A social wall gives your employees a dedicated space to connect with colleagues by sharing news, opinions, and personal updates. It is a powerful tool for building a sense of community and reinforcing company culture, which is especially vital for connecting remote teams and frontline workers. Social walls are flexible and customizable, and can be based on a theme that fits your organization best. The use case below will help you shape your social wall into a hub for your employees.

In this article:

Key Facts | Video Tutorial | Steps | Measure Success | Best Practices | Customer Stories | 
How Social Walls Look for Users | Additional Resources

Problem Statement: Remote or frontline employees can lack an informal channel to connect with colleagues, leading to feelings of isolation and disconnection from company culture.

Business Objective: Implement a central, digital space for peer-to-peer interaction to increase employee engagement, foster a sense of community, and improve morale.

Staffbase Features: 

• News: Social walls are dedicated News channels, open to all or specific groups of users. You can manage permissions to keep informal, user-generated content separate from official company news.
• Post Widget: Allow your users to create a social wall news post directly from a specific page.
• Pages: Promoting the social wall on a page helps to promote its use and makes it easy for employees to find.

Audience: All employees, especially geographically dispersed teams, remote workers, and frontline employees, as they may lack consistent access to traditional corporate communication channels.

Outcome: Increased peer-to-peer interaction and stronger company culture. Employees feel more connected to their colleagues and the organization, leading to improved morale and a greater sense of belonging.

You can use this step-by-step guide to set up this use case in Staffbase.

Create an Interactive News Channel

1. In the Studio, navigate to Content > News.
2. Click Add channel.
3. Provide a name for your social wall.
4. Under Channel type, select Updates.
5. Click Save.
6. Under the Contributors dropdown, select which users or user groups can post to the interactive news channel.
7. Click Save
8. Navigate to the Settings, to adjust the push or email notifications options.
9. Click Publish Channel.

Learn more about creating a channel and news channel types.

Introduce the Channel With a Post 

1. In the social wall, click Create Post.
2. Write a news post introducing the channel to your users.
3. Click Save draft.
4. Optionally, click Preview to see how the post will look for your users.
5. Click Publish.

Learn more about creating a post, and publishing a post.

Add the News Feed and Post Widgets onto a Page

1. Add the News Feed widget and Post widget onto a page to promote employees using the social wall.
2. Select your new social wall channel as the source for both widgets.
3. Click Save.
4. Click Publish.

Break the Ice and Promote your Social Wall

1. Post a friendly starter message to set the tone. 
   Share a story, photo, or question that invites responses and makes it easier for others to jump in.

2. Ask leaders to contribute first, and suggest their posts include media. 
   Visible participation builds trust and signals that the wall is a safe space, while a variety of post types (text, photos, videos) keeps it interesting and engaging.

3. Promote the social wall in internal newsletters, meetings, or the app homepage. 
   Highlight the channel further by adding the News Feed Widget directly onto a page.

4. Moderate activity by regularly checking the posts and comments section.
   Moderation helps maintain a positive environment to encourage active, meaningful participation.

These are different ways you can track the success of this use case.

Reach and Silent Engagement

• High viewership means the wall is serving as an information hub and building awareness.

• Use the News tab of the Analytics Dashboard to monitor how often new content is posted and track how many employees view posts, even if they don’t interact.

Engagement per Post

• Set an engagement goal early as a benchmark. High and rising engagement levels reflect a connected, active community.

• Use the post statistics to measure average likes and comments per post to gauge responsiveness.

Employee Feedback & Sentiment

• Positive sentiment and anecdotes signal the wall’s cultural and emotional impact.

• Gather quantitative and qualitative feedback from wall comments, surveys, or conversations.

Staffbase has a few recommendations to ensure the best experience for your users.

 

Decide on a Social Wall Theme

• Select a simple and engaging theme that’s easy for everyone to contribute to, regardless of role or location.
• Broad, inclusive themes invite creativity and maximize participation, such as Your Week in One Photo or Meet My Workspace.

 

Moderate Your Social Wall

• Formulate and share an etiquette for your social walls to ensure respectful, inclusive, and purposeful interactions that align with your community guidelines.
• Dedicate time and resources to social wall moderation to address inappropriate content promptly and encourage active, meaningful participation. 

 

Create Event-Specific Social Walls

• Launch the wall in advance to build anticipation and encourage pre-event introductions or content sharing.
• Encourage employees to use the wall during the event to capture live moments, reactions, and behind-the-scenes updates.

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Customer Stories

Learn how other Staffbase customers successfully use this use case.

• Yageo encouraged employees across all its regions to use the social wall feature to post department news and event information. This strategy led to high employee engagement, with the social wall attracting over 6,000 weekly views and active participation from more than 80% of the company's global locations. As a result, employees worldwide are more connected to company activities, which enhances their sense of cohesion and belonging.
• Brussels Airlines introduced a social wall within their app as a space for employees to share their thoughts about work in a way that was visible and could be acted on by the organisation. Before this, employees had set up pages on social networks, such as Facebook. This change worked to foster a sense of community and helped to prevent sensitive information from being leaked externally. The social wall's usage extended beyond day-to-day communication. This empowered employees to exchange ideas, ask questions, and share professional insights.

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How Social Walls Look for Users

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Additional Resources

• Etiquette Template
   

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Additional Helpful Information

• Overview of Interactive News Channels
• Creating an Interactive News Channel
• Configuring the Post Widget
• Overview of Surveys