’s a town hall, video announcement, or coordinated team briefings. Use creative that’s tailored to employees, not customers.
3. Embed – Follow up with supporting content, Q&A sessions, and resources that help staff live the message in their roles.
4. Sustain – Keep the message alive over time with ongoing updates, recognition for contributions, and measurable progress tracking.

This cycle can be scaled up for major brand overhauls or down for smaller initiatives, but the logic remains the same: don’t just announce – integrate.

If you fail to do this, the experience can be quite alienating for employees who feel like they have been left out of a major decision that affects the way that they work.

You should look to create a perception of exclusivity, which can help with buy in and strengthen your employer brand.

How to do it effectively

For me, the key is in treating your employees as a distinct audience.

This means avoiding recycling customer-facing creative and instead speaking to them with the same respect you’d offer a valued client, but with the insider context they already have.

• Be transparent – Internal audiences can handle more nuance than the public. Share the ‘why’ behind initiatives, even if it involves challenges or trade-offs.
• Get the message right – Time needs to be taken to consider how the message will land with your team and make sure it is tailored correctly, perhaps even segmenting depending on a person’s role.
• Use multiple channels – Don’t rely solely on email or the intranet. Town halls, video updates, digital signage and team briefings can reinforce key points in different ways.
• Make it participatory – Employees are more likely to support initiatives they’ve helped shape. Solicit feedback early and publicly showcase contributions made by your team.

How will you know it is a success?

There are more formal methods like surveys and attendance metrics, but often it is the informal “staff listening” approach that will help you gauge whether the message is landing.

The internal marketing payoff

Done well, internal marketing informs staff and turns them into informed, motivated advocates who extend your brand’s reach and credibility.

It’s important because your potential clients and customers are far more likely to believe the words of a real employee than a polished ad campaign.

LinkedIn’s data shows that employee-shared content typically generates twice the engagement of corporate posts.

Want to start communicating your goals with your employees better? Speak to the experts.