Healthy internal communication is critical for good teamwork and atmosphere in the workplace. When you’re building your team, make sure that every one you pick to work with is on the same page with you and the rest of the crew. Once you accomplish that, everything else will just click. And when the things “click” it will be much easier to communicate inside the team. We’re presenting 15 great apps that will help you manage effective internal communication and keep your team in the loop.
Slack
Slack is everyone’s favorite tool for real-time (chat) team communication and a superstar app. To access Slack, first you need to join the team, or to create one. Once you’re in, you’ll see a clean and straightforward interface with few different channels. Channels are used to group conversations on different topics and you can easily create your custom channels. You can also use private messages for direct, one-on-one communication or create your private channels with only a few co-workers. One downside is that constant, real-time notifications about new messages can become overwhelming and distracting, so make sure to fine-tune your notification settings.
BlogIn
Internal company blog proved to be an excellent tool for internal communication and a great platform for archiving company knowledge and expertise. BlogIn provides an easy to use, out-of-the-box internal blog solution for your company that enables your employees to quickly share ideas, news, and knowledge, pitch suggestions, ask questions and gain feedback. The primary objective of BlogIn is to keep all team members informed and up-to-date by collecting all relevant information and knowledge in one, organized place. By having centralized company hub your flow of information will be more relaxed and all employees will know where to look for information they need to make faster and smarter decisions.
Trello
Trello is a great platform for project management — specifically for keeping track of and remembering tasks and viewing previous team action. Once you have started the app, you can create different boards, with cards which contain tasks. You can assign tasks to team members and you can freely move tasks from card to card. Trello is great for getting the big picture and keeping track of what has been done and what is left to be done (and by whom). All tasks support additional features such as file upload, labels, checkboxes, and comments, so besides managing your project you can also discuss it with your team.
Campfire
Campfire is a web-based communication tool, which offers password protected group chats. An employee can invite a colleague, vendor, client or anyone else to this chat. There is also an option for a file, text, and code sharing. Considering that this is a web-based tool, account setting is really easy and doesn’t take much time.
Bitrix24
Bitrix24 is an app specially built for small enterprises and startups. It is similar to Slack, but much easier and up-to-date (if that’s even possible). The main difference is that Bitrix24 offers the ability to create plans. This app is encouraging project management by giving every employee an opportunity to make group video calls, share files and calendars.
eXo Platform
eXo Platform is an open source social solution — social intranet tool for team communication. It can be customized completely to fit all company’s needs and requirements. It provides stress-free collaboration, by enabling everyone to create and share files and polls, and use productivity tools set.
Fuze is a desktop and mobile app, which offers excellent internal communication environment. An employee can quickly make HD video calls and video conferencing and also organize and conduct a meeting. It has Fuze Analytics tool, which helps with analyzing enterprise processes and any kind of data. Fuze can integrate with Microsoft Outlook, Lync, Google Calender, Box and some other apps.
Glip
Glip is a communication and collaboration app, designed to take care of everyday duties of an employee’s stored in notes, tasks, to-do lists, calendar, and chats. Glip’s fundamental goal is to eliminate ineffective work — frequent checking of email and inbox. The great additional feature is built-in video calling functionality. Glip is perfect for work on-the-go and keeping in touch with co-workers and clients.
HipChat
HipChat is quite hot and easy-to-use internal communication app. It offers group and private chats, file sharing, video calling, unlimited file transfer, secure guest access, and more. Because of its low price, (free for 5 GB storage and 25000 searchable messages, or $2 a month for unlimited search history and unlimited storage) it is very attractive for small businesses and startups.
Microsoft Lync
Lync is an internal communication tool made by Microsoft that you can use for instant messaging and chat with clients. Formerly known as Microsoft Office Communicator, this app can now integrate with all Microsoft tools, creating a quality platform for team communication, especially of you’re a fan of the Redmond giant. News flash: there is an announcement of the integration of Microsoft Lync with Skype Business.
Redbooth
Redbooth is an app specially designed for project management activities and forming teams. It provides an opportunity to define what the task is, when is the deadline and who needs to do it. It also has a chat room and offers HD video calls, file sharing, charts, text documents, and reports. By merging chat and project task, employees can achieve quality communication and always be up-to-date.
Skype
Skype is one of the greatest tools that companies still use for internal communication. By providing features like group chats, file sharing, free audio and video calls, free group video calling, and screen sharing, Skype is one of the simplest and most popular tools out there. If you are looking for a more serious communication tool, there is Skype Business, which has been released in 2015. Skype Business provides similar services, with the addition of integration with Office apps, online meetings, scheduling meeting in Outlook, and a few more perks more.
StaffConnect
StaffConnect is quite a professional app for internal communication. It is created to connect colleagues, encouraging two-way dialogues. StaffConnect helps employees to deliver and broadcast the news, share information, images, videos and updates, display results to the team, and more. StaffConnect also gives you the opportunity to promote an event on and offline, by linking them to relevant pages.
Wrike
Wrike is another project management and assigning tasks tool, great for internal communication. Wrike offers collaboration platform, a place to start a discussion, and share files. Every information is transparent so everyone can comment and give their opinion. Wrike is not designed for keeping contact information and different charts, it is a tool specifically designed for brainstorming and delivering projects on time.
Yammer
Yammer is an excellent communication tool, which includes single Inbox (for latest news), document collaboration, conversation space, file sharing, context-based search, etc. It helps employees to connect and work together across different sectors and locations. This tool is also under the Microsoft’s umbrella, and it can be easily integrated with other MS products.
There are many great internal communication apps out there. This list offers only a few of them that we consider being the coolest. Do you agree? Which is your favorite internal communication app?
No matter what you choose, make sure you pick the one that fits you best and go ahead — build good team communication, engagement, and trust!
Originally published at blogin.co.
