Appraising the channel mix to guide and improve communications

Better known as its main brand O2, Telefónica UK has over 25 million mobile customers. It has the highest customer satisfaction of any mobile network, and has done so for seven years (Ofcom).

HarknessKennett has extensive experience of working with the company on channel and change communication research, pulse measurement, and a ‘Listening Project’ to guide strategic communications during a proposed takeover deal. Some of this work won the IABC’s Gold Quill Merit Award, and was shortlisted for the CIB awards.

Continuing this working relationship, we were engaged to work with O2’s communications team on a new research project. Having adopted Facebook’s Workplace, the team wanted to assess its impact as part of a wider review of its activity. The resulting insights would inform a new strategy and improve communication planning across the business.

We followed an audience-centric approach, using one-on-one interviews with leaders, an online survey and energetic, activity-led workshops to gather the views of colleagues at different locations. As well as evaluating the channel mix, we explored views on O2’s external social media channels, and looked at leadership communication as well as the wider communication culture.

Results were encouraging. Over 70% of colleagues agreed that ‘channels reflect who we are at O2’ and there were very positive views about the impact of Workplace and the resulting social participation of leaders. However, we also concluded that reducing the ‘noise’ across channels should be a priority.

As a result, the team has since cut the number of stories on the intranet, introduced a news channel on Workplace, and committed more resources to data analysis, to steer future communications planning.

“We have a long-standing partnership with HarknessKennett, who bring an invaluable external perspective to measurement of our communications. We know that we can trust them to take the right approach with O2 people working in very different environments, and to bring back some clear direction for our team.”
Channels & Content, Corporate Affairs, Telefónica