What is an intranet? Definition, examples, and tools for 2026

Employee retention is the art of holding onto your staff once you’ve hired them.

And, in 202w, it’s more important than ever.

Why?

Because companies are finally waking up to the competitive advantages of being a "people" company. A "churn and burn" approach to hiring results in poor customer service.

This is an issue, because customers are placing increasing value on good service. With smartphones, it’s easier than ever to find a competitor company to buy from. Or in the case of consumer goods, to avoid the shop altogether and order online.

Before we start.

You can hold onto employees (more or less) by treating them well. Listening to their concerns, and providing them with a few incentives to stay put.

If you’re an HR professional or a CEO, you don’t need us to tell you that.
What you might find useful is an in-depth guide to employee retention in the modern workforce.

How to maximize your employee engagement efforts. And make sure there were no stones left unturned in creating the most comprehensive guide... we asked some industry-leading experts to contribute.
We’ll cover:

• Detail on the importance of employee retention today.
• How to build effective employee retention strategies.
• The exit interview, and how to turn it into your secret employee retention weapon.

Let’s begin...

Why is employee retention important?

Employee retention means "treating your employees right"; it’s an end in itself, not just the means.

From an ethical standpoint, no company should mistreat their employees. Meeting your colleagues’ basic needs and providing them with a safe and stimulating workplace? It's the right thing to do for its own sake.

But it’s more than that.

Attracting talent to your company—and keeping it once you’ve found it—has so many advantages. According to Herzberg's famous Two-Factory Theory, employee retention and employee motivation are interdependent. You can find out more about this in the Vantage Circle HR blog. A strong employee retention strategy will:

• Reduce operating costs.
• Improve customer service levels.
• Allow you to out-compete your competitors for the best people.

The cost of high employee turnover

Hiring and firing is expensive.

Eye-wateringly expensive, to be precise. Think six to nine months salary as a conservative estimate.

Then you need to consider the impact of not having someone there to do that person’s work. That could slow down a massive project. Cause higher overtime costs as existing staff pick up their work. Or just lead to a reduction in staff morale as they struggle with increased workloads.

Companies tend to get the importance of this for salaried positions and execs. but there’s often a bit of a blind spot when it comes to their non-desk workforce and the real cost of losing an employee.

Sure, replacing a senior-level manager is more expensive than replacing a bus driver. But what happens if your bus drivers’ morale becomes so low that two or three quit per month?

It all adds up.

"Losing talented staff can also have emotional consequences on those who stay. Effectively reducing productivity by decreasing morality and motivation," says Rochelle van Rensburg of the Ezzely Blog.

"Maintaining essential talent is therefore mission-critical to organizational effectiveness for all these reasons. Staff retention puts companies ahead of their competitors, by reducing recruiting and re-skilling costs. But more importantly, by keeping the top performers, which results in all of their specialized knowledge and expertise remaining in-house."

Your mobile workforce interacts most with customers. They are the public face of your company. So, their happiness will reflect in the level of service they give your customers.

Happier, more engaged employees deliver better customer service. They also build up a bank of operational knowledge over time. This helps them respond to queries quicker and more effectively than a steady stream of new hires ever could.

The importance of employee retention in 2020

An active employee retention strategy is more important than ever.
There are two key reasons for this:

Firstly, it's never been easier for customers to look elsewhere if they feel that your levels of service don’t match their expectations. We live in an age where any information you want is available via a few taps of a smartphone screen.

Dissatisfied with a hotel stay? Booking.com can recommend thousands of others.

Bad experience in a taxi? A quick Google gets you all the phone numbers of other local firms.

Poor customer experience at a theme park? TripAdvisor lists other attractions.

You get the idea.

Despite this, customers still want to be loyal. Millennials want to stick around if your brand fits in with their personal values. Don’t throw away this loyal market.

Secondly, it's never been easier to browse jobs via online jobs boards. If your workforce isn’t happy they will move. Don’t assume that they will sit in their job miserable because there aren’t any other options.

Reasons why employees leave and reasons why managers leave aren't always the same.

Your competitors may be waking up to the benefits of being a "people company." They'll more than happily snap up the staff you can't keep.

The best employee retention strategies

A strong employee retention rate is crucial to remain competitive. How you go about doing this is worth examining in some depth.

Remember - you are an employee too! As you create your employee retention strategies, keep asking yourself, "would I be happy with this?" or, "does this seem reasonable to me?"

Here are a few points you’ll need to cover when creating an employee engagement plan. Remember, the employee experience starts before the first day at the interviewing stage. To set each new starter up for success, getting the onboarding right is crucial. Want to learn more? Check out the Definitive Guide to Onboarding.

Let's quickly touch on the foundation of any working relationship: trust. As Kayla Lopez from the recruitment firm Viqtory.com reminds us. "If your employees trust you and the organization they tend to embrace the workplace; this begins before the employee is even hired. Transparency is something that we need to willingly support to gain trust. A workforce that trusts you will be engaged, a workforce that is engaged will retain. Trust is the foundation of all strong partnerships."

Now for the details...

Pay well

We’ll start with the basics.

If your pay rates don’t match with your competitors’, you’re going to have a bad time keeping hold of your high achievers.

Take a quick look at what your competitors pay for equal positions. Try and build a league table of what similar companies to you pay, and where you rank. Glassdoor is a good starting point.

Aiming for the absolute top is ideal if you can afford it, but you don’t have to offer the best salary offer out there. There are plenty of other ways to encourage your staff to stay put (more on that below), as long as you can land in the middle of the table. For someone working in a frontline job, it is difficult to give your best at work knowing you could get $5.00 per hour more for the same job elsewhere. (Even if there’s free pizza every Friday).

It’s also worth noting that even a generous wage packet won’t persuade your employees to stay if you’re otherwise a nightmare to work for.
Consider this step the cornerstone of all your employee engagement efforts. Not enough by itself, but essential in building something lasting and meaningful.

Give competitive benefits

You might not be able to take it to Silicon Valley levels. (Free three-course meals for breakfast, lunch and dinner, unlimited holidays, and puppy creches).

You can offer a benefits package or a performance bonus scheme tailored to the size of your business, your budget, and your business objectives. The key is to prioritize benefits that would have a tangible difference to the lives of your employees. Add the fancy stuff on if you have money to spare.

Think about:

• Childcare vouchers: we’re all aware of the struggle to find affordable childcare. Help your workforce with their work-life balance (and keep it diverse—most of the people who end up quitting jobs for childcare reasons tend to be women) by offering vouchers to help with the cost.

• Health cover for employees and dependents: an absolute must if you're US-based, although even if you live in a country which has some form of universal health care, giving employees the opportunity to go private is very appealing.

• Flexible working: if the type of work you do accommodates it, flexible working is like gold dust to your staff. A "work your hours however you want" policy helps people manage childcare commitments, fit in dentist appointments, and reduce the stress of trying to juggle work and life commitments.

• Lunch program: Most of the lunch break is spent buying, prepping or reheating food. Offering a tasty and healthy in-house solution, such as the online canteen Smunch, allows your employees to capitalize on their break time and share a meal together. Ultimately, this will improve your company culture and cross-departmental communication as well.

Once you’ve got the basics sorted, some nice-to-have options include:

• Above average PTO allowances
• Free gym memberships and cycle to work programs
• Personal development funds

Develop a feedback culture to empower employees

Your employees know their workplace better than anyone else. Make the most of it.

If your employees feel involved in shaping their workplace and consulted on major decisions then they will be reluctant to leave it.

The key to this is to carry regular, easy-to-complete employee engagement surveys so you know exactly what the mood on the ground is and how to improve it.

Employees will hold an enormous amount of goodwill towards a workplace that listens to their concerns and acts on them. Equally, they will reserve a special sort of resentment for those that send out survey after survey, only to ignore the results.

It’s essential to have a solid plan in place for your employee engagement surveys, or they will backfire spectacularly.

Key pointers

• Small, regular surveys are better than long, annual ones. Only giving your employees one chance per year to raise issues will result in bottled up frustrations spewing out come survey time. Not only does this result in surveys that skew unhelpfully negative, but it also means that your HR team will face an uphill struggle
• Another point about designing surveys that you can respond to effectively: keep it targeted. Focus each of your quick-answer surveys on a specific area—facilities onsite, for example, or about relationships with line managers.
• Use short answer questions: "yes/no" or "on a scale of 1-5" formats make it easier for people to respond immediately. Long-form feedback can be helpful, but having lots of long-answer text boxes on your survey will put people off completing it. A good compromise is to have an optional "any specific comments" box at the end of the survey.

When you’ve processed the surveys, share the results and shout about what you’re doing to act on feedback. Employees will appreciate the transparency, and it’s important to signpost what you’re doing to address the concerns they raise—or they won’t bother to participate in future surveys.

Try and create a "feedback culture" in your company by encouraging people to come forward with suggestions for improvements any time they want. Surveys highlight pain points as they are reactive; an anonymous suggestions box (either digital or real-life), on the other hand, will bring out the more innovative side of your workforce.

These suggestions might be small—a new way of organizing the break room fridge, or the introduction of free coffee Mondays—but the opportunity to improve the workplace in this way will work wonders for your wider staff’s sense of allegiance to it.

Make your workplace a fun place to work

If your coworkers are your friends, spending time at work doesn’t seem so taxing.

This is where the fun stuff comes in—the away days, lunchtime yoga, the free breakfast bar, the Christmas party...

If you have a mobile workforce, don’t forget to include them, too! They might not be in the office that often, so having regular get-togethers or breakfast clubs when shifts change is a great way to build a sense of belonging.

Obviously, base these activities on what your own workforce would like, but some ideas include:

• Regular lunchtime sports clubs (running, yoga, five-a-side, badminton are good starting points)
• Away days and team-building weekends.
• Semi-regular opportunities for free food. Depending on the size of your team, you could offer lunch on the company each Friday, pizza parties when teams hit their targets or just because
• Big events like Christmas parties and family fun days. If you run awareness weeks for things like diversity, mental health and stress, why not run some exciting events for these too?
• Recognition of key milestones. If there are particularly busy periods throughout the year (like the Christmas rush for anyone working in retail or hospitality), put on an event to recognize the hard work your employees put in. This could be a full-on party, or simply just giving your staff the nod to take off after lunch on a quiet day.

This step does, however, come with a big flashing warning sign that says: don’t bother doing any of these without doing the steps listed above first.

Because these are fun and exciting, and sound super trendy when you put them on your Careers page, people often use them in place of paying a decent wage, or offering flexible working hours, or acting on employee feedback.

The exit interview - your employee retention secret weapon

One of the best ways of figuring out what’s going wrong with your employee retention efforts is asking your colleagues when they leave.

Seems counter-intuitive, and rather frustrating, doesn’t it?

And in some ways, it is. No amount of collecting and aggregating exit interview data, tweaking your employee engagement plan and making changes in your company to reduce employee turnover will change the fact that, for that particular employee, your efforts weren’t enough. For HR people and line managers, that stings sometimes.

Still, if you can take your losses on the chin, this is a real opportunity to do better for your colleagues, and identify and fix any major issues that push people to leave.

There are three main reasons why exit interviews are so effective at flagging up things that need to change:

The employee is leaving so won't hold back

Regardless of how many times you reassure your colleagues that your pulse surveys are anonymous and that helpful suggestions are encouraged, they will still be a little suspicious.

The worry that surveys aren’t really anonymous, or that speaking out about a key workplace bugbear will get them labelled as a troublemaker, will be a constant thorn in the side of your employee retention efforts.

(As a side note, if this attitude is pervasive then it might be time to take a look at your workplace culture. A little reticence is natural. An all-encompassing dread of speaking up might indicate something a little more sinister).

The exit interview is a different kettle of fish. They’re leaving. There are no raises or opportunities for promotion in the pipeline. This is their opportunity to "tell it like it really is."

Listen, even if you think they’re being unfair and bitter.

Problems brought up during exit interviews tend to have weighed heavily on an employee’s decision to leave. In other words, they’re big issues you need to address urgently.

Get the whole picture

Multiple exit interviews help build up a better picture of life on the ground.

Of course, there’s always the chance that one particular employee just, for whatever reason, didn’t have a good time.

That’s where keeping data from previous exit interviews comes in.

For example, if an employee complains about their line manager being unbearable, it might just be a clash of personalities. Equally it could be because that line manager is difficult to work for and too demanding. It’s difficult to say without further info.

So. Run some analytics.

How many other employees from that line manager’s team have left over the past year?

Did they say anything in their exit interviews?

Have they been flagged to HR for anything previously?

If so, you might want to investigate further.

This is why it’s important to conduct an exit interview for every single person that leaves the business. If you restrict it to management positions, people based in HQ, or full-time workers, you’re missing key sets of data that could be useful in improving your employee retention strategy.

Find out what went wrong

An exit interview, conducted well, helps you identify wrong turns in your employee journey map.

You’ll probably have some sort of employee journey map already.

You might call it something different. We’re referring to the plan you make that starts at the hire phase and ends with the offboarding phase when the employee leaves. This normally includes guidelines for each stage they go through with your company. For example:

Hiring:

• Offer letter and contract sent
• Start date agreed two weeks in advance

Onboarding:

• First day: tour of premises, fire safety, welcome coffee or lunch
• First six weeks: all e-learning to be completed

You get the idea. Here's a basic template you could expand on:

(Source: Trends in Employee Journey Maps)

The exit interview provides an excellent opportunity to ask your employees about various stages in this plan, to see whether they’ve been carried out to your expectations.

Ask specifically, and don’t be afraid to go right back to the start of their employment. Whether they felt welcomed in their first weeks, for example. If they were given clear and regular feedback on their performance, and compare that to your notes on how your employee journey should pan out.

It could be that, despite your meticulous efforts in planning it, your employee journey map isn’t being adhered to by managers in the wider organisation. This could be why your employees are leaving - this map provides guidelines on how to make sure people feel safe, supported and included at work. If people don’t follow it you’re going to have problems.

Your employee journey map is important. If it isn’t being followed, you need to correct that as soon as you can. Exit interviews are the best way to do this.

How to conduct an employee retention interview

Be flexible around your employees needs

If a lot of your workforce are remote or mobile, don’t insist on a face-to-face interview at HQ.

There are several free video calling apps available, so why not make use of them? An employee is more likely to feel comfortable talking to you if you’ve made accommodations for their situation.

If they’re more comfortable talking to you, they’re more likely to be honest with you, and that’s exactly what you want.

Don’t make it overly formal

Go for a relaxed vibe. Making things too formal will only stifle conversation.

If you’re conducting a face-to-face interview, it’s a nice touch to provide some sort of refreshments; hot drinks and a pastry, maybe. The employee will appreciate the gesture, and it will encourage a more conversational feel, which is exactly what will get them to open up.

Identify the specifics to touch on

You will know, from previous exit interviews if there are any particular pain points in your employee experience.

Ask about them. You’ll then be able to establish:

• Whether these are still issues
• What progress you’ve made on them, and how effective your efforts to tackle them have been.

...But allow them to express their opinion too

If the structure of the interview is entirely created by you, you could miss something important.

By allowing employees space to expand on their own concerns, you give yourself the opportunity to pick up on potential issues that aren’t on your radar. Sure, a lot of this could be specific to that particular individual, but you should investigate nonetheless—otherwise you’ll never know whether it’s the iceberg tip of something bigger.

Remember: your relationship with the employee isn't over

People leave for all sorts of reasons—not all of them negative.

You might want to leave the door open for talented employees, in case they want to return at some point. Also consider that talented former employees can be great source of referrals.

These can be your company’s cheerleaders, even after they’ve left. A good exit interview can make this relationship. A poor one can ruin it.

Of course, there’s also the possibility that the employee leaving has been less than stellar. In this case you should see the exit interview as a chance to smooth things over, and divert potentially negative Glassdoor reviews or social media mentions.

Final thoughts

To summarize:

• An employee retention strategy is important because it makes your employees happier. Happier, more engaged employees perform better in general, and deliver better customer service.
• The cost of employee turnover is measured in increased operational costs and decreased institutional knowledge.

Bearing this in mind, the question you should be asking yourself isn’t "can we afford to expand our employee retention efforts?"

It’s "can we afford not to?"

An engaged, happy workforce with a low churn rate isn’t just a nice thing to have.

It’s not just something you can boast about on your Careers page.

It’s a competitive advantage—and people are only just waking up to this fact. Because now more than ever, people value good customer service. If you can provide that, you’ll have a serious head start on your competitors.

Blink is an internal communications tool that’s does everything your intranet does, but better. Try it out today! Request a free demo to get started.

New hires in restaurants don't get much runway. A day or two of shadowing, a stack of forms, and then they're on the floor during a Friday dinner rush, expected to keep up. It's not that operators don't care about onboarding. It's that the tools most restaurants use for it, paper checklists, a binder in the back office, a manager's memory, were never built to scale.

Restaurant employee onboarding software exists to close that gap. Done well, it gets new hires productive faster and keeps more of them around past the point where most restaurant turnover actually happens.

What restaurant employees actually want from onboarding

7shifts' 2025 Restaurant Employee Engagement report, based on a survey of 1,500 active restaurant employees, found that preferences on onboarding length are split but clear: 46.6 percent want one to two weeks of structured onboarding, and 38 percent want less than a week. Very few want a long, drawn-out process. What they want is a short, well-organized one that actually prepares them for the job, not a marathon of paperwork that delays their first real shift.

Where paper-based onboarding breaks down

A binder or a stack of printed forms works fine for one new hire at a time, in one location, with one manager who remembers where everything is. It breaks down fast at any real scale: a franchise group opening a new location, a manager turnover that takes institutional knowledge with it, or simply a new hire who has a question on day four and no easy way to find the answer without tracking someone down.

The cost of getting this wrong isn't abstract. Black Box Intelligence's 2025 restaurant workforce data puts the cost of replacing a single hourly restaurant employee at $2,706, with training making up roughly 35 percent of that figure. A disorganized onboarding process doesn't just create a rough first week, it actively increases the odds that cost gets paid out again a few months later, feeding straight back into restaurant employee turnover.

What good restaurant employee onboarding software includes

A structured, mobile-first checklist. New hires should be able to see exactly what's expected of them, in order, on the phone they already carry, rather than relying on a manager to remember what comes next.

Digital forms, not paper ones. Tax forms, policy acknowledgments, and compliance documents should be completable from a phone before day one, so the first shift can focus on the job itself.

A way to ask questions without feeling like a burden. A searchable knowledge hub for policies and procedures means new hires can find answers themselves instead of interrupting a busy shift lead mid-rush.

Onboarding that doesn't stop at week one. The best restaurant employee onboarding software extends check-ins, recognition, and connection past the first few days, since the risk of a new hire leaving doesn't disappear once the paperwork's done.

Visibility for managers across locations. For multi-location and franchise operators, onboarding software should show which new hires are on track and which need a follow-up, without a manager having to chase down a status update site by site.

How Blink supports onboarding for restaurant teams

Blink turns paper-based onboarding into a structured, mobile-first journey that new restaurant hires can complete from their own phone, with digital forms replacing the printed stack and a searchable knowledge hub available for the questions that come up after week one. Because every employee gets access from their first day, whether or not they have a company email address, onboarding doesn't wait on IT setup or a manager's schedule.

For multi-location and franchise groups, that same structure runs consistently across every site, giving operators visibility into onboarding progress without needing a separate system per location. It's the same foundation behind Blink's restaurant employee app more broadly.

Blink. And make a new hire's first weeks the reason they stay.

Sources: 7shifts Restaurant Employee Engagement Report (2025) and Black Box Intelligence Restaurant Workforce Data (2025).

Many factors go into a business making it in today’s world, but one of the biggest make-or-break factors is the environment. Strong downtown districts tend to benefit from a range of factors, the main ones being population growth, local engagement, and economic activity. From retail to hospitality, mid-sized cities are a good sweet spot due to affordability and space.

For businesses, understanding where people spend time and engage with their communities is becoming increasingly important. That's why Blink helps brands better understand and connect with local audiences. By identifying the cities where residents are actively exploring, businesses can make more informed decisions about where to invest and grow.

A successful Main Street isn't just about the number of businesses operating there. It's also about whether people want to work, shop, eat, and spend time in the area. To determine the U.S. cities with the most booming downtown areas, we focused on retail and food/hospitality business density, small business births, and workforce growth, alongside search volume, population growth, and walkability score.

Not sure where your business falls? Find out what qualifies as a small business in high-growth U.S. cities.

The best U.S. cities for small business growth

‍

1. Orlando, Florida

Orlando takes the top spot with a score of 46.8, thanks to its blend of rapid growth, thriving tourism, and a steady stream of new businesses. The city added 7,464 residents in just one year and generated one of the highest small-business search volumes in the rankings, at 8,140. Retail and hospitality continue to flourish, with thousands of new businesses opening across both sectors. Orlando's appeal extends well beyond its theme parks, too, with 25,800 searches for things to do in the city. For entrepreneurs, that means access to a large, active audience of locals and visitors looking to shop, dine, and explore.

2. McKinney, Texas

McKinney may have one of the smaller populations in the top 10, but it's growing faster than almost anyone else. The city added 11,664 residents between 2023 and 2024—the largest population increase in the rankings—and continues to see strong growth in both retail and hospitality. That momentum is helping transform McKinney into one of the most exciting business destinations in North Texas. With more than 3,000 searches for both local businesses and things to do, it's clear that people are increasingly paying attention to what the city has to offer.

For entrepreneurs eyeing cities like McKinney, getting the foundations right matters from day one—starting with choosing the right business structure for a high-growth market. 

3. Frisco, Texas

Once overshadowed by neighboring Dallas, Frisco has quickly carved out a name for itself as one of Texas's fastest-growing business hubs. The city earned a score of 41.7 after adding more than 8,200 new businesses in a single year and posting strong employment growth across retail and hospitality. Interest in the city is growing alongside its business community, with searches for things to do in Frisco reaching 3,700. As more residents and visitors discover the city's shopping, dining, and entertainment options, Frisco continues to strengthen its appeal for entrepreneurs.

4. Tampa, Florida

Tampa combines the advantages of a large city with the energy of a growing small business scene. Home to more than 427,000 residents, the city welcomed nearly 4,800 new people in the past year while generating more than 7,000 searches for small businesses. Tampa's downtown also attracts plenty of attention, with nearly 16,000 searches for things to do. Supported by a healthy mix of population growth, tourism, and local engagement, Tampa remains one of Florida's strongest cities for retail and hospitality businesses.

5. Garland, Texas

Garland rounds out the top five with a score of 38.5, driven by strong business expansion and steady population growth. The city added more than 4,100 residents over the past year and achieved an impressive average employment growth rate of 10.3% across retail and hospitality. At the same time, thousands of searches for local businesses and downtown activities show that people are actively exploring what Garland has to offer. These trends suggest the city is becoming an increasingly attractive place for both business owners and customers.

6. Arlington, Texas

Arlington is best known for its sports, entertainment, and major attractions, but it is also proving to be a strong environment for small businesses. The city is home to more than 408,000 residents and recorded average employment growth of 10.3% across the retail and hospitality sectors. Interest in local attractions remains high, with more than 4,000 searches for things to do downtown and more than 3,300 searches related to small businesses. Combined with steady population growth, Arlington offers businesses a large audience and plenty of opportunities to stand out.

7. Boise, Idaho

Boise shows that a smaller city can still deliver big opportunities for entrepreneurs. With a population of just under 239,000, Boise recorded an average employment growth rate of 9.7% across retail and hospitality sectors, while also earning the highest walkability score among the top 10. More than 3,700 searches for small businesses and over 3,000 searches for things to do downtown reflect a community that actively supports its local economy. Combined with steady population growth, Boise continues to attract both new residents and new business ventures.

8. Glendale, Arizona

Glendale has quietly become one of the strongest markets for retail and hospitality businesses in the Southwest. The city added more than 3,100 residents over the past year and recorded some of the strongest workforce growth in the rankings, including a 15.3% increase in hospitality employment. Searches for local businesses and downtown activities also remain healthy, highlighting a city that is attracting attention from both residents and visitors. These factors helped Glendale secure a place among the top 10 booming main streets in America.

9. Scottsdale, Arizona

Scottsdale pairs strong business growth with one of the most engaged audiences in the rankings. The city posted an average employment growth rate of 11.5% across retail and hospitality while generating 6,450 searches for things to do downtown—one of the highest totals in the study. Searches for small businesses also remained strong at 3,680, showing that people are actively seeking out local experiences. This combination of business activity and visitor appeal continues to make Scottsdale a standout destination for entrepreneurs.

10. Plano, Texas

Plano closes out the top 10 with a score of 37.0, demonstrating that a strong business community can thrive even during slower population growth. Despite a slight population decline, the city maintained an average employment growth rate of 10.3% across retail and hospitality and generated nearly 3,800 searches for small businesses. Interest in local attractions also remains high, with almost 4,500 searches for things to do downtown. Those figures suggest Plano's established business ecosystem continues to attract customers, helping the city remain competitive for new and growing businesses.

The top U.S. cities for job growth

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1. Lubbock, Texas

Taking the top spot is Lubbock, TX, with the highest average employment growth rate in the ranking at 13.1%. The city's labor market is being driven by strong expansion across both major industries analyzed. Retail employment grew by 11.3%, while employment in food and accommodation services climbed even higher at 14.9%, making Lubbock one of the few cities to post double-digit workforce growth in both sectors. This balanced growth suggests that job creation is occurring across a broad range of businesses rather than being concentrated in a single industry. With a population of 279,104 and an annual population growth of 4,033 residents, Lubbock's workforce momentum shows few signs of slowing.

For small businesses looking to compete in markets like this, offering the right employee benefits can be the difference between attracting top frontline talent and losing them to larger employers.

2. Huntsville, Alabama

Coming in at #2 is Huntsville, AL, with an average employment growth rate of 12%. The city recorded workforce growth of 10.6% in the retail sector and 13.4% in food and accommodation services, highlighting strong hiring demand across consumer-facing industries. Huntsville's ability to achieve double-digit employment growth in both sectors demonstrates a healthy local economy that is rapidly creating opportunities for workers. Supported by a growing population of 237,413 residents and an annual population growth of 1,305 people, Huntsville continues to establish itself as one of the strongest job markets in the country.

3. Glendale, Arizona

Rounding out the top three is Glendale, AZ, with an average employment growth rate of 11.45%. While retail employment increased by a solid 7.6%, the city's food and accommodation sector was the standout performer, recording workforce growth of 15.3%—the highest among the top three cities. This surge in hospitality hiring helped push Glendale's overall employment growth into double digits and reflects increasing demand from both residents and visitors. With a population of 262,745 and an annual population growth of 3,142 residents, Glendale's expanding workforce suggests a city where employers continue to invest and hire at a significant pace.

The fastest-growing U.S. cities

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1. Spring Valley, Nevada

Taking the top spot is Spring Valley, NV, which added an incredible 22,974 residents from 2023-2024, the largest population increase in the ranking. With a total population of 229,494, the city is experiencing rapid expansion, welcoming new residents at a pace that far exceeds that of many larger metropolitan areas. Spring Valley also maintains a substantial business presence with 6,500 retail businesses and 5,780 food and accommodation businesses. The area's continued population boom suggests growing demand for housing, services, and local businesses as more Americans choose to call this Nevada community home.

2. Port St. Lucie, Florida

Coming in at #2 is Port St. Lucie, FL, which welcomed 11,880 new residents in 2023-2024 alone. The city now has a population of 284,448 and remains one of Florida's fastest-growing destinations. Population gains have been accompanied by healthy economic growth, with average employment growth reaching 5.1% across the retail and hospitality industries. The city is home to 1,639 retail businesses and 1,011 food and accommodation businesses, helping support its expanding population. As more people relocate to Port St. Lucie, demand for local services, shopping, dining, and entertainment is likely to continue rising, further strengthening the local economy.

3. McKinney, Texas

Ranking third is McKinney, TX, which added 11,664 residents in 2023-2024, bringing its population to 242,534. The North Texas city continues to attract new residents thanks to its strong economy and growing business community. Employment growth averaged an impressive 10.3% across retail and hospitality sectors, one of the highest rates in the ranking, indicating that job creation is helping fuel population growth. McKinney also benefits from a sizable business base, with 21,680 retail businesses and 18,161 food and accommodation businesses supporting the local economy. With thousands of new residents arriving each year and employers continuing to expand their workforce, McKinney remains one of the fastest-growing cities in America.

The U.S. cities with the most walkable downtowns and main streets

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1. Boise, Idaho

Taking the top spot is Boise, ID, with an exceptional walkability score of 93, making it the most walkable downtown and main street destination in the ranking. For residents and visitors alike, this means many of the city's shops, restaurants, and attractions can be reached on foot, creating a vibrant environment for local businesses. Boise is home to 2,281 retail businesses and 1,732 food and accommodation businesses, while employment growth remains strong across both sectors, averaging 9.7%. People are also very interested to see what the city of trees has to offer, with 3,730 searches for small businesses, 500 for local shops, and 3,080 for things to do downtown. Combined with annual population growth of 1,530 residents, Boise's highly walkable downtown continues to support both economic activity and quality of life.

2. Jersey City, New Jersey

Jersey City, NJ, takes the second spot thanks to its highly walkable downtown and vibrant urban atmosphere. With a walkability score of 87, residents can easily access shops, restaurants, and local services without relying on a car, helping create a lively environment for small businesses. The city is also home to a substantial retail and hospitality sector, supported by strong interest in local attractions and businesses, with more than 4,000 searches for small businesses over the past year. While employment growth has slowed recently, Jersey City still added 4,609 residents, suggesting its mix of convenience, amenities, and proximity to New York City continues to attract new residents and support local commerce.

3. Newark, New Jersey

Newark, NJ, rounds out the top three thanks to its highly walkable downtown, growing population, and thriving business community. With a walkability score of 76, residents can easily access local shops, restaurants, and everyday services, helping create a bustling environment for businesses of all sizes. The city added 8,078 residents in the past year—one of the largest population increases among the top-ranked cities—while also generating nearly 4,800 searches for small businesses and more than 2,400 searches for things to do downtown. With its extensive retail and hospitality sectors, Newark continues to offer a mix of accessibility, activity, and growth that helps local businesses thrive.

Curious where your city ranks? Check out our interactive table below 

What America’s top main streets have in common

The results show that thriving main streets aren't limited to major metropolitan areas. While fast-growing cities in Texas and Florida performed especially well, the rankings highlight a broader trend: places with growing populations, active downtown districts, and strong retail and hospitality sectors tend to create the best conditions for small businesses. But the businesses that thrive long-term in these cities are the ones that also get the fundamentals right internally — from managing employees effectively to building teams that grow with the city around them.

Whether driven by tourism, new residents, or vibrant local communities, these cities are proving that a successful main street depends on more than just business density; it requires an environment where people want to live, work, shop, and spend time.

Methodology

To determine which U.S. cities have the most booming main streets, we analyzed the 200 most populous mid-sized cities (pop. 500,000 or less) using a weighted index combining four key indicators:

- Retail & Food/Hospitality business density — the total number of retail, food, and hospitality businesses (NAICS 44-45) (NAICS 72) operating in each city's surrounding metro area

- Retail, Food, and Hospitality workforce growth — the percentage change in retail, food, and hospitality sector employment between Q1 2019 and Q1 2025

- Retail, Food, and Hospitality small business births - The number of newly established retail, food, and hospitality small businesses within each city's surrounding metro area

- Search Volumes - The total search volume for each query (“Small businesses [city]”, “Local shops [city]”, “Things to do downtown [city]”) across each city listed 

- Population Growth (1-Year growth '23-'24) - The increase or decrease in population YoY from 2023-2024 (most recent data available) 

- Walkability Score - The total score determining how easy it is to walk around each city listed 

Establishment counts were sourced from the U.S. Census Bureau's 2023 County Business Patterns. Employment growth figures were drawn from the U.S. Census Bureau's Quarterly Workforce Indicators, accessed via the LED Extraction Tool. The MSA populations were sourced from the 2023 American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates.

Cities sharing an MSA were assigned the same metro-level data, showcasing that retail and hospitality businesses serve regional economies rather than strictly city limits. Cities were then ranked from highest to lowest by total score to identify the metros where small-business activity and growth are strongest.

* Workforce growth was measured by comparing Q1 2019 to Q1 2025 employment data from the U.S. Census Bureau's Quarterly Workforce Indicators (QWI). For four metros — Columbia, MO; Springfield, MO; Springfield, MA; and Worcester, MA — Q1 2024 was used as the endpoint due to the delayed Q1 2025 release; this represents a 5-year span instead of the standard 6-year span. For Anchorage, AK; St. Louis, MO-IL; Detroit-Warren-Dearborn, MI; and Grand Rapids-Wyoming-Kentwood, MI, workforce growth could not be calculated due to incomplete or unreleased state-level QWI data. These cities remain in the ranking based on their establishment density figures (Census 2023 County Business Patterns), with workforce growth treated as -100%. Data accurate as of May 15th, 2026.

As companies rethink how they connect with employees in a hybrid, mobile, and fast-moving world, many are looking beyond traditional intranet platforms like LumApps. While LumApps is a solid option for knowledge management and Microsoft/Google integrations, it can fall short when it comes to usability, real-time communication, and mobile performance.

Whether you’re rolling out internal comms globally, trying to unify systems into one employee app, or simply seeking a more flexible and modern intranet experience, there are better options out there.

What to look for in a LumApps alternative

When evaluating alternatives to LumApps, here are five key factors to consider:

#1. Mobile usability

Your employee experience platform should be just as powerful on mobile as it is on desktop — especially with today’s hybrid, frontline, and remote workforces.

#2. Ease of use

A modern intranet or communications tool must be intuitive for both admins and end users. Platforms with steep learning curves or clunky interfaces will see low adoption.

#3. Real-time communication

Timely communication is essential — whether it's leadership announcements, crisis updates, or team alerts. Look for platforms that offer native chat, push notifications, or news feeds.

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#4. Integration ecosystem

You shouldn’t have to cobble together multiple tools. The right platform integrates with your HRIS, LMS, scheduling, payroll, file storage, and more.

#5. Analytics & insights

Data matters. Choose a solution with actionable dashboards that help you measure what’s working, what’s being read, and where to improve.

The top 12 LumApps alternatives

Now that you know what to look for — and why LumApps might not be the best long-term fit — here are the best alternatives, starting with the standout:

#1. Blink – The #1 LumApps alternative for unified employee experience

Blink is an employee experience platform designed to bring communications, resources, and tools into a single, easy-to-access app. With a strong focus on usability, real-time engagement, and seamless integrations, Blink empowers companies to connect with their entire workforce—whether they’re on mobile, desktop, or a shared device.

Why Blink is the best LumApps alternative:

• All-in-one communications hub: Combines chat, news, content, HR tools, recognition, and surveys into one streamlined platform.
• Mobile + desktop parity: Offers full functionality on any device, with no reliance on corporate email.
• Powerful analytics: Gives real-time insights into usage, engagement, and sentiment to help you optimize comms strategies.
• Integrations-first approach: Blink integrates with HRIS, LMS, payroll, scheduling, and document systems to centralize everything your workforce needs.
• Top-rated platform: 4.8★ average on Gartner Peer Insights and a leader in G2 for internal communications and employee apps.

Pros:

• Unified digital workplace accessible from anywhere
• Highly intuitive UI with rapid user adoption
• Dedicated support and success teams for onboarding and beyond
• Transparent pricing and strong ROI

Cons:

• May require customization for highly complex intranet needs
• Some advanced analytics features are part of higher-tier plans

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#2. Simpplr

Simpplr is an intranet platform designed to streamline internal communication, content distribution, and knowledge sharing. It includes personalization features, integrations with HR tools, and prebuilt templates to simplify setup. The platform is geared toward companies looking for a structured, branded experience.

‍Pros: Great personalization, modern interface
Cons: Limited customization, costly at scale
Pricing: Custom
Gartner: 4.7★

#3. Staffbase

Staffbase supports internal communications across multiple channels, including email, mobile apps, and digital signage. It offers features for content scheduling, targeting, and employee surveys. Often used by global enterprises, the platform emphasizes scalability and branding consistency.‍

Pros: Email, mobile, signage comms; powerful targeting
Cons: Less flexible for content management or smaller teams
Pricing: Custom
Gartner: 4.1★

#4. Interact Software

Interact Software delivers an intranet platform with features for content publishing, employee engagement, and search. It includes integrations with Microsoft products and offers tools like blogging, forums, and document sharing. The platform is designed for medium to large organizations.‍

Pros: Social features, easy setup
Cons: Limited analytics and design flexibility
Pricing: Custom
Gartner: 4.6★

#5. Haiilo

Haiilo combines intranet functionality with features for social advocacy and personalized content delivery. The platform includes analytics, customizable pages, and AI-based search to help surface relevant information. It is commonly adopted by organizations prioritizing internal engagement and branding.‍

Pros: Strong search, personalization, advocacy tools
Cons: Steep learning curve for admins
Pricing: Custom
Gartner: 4.1★

#6. Unily

Unily provides a cloud-based intranet designed for enterprise use, with features for knowledge management, internal communications, and collaboration. It integrates with Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, and other enterprise tools. The platform is known for its flexible content management and multilingual support.‍

Pros: Rich design options, integrations
Cons: Expensive and complex setup
Pricing: Custom
Gartner: 4.4★

#7. MangoApps

MangoApps offers a unified platform that combines intranet, collaboration, learning management, and document storage. It supports both desktop and mobile access and is used by a variety of industries. The platform is modular, allowing organizations to deploy only the tools they need.‍

Pros: Feature-rich; good for training-heavy orgs
Cons: Dated interface; inconsistent UX
Pricing: Custom
Gartner: 4.4★

#8. Workvivo by Zoom

Workvivo is a social intranet platform that combines internal communications with engagement tools like activity feeds, shout-outs, and surveys. It offers a familiar social media-style experience and integrates with Zoom and Microsoft 365. The platform is primarily used by mid-size to large organizations.‍

Pros: Engaging UX, employee advocacy tools
Cons: Lacks unified mobile-desktop parity and deep analytics
Pricing: Custom pricing
Gartner: 4.7★

#9. Firstup

Firstup is a communications platform focused on personalization, automation, and real-time analytics. It supports targeted messaging and integrates with a range of enterprise systems. Firstup is commonly used by large organizations with distributed workforces.‍

Pros: Powerful targeting, personalization, and analytics
Cons: High cost; not ideal for smaller teams
Pricing: Custom
Gartner: 4.8★

#10. Connecteam

Connecteam is a mobile-first platform designed for managing non-desk workforces. It includes scheduling, task management, chat, and time tracking tools. The platform is often used in industries like retail, logistics, and hospitality.‍

Pros: Ideal for dispersed teams; affordable tiers
Cons: Lacks deep intranet functionality
Pricing: Free tier available; paid starts around $29/month
Gartner: 4.7★

#11. ThoughtFarmer

ThoughtFarmer focuses on knowledge sharing and collaboration within hybrid and remote teams. It provides customizable intranet pages, wiki functionality, and employee directories. The platform is suited for organizations seeking structured documentation and internal search tools.‍

Pros: Excellent for documentation and wikis
Cons: Setup can be time-intensive
Pricing: Custom
G2: 4.8★

#12. Bitrix24

Bitrix24 is a collaboration suite that includes intranet features alongside tools for CRM, task management, and chat. It offers free and paid tiers, making it accessible to a wide range of teams. The platform is modular but can be complex to navigate.‍

Pros: Wide feature set for budget-conscious teams
Cons: Overwhelming interface; some tools feel outdated
Pricing: Free plan available; paid starts ~$24/user/month
G2: 4.2★

Final thoughts: Blink vs. LumApps

While LumApps remains a strong player — especially for companies tightly integrated with Google Workspace or Microsoft — Blink stands out for teams that value ease of use, real-time communication, data-driven insights, and a single place for everything work-related. It offers a more unified experience across devices, better analytics for employee engagement, and faster time to value.

If you’re looking for an employee experience platform that’s as intuitive as it is powerful, Blink is your best bet.

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Why teams choose Blink over LumApps

LumApps is a strong enterprise intranet, particularly for Google Workspace-centric organizations, but it's built with desk-based collaboration as the default. Blink is mobile-first, requires no corporate email, and is used daily by teams at McDonald's, Domino's, and Chick-fil-A. See how Blink compares.

Frontline workers are leaving the party 

We all know why we’re here. Frontline workers are quitting en masse: more than 55% of the US frontline left their posts in 2021.  

Unfortunately for C-suite execs at frontline organizations, unless decisive action is taken quickly, things will only get worse. 

While the problem of frontline turnover has many contributing factors, from salary competition to changing workforce demographics, one important part of the solution remains constant: employee engagement.  

And here lies the problem: most of the time, it doesn’t work.  

“If you build it...they won’t actually come”  

Frontline businesses have invested in engagement solutions and projects before, but regardless of the type of organization, these are generally met with tepid responses. 

The list of fallen soldiers here is considerable: town halls, employee surveys, intranets, ERGs. And often, the response sounds something like this:  

“Great, another thing to remember” 

“It’s not a natural part of my day” 

“It’s a one-off thing” 

“It’s too hard to use”  

Hours of time from leadership, People teams, Internal Comms functions and supervisors go into projects that rarely succeed in their mission. This is like the birthday party where the decorations are up, the cake is ready and the music’s on – but nobody’s showed up.  

The result? Frontline workers aren’t sustainably engaged, the cycle of attrition continues and there’s little meaningful data in order to understand exactly what to do to fix it.  

The solution: chips and dips 

Turning this around warrants changing the way we think about employee engagement. For most businesses, employee engagement is a thing that we ‘do’ - it’s a project, an initiative, even a tool or an app. But this is where we’re going wrong.  

The solution lies in approaching frontline engagement as something that we ‘earn’ - it’s an outcome, not an output.  

To illustrate this, let’s return to our party. Anyone who’s ever been to a house party will be able to tell you exactly where most people end up: the kitchen. And why are they in the kitchen? Because that’s where the drinks, the mixers, the snacks and the ice is. There’s useful stuff there, and so they gravitate there, and the good times start rolling.  

So to return to frontline engagement: put out the ‘chips and dips’. In other words, focus on providing frontline workers with services and tools that not only fit into their busy days, but make them better – and use that space to invite engagement.  

How it works: chips, dips and paystubs  

Blink is a new type of frontline engagement app that the average worker opens ten times per day! Blink brings the processes that frontline workers and their managers need all into one place – from payslips to scheduling and critical documents, all with one login. This is our ‘chips and dip’. 

For leaders and managers looking for engagement, this is the time to swoop. The whole of the frontline’s eyeballs are on the app, which means that surveys get seen, important messages from the CEO and HQ are read, and the work being done to improve the working day gets cut-through.  

If a once-yearly employee engagement survey is the equivalent of putting out samples at Costco in the hope that a nameless stranger will take a drive-by snack, this is the equivalent of the work cafeteria – the place where the whole companies gathers, day after day.  

How to be a good frontline host: Elara Caring’s story 

Elara Caring – one of the largest US-based providers of personal care, home health and hospice care – had a frontline engagement problem when we first met them last year. With a 62% turnover rate of their more than 32,000 personal care attendants (PCAs), the leadership team needed sustainable engagement badly.  

In adopting Blink, Elara looked to empower its PCAs and make their lives easier – and get engagement and loyalty in return.  

They used Blink to remove the burden of paper-based admin: Elara’s PCAs had to constantly fill out expenses and other forms on paper. Blink’s solution was to integrate these manual processes and systems into a single app. Payslips, expenses and mileage reporting, key information from Sharepoint, schedules and rotas were all suddenly available to Elara’s PCAs at their fingertips. 

The benefits for Elara’s PCAs? Time savings, with more attention devoted to their “real jobs” than ever before.   

The benefits for Elara Caring? Sustainable engagement, with 95% of employees saying that they now feel more connected to the company. PCAs have begun to use Blink to create a community – and sub-communities – within the organization, creating the connection and cohesion that makes them stay.  

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In conclusion: good parties don’t skimp on the guac  

In a war for a diminishing talent pool, the need to directly address frontline engagement has never been more acute. But it’s also shown where there are failings in trying to get engagement from the activities and programs that work for desk-based, white-collar workers. The key to success for the frontline is to not only fit into frontline life, but to make frontline life better and easier – and use that digital space you’ve created to finally connect your people. 

Change is the only constant? It’s a phrase we hear a lot these days. But it’s definitely true of business. And it’s also true of internal communications.

As new generations enter the workforce, as technology advances, and as employee expectations shift, internal communication trends are liable to change.

Keeping up with those trends is essential if you want to maintain an engaged and productive workforce. Because internal communications is how you keep employees in the loop, connect them to company culture, and inspire them to go all in for your organization.  

So, as we approach the halfway point of 2025, we thought it a good time to recap the internal comms trends we’ve seen developing over recent months.

The latest internal communication trends

The five internal comms trends we’ll be looking at include:

1. Ask questions
2. Focus on employee-generated content (everyone is an internal communicator)
3. Prioritize mobile-first communication
4. More visual, conversational, and authentic content
5. Focus on employee wellbeing and mental health

Let’s take a look at these in more detail.

1. Ask questions

Employees want more than company updates — they want a voice within their organization. And while companies have traditionally focused on delivering top-down messages, there’s now increasing focus on two-way communication and interaction. 

Whether it’s regular pulse surveys, leader Q&As, listening tours, or a good old-fashioned suggestion box, more and more organizations are seeing the value of regularly checking in with their workforce.

They’re giving employees the opportunity to be heard. Asking them questions and seeking their feedback on everything from the employee experience, workplace changes, ideas for innovation, and even the quality of internal comms itself.

It’s certainly a rising priority, with some organizations, including financial tech company Intuit, even employing a dedicated Head of Employee Listening. 

So how do you make a success of employee voice initiatives? Here are a few ideas:

• Start by asking the right survey questions. Align questions with your KPIs. Base questions around areas that you’re prepared to take action on. Word your questions neutrally and don’t overwhelm employees with too many survey questions.
  
  
• Create a culture of psychological safety. You’re unlikely to get valuable feedback if employees don’t feel comfortable sharing their honest opinions. So train your managers in active listening and empathy. Champion open communication across your whole organization. And consider giving employees the option to give feedback anonymously.
  
  
• Close the feedback loop. Only 58% of organizations take action to improve after receiving employee feedback. This leads to a loss of faith in the feedback process. So close that loop. Thank employees for their input, tell them about your findings, and clarify what you plan to do next.
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• Seek feedback regularly. The yearly employee engagement survey doesn’t cut it in a rapidly changing workplace. You’re more likely to miss vital insights relating to the employee experience and retention. Quarterly surveys, supplemented with short pulse surveys and increased leadership visibility can give you a consistent and cohesive view of what is happening with your workforce.

2. Focus on employee-generated content (everyone is an internal communicator)

Next on our list of internal communication trends? It’s EGC — or employee generated content. 

Traditionally, creating internal communications content has fallen to marketing and communications teams. And while there's certainly still a place for that, internal communications professionals are increasingly taking on the role of curator. They’re enlisting the help of employees in the content creation process.

EGC is any content created by employees. It’s a way to share real, human stories from across your organization. And it can fit into any content category — videos, pictures, stories, blogs, a comment on a news feed post.

EGC is useful for a number of reasons:

• It brings employees into the company conversation
• It helps you publish authentic, relatable content
• It creates a sense of community, trust, and belonging
• It improves employee engagement with internal comms

Ultimately, EGC helps to improve company culture, employee satisfaction, and retention, while reducing content production costs.

There’s an added benefit. You can use EGC on your internal communication channels and externally too. Share employee success stories on your website and social media channels and you build your employer brand, which makes talent acquisition that bit easier.

So how do you make EGC part of your internal comms ecosystem? 

Recognition and incentives for contributors encourage more employees to take on the role of content creator. A short EGC playbook tells employees what to include and what to avoid in their content. You can also use internal communication tools with permissions and content moderation features so you can always be sure that EGC aligns with company values.

3. Choosing mobile-first communication

A surefire way to improve comms engagement in 2025? Mobile-first communication tools.

Just 52% of internal communicators are confident they have the right tools for reaching all employees, regardless of their location or work type. 

They’re struggling to provide an equitable comms experience for a dispersed workforce, with the hybrid and frontline experience lagging behind that of desk-based staff.

Another revealing stat. Only 45% of comms pros say their comms tools provide a good user experience for employees.

They’re competing with the engaging, customer-grade experiences employees enjoy on popular messaging apps away from work. Clunky, desktop-only communication tech pales in comparison.

There’s another challenge looming. The number of digital natives within your workforce is growing. By 2030, Gen Z is predicted to make up 30% of the US workforce.

This is a generation that leans toward mobile-first, real-time messaging tools. In fact, Gen Z workers actively dislike emails, with 40% of them saying that email restricts their ability to show their personalities at work.

To provide an internal comms experience that aligns with the needs and expectations of an increasingly dispersed and tech-savvy workforce, many comms teams are enlisting the help of mobile-first employee communication and experience tools, in the form of an employee app.

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An app makes internal comms available to every employee smartphone. It makes it easier for your teams to connect, collaborate, access workplace resources, and stay up-to-date with the latest company news, no matter where they work. And it supports a more engaging comms experience.

4. More visual, conversational, and authentic content

What do TikTok and internal communications have in common? Much more than they did a couple of years ago.

The “TikTokification” of internal comms is in full swing, with communicators taking inspiration from social media’s engaging, multimedia, mobile-first content.

We’re talking short-form videos, an interactive news feed, co-worker communities, and snackable, personalized messages. Employees have the opportunity to respond to content too, sharing, reacting, and commenting in a way that keeps the conversation flowing.

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There’s research to support this shift — and to prove that a social-media-style approach doesn’t just suit the younger members of your workforce. For example, we know that 83% of people, a huge majority, prefer watching videos over reading or listening to instructional content.

Interactive, multimedia messages are more engaging. Which means workers are more likely to tune into your employee communication channels and act upon your content. This approach can also revolutionize frontline comms, helping you reach workers who don’t always have the time to read a long email or policy document. 

The good news? You don’t need a lot of fancy equipment to incorporate this internal communication trend into your way of working. Smartphones and a comms tool with modern social features are all you need to create Insta-worthy internal communications.

5. Focus on employee wellbeing and mental health

Just last year, “wellbeing and mental health” was the 9^th most communicated-about topic on internal communication channels. This year, it’s risen to 5^th.

This, unfortunately, is a fair reflection of how the workforce is feeling. 53% of workers in the UK say that the demands of their jobs cause them excessive stress. In the US, 76% of workers report at least one symptom of a mental health condition — burnout, depression, or anxiety.

Despite this epidemic, just 55% of workers say that their organization genuinely prioritizes wellbeing. This is despite 81% saying that they look for mental health support when choosing where to work. 

The takeaway? We need to do better.

Caring, empathetic communication helps keep your employees healthy, happy, and motivated. And you get the best results when your words reflect concrete action on employee mental health across your organization.

At Hilton Hotels, an employer renowned for its mental health and wellbeing support, they’ve made it easier, cheaper, and faster for employees to access their employee assistance program (EAP) and rolled out an education curriculum on topics like resilience, stress management, and grief.

At Safeguard Global, they discovered that workers were stressed and struggling with high winter heating bills. So the company stepped in and helped out with a monthly stipend, relieving their workforce of a major worry. 

Clear communication about the mental health and wellbeing support you have on offer is vital. And internal comms can help in other ways, too. Because a positive workplace culture (which comms can help build) has a positive impact on employee wellbeing. 

When your company culture incorporates appreciation, a sense of purpose, and opportunities for growth, the odds of employees experiencing mental health challenges decrease by up to 87%.

Ensure that everyone — including hard-to-reach hybrid, WFH, and frontline employees — experiences the same access to company culture and wellbeing support, and you experience these benefits across the board.

Put these internal communication trends into practice for a happier, healthier workforce 

In 2025, we’ve moved way beyond the desktop-based intranets and top-down, text-based comms of old.

Today, employees want a voice. They want authentic, mobile-first, social-media-style communications that they can engage with on the go. And they want employers to tackle the topics that matter most, with mental health and wellbeing top of the agenda.

Organizations that embrace these internal comms trends stand to improve company culture and the employee experience. They can count on better engagement with company messages and better staff retention.

The C-suite has an important part to play. Internal communicators who have collaborative relationships with leaders are more likely to meet or exceed their success indicators. 

Work together with your comms team and you can implement the communication tools, strategies, and cultural change you need to take your communications to the next level.

Blink. And upgrade internal comms with a modern, mobile-first employee app.