Why no one is reading your company-wide emails — and how AI can help

It's a familiar scenario in business. You think you've crafted the perfect message to share, company-wide, about an exciting new initiative. You hit "send," and wait for the feedback to pour in with excitement. When it doesn't, a haunting suspicion surfaces: No one is reading your company-wide email. 

Sixty percent of companies don't have a long-term internal communications strategy, and of those that do, 12% don't measure the effectiveness of these communications, according to data from insurance company Arthur J. Gallagher. As a result, 38% of employees and managers feel bombarded by excessive, confusing memos, according to research from Gartner, but artificial intelligence could make the process smoother.  

"There hasn't really been a solution for internal communication yet," says Roy Schwartz, co-founder and president of Axios HQ, an AI-powered software that helps organizations manage their essential communications. "Most companies don't even track the open rates of their all-hands, which are important communications with their staff about benefits or initiatives on strategy and vision. Are people actually understanding it? Are they able to absorb it? Did they read it? All of those things are not being measured right now."

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According to the International Data Corporation and the online library of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, ineffective internal comms can cost organizations $2 trillion per year, or $15,000 per employee in lost productivity, due to time spent searching for project-critical information. 

The pandemic and the following shift to hybrid styles of work have only worsened an already existing problem, according to Schwartz. 

"How do you share really important updates with your company when you can't do it in person? You're missing a lot of the glue that would take place in an office where people would naturally fill in information that's missing," Schwartz says. "You have to be very deliberate now about what you communicate, when you communicate, and how you communicate, and companies are really struggling to find that balance." 

A generative AI tool, however, can tailor its approach to suit every employee — whether through avenues like Slack or email — and be programmed to deliver information more efficiently and automatically. It could also be a valuable resource for employers when it comes to actually writing the message they want to send, prioritizing clarity and voice.

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"AI can basically be like an editor over your shoulder — improving your writing and making it efficient," Schwartz says. "Brevity doesn't mean just short, it means the shortest possible way for the information you're trying to convey."  

AI can also help companies with subject line generation, image generation and auto-completion of sentences that suggest the best way to present a certain message. The ability to alleviate the administrative burden will only strengthen communication departments and allow them to better prioritize their goals.

"It unfortunately does mean we're probably going to get a lot more emails and text messages and Slack messages," Schwartz says. "But if we can get better at surfacing great content that companies want to share with people, then the people who right now are in the comms department can spend more time perfecting their strategies."