In a world of ongoing unpredictability and disruption, it’s important to stay up to date with the latest communication, media and technology news. We like to go one step further by combining our solid industry experience with facts and research to make predictions about what lies ahead in the internal communication sphere and share them with clients through our annual Trends book. So, ahead of the release of our 2018 book, let’s look back at previous trends we correctly predicted ahead of time, and how we’ve helped clients tackle their communications challenges head on.
In 2014, we declared that ‘the image itself has become the message’, driven by the phenomenal growth of social media and the fact that images help us to understand ideas better.
Two years later Marketing Week confirmed our sentiments with an article about the importance of good design. “All visuals create a pattern of attention, which is why it is so important for brands to give designs a clear focus, as humans have limited attention spans,” according to psychologist Natalie Nahaï.
Read about how we help clients communicate its complicated systems architecture with animation.
In 2015 we looked at data collection and research within internal communications – how we should use data to inform business decisions – and predicted that ‘social graphs’ and ‘network maps’ would become commonplace.
In 2017 Forbes magazine published an article about how big data will drive business operations, rather than simply reflecting performance.
Read about how we used quantitative and qualitative data to help Nationwide shape future activity.
Despite estimates in 2015 that only 20 per cent of large enterprises had embraced new tools and technologies, we predicted 2016 to be the year of the rise of the digital workplace.
Technology today is a core element of the employee experience and things are improving. We’ve been working with clients to help them refine their digital employee experience and increase their success when launching a new digital channel. We expect to see a greater focus in this area as more organisations adopt the powerful tools within the Microsoft Office 365 suite.
Read about how we helped Kerry Foods build an award-winning microsite.
Our Trends book for 2017 year explored how communicators of the not-too-distant future will use neuroscience to good effect. By knowing how our brains receive and react to information, we can make our messages more specific and better understood.
Entrepreneur had the same idea in an article published last month which implored employers to first understand how their employees’ brains work before trying to build a resilient and engaged workforce.
Read about how we help bring stories to life with engaging storytelling and design.
For 2018, our fifth year of helping clients identify the IC trends that matter, we consider the development of Microsoft Office 365. We also review the growing importance of ethical communications, marvel at the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) and consider the challenges of chatbots.