At Pebb, we live and breathe internal communication. Every day, we see how the right tools can transform a workplace. In this post, I’ll share insights on why internal comms is mission-critical in 2025, how internal communication tools have evolved, what to look for in a platform, and a candid comparison of leading solutions (Slack, Microsoft Teams, Workvivo, Staffbase) – and why we built Pebb to be the ultimate internal comms platform for your team. Expect real data, industry examples from hospitality to tech, and an honest, insider perspective (with a friendly personal tone to boot!). Let’s dive in.

Why Internal Communication Matters More Than Ever in 2025

Effective internal communication isn’t a “nice to have” – it’s the heartbeat of a successful organization, especially in 2025’s hybrid work era. Why? Because when communication falters, everything else does too. Poor communication is literally a productivity killer – 41% of employees say poor internal communication has reduced their productivity, and 35% report lower job satisfaction as a result (An Internal Comms Strategy for a Hybrid Work World). In fact, a staggering 86% of employees and executives blame workplace failures on poor communication. Miscommunication doesn’t just hurt feelings; it can cost businesses big time (one estimate pegs the cost at $1.2 trillion annually in the U.S. due to mistakes and inefficiencies).

On the flip side, great internal comms drive real results. Companies with effective communication strategies enjoy up to 4.5 times higher employee retention (Workplace Communications Statistics You Need to Know in 2025) and see team productivity jump 25%. Employees who feel informed and heard are dramatically more engaged – transparent communication can boost job satisfaction 12x over. And engagement isn’t just a buzzword; only 33% of U.S. employees were engaged at work in 2023, which translates to a whopping $1.9 trillion in lost productivity ((Gallup found employee engagement stagnated at around one-third of employees, illustrating the huge cost of disengagement.)

Internal communication matters across every industry. In healthcare, for example, timely internal updates can impact patient safety and staff coordination. In hospitality and retail, where millions of “deskless” employees don’t sit at computers, keeping everyone in the loop is a massive challenge – 83% of non-desk workers have no corporate email address, and 45% have zero access to a company intranet. No wonder frontline employees often feel “out of the loop.” Yet these workers are your company’s face to customers, so missing the communication mark here can hurt service and morale. (Imagine a hotel where only managers get the memo about a new safety protocol – not good.)

Remote and hybrid work have raised the stakes even more. As of 2025, about 27% of the U.S. workforce works remotely at least part-time (14 Real Company Intranet Examples for Different Industries), and globally we’ve never had more distributed teams. When some people are in HQ and others are in home offices (or coffee shops), we must work extra hard to keep everyone connected. Nearly half of professionals don’t even understand their company’s hybrid work plan, often because of patchy communication. That’s a recipe for confusion and disengagement. The bottom line: internal comms is the glue holding hybrid teams together. It ensures your newest Gen-Z hire in a remote role and that 20-year veteran on the factory floor both know the company mission, feel included, and can voice feedback.

The Evolution of Internal Comms Tools: From Bulletin Boards to AI Chatbots

How we communicate at work has come a long way. I’m old enough to remember when “internal communications” meant a newsletter tacked to a bulletin board or a mass email nobody read. In the early days, the tools were old-school and top-down: think printed memos, all-staff emails, maybe the occasional all-hands meeting. Those had limited reach and zero interactivity.

Then came the age of the company intranet. In the late 90s and 2000s, organizations built internal websites for news, HR policies, and maybe a forum. It was a step forward, but many intranets turned into dusty archives where content went to die. (Be honest, how many times have you struggled with an outdated intranet that feels like a 1999 web portal?) The intent was good – one central place for info – but usability and engagement were often lacking.

Fast forward to the 2010s, and we saw the rise of team chat and collaboration tools. Slack burst onto the scene and changed the game with real-time messaging organized by channels. Microsoft Teams followed, leveraging the Office 365 ecosystem to combine chat, video calls, and file collaboration. These tools made communication faster and more conversational. By 2024 Slack reached 42 million daily users (showing how popular real-time messaging has become), and Microsoft Teams, launched just in 2017, rocketed to 320 million monthly users by 2024 (Microsoft Teams Revenue and Usage Statistics (2025)) – that’s roughly 8x Slack’s user base. Clearly, organizations everywhere recognized the need for better day-to-day team communication.

However, something interesting happened: while Slack and Teams solved one part of the puzzle (quick team chats and collaboration), they aren’t designed as full-fledged internal comms platforms for broad employee engagement. They’re amazing for work stream coordination in teams, but not ideal for top-down announcements, engaging frontline workers who don’t sit at desks, or fostering company-wide culture. This gap led to the emergence of specialized internal communication platforms like Workvivo, Staffbase, and yes, our own Pebb. These newer platforms took inspiration from social media and employee engagement concepts – think of an internal Facebook/LinkedIn hybrid, with a dash of intranet and a sprinkle of Slack. The goal: combine the interactivity of chat with the reach of an intranet and the engagement of a social network.

By the early 2020s, internal comms tools have evolved to be mobile-first, multimedia-rich, and employee-centric. Modern platforms let you publish a CEO update with a slick video, instantly push urgent alerts as mobile notifications, allow employees to “like” and comment on news (driving interaction), and even leverage AI to personalize content feeds. Many integrate surveys and recognition features (e.g., shout-outs for a job well done) to make communication a two-way street. We’re also seeing integration of AI assistants – for example, drafting announcements or analyzing employee feedback sentiment – which is a far cry from the static intranets of yesteryear.

A noteworthy trend is the consolidation of tools. Companies got tool-fatigue from having one app for chat, another for HR updates, another for file sharing, etc. The evolution now is toward all-in-one platforms that unify these functions. (This is exactly what we aimed for with Pebb, which I’ll talk more about later.)

And let’s not forget analytics – the new generation of internal comms software offers dashboards to track open rates, engagement levels, and feedback in real time. Communications is becoming more data-driven; in 2025, internal comms pros want to know which messages resonate and who is or isn’t engaging, so they can continuously improve strategy.

To sum up this evolution: we’ve gone from passive, one-way channels to dynamic, community-oriented platforms. Today’s employees (especially millennials and Gen Z who grew up with social media) expect internal communications to be as easy to use as Instagram or WhatsApp – and finally, the tools are catching up to those expectations.

What to Look for in an Internal Comms Platform

Not all internal communication tools are created equal. Choosing “the best” platform means finding one that fits your organization’s needs. From my experience working with a variety of companies, here are the key things to look for when evaluating an internal comms platform (a.k.a. employee communication software or communication platform for teams):

• 👍 Ease of Use and Adoption: If your internal comms tool isn’t easy and intuitive, employees simply won’t use it. Look for a modern, user-friendly interface (think familiar social media-like features) and low friction onboarding. A good platform should require minimal training – employees should be able to pick it up quickly, whether they’re tech-savvy developers or a 60-year-old warehouse supervisor. High adoption rates (90%+ of employees using it) are a strong sign; some companies have achieved over 90% adoption within weeks of launching a truly user-friendly platforms.

• 📱 Mobile Accessibility: In 2025, mobile is non-negotiable. Your platform must have a great mobile app so frontline and remote employees can stay connected on their smartphones. Remember that stat: 83% of non-desk workers have no corporate ema, but nearly all have smartphones. A mobile-first design ensures everyone—from a nurse on the hospital floor to a retail associate on the shop floor—can receive updates, check their schedule, or applaud a colleague in real time. If the tool isn’t optimized for mobile (offline access, push notifications, easy login), engagement will suffer.

• 🔌 Integration with Other Tools: Internal comms doesn’t happen in a vacuum. The platform should play nicely with your existing tech stack. Common integrations to look for: Single Sign-On (for easy access), HR systems (to sync employee directory info), productivity suites (Office 365, Google Workspace), and even Slack/Teams or email for multi-channel delivery. For example, an update posted on the platform could optionally also send an email or Teams message to ensure nobody misses it. Integration capabilities prevent the platform from becoming yet another silo and instead make it a hub that ties everything together.

• 📰 Multi-Channel Communication: A robust platform supports various content types and channels: announcements, threaded discussions, private and group chats, video calls/meetings, and even traditional intranet pages for static content like policies. Think of it as a Swiss army knife – you should be able to broadcast a company-wide newsletter, but also enable a specific project team to brainstorm in a chat or a department to maintain their own knowledge base page. Flexibility is key: from video messages to polls to live Q&As, the more ways you can communicate, the better you cater to different preferences.

• 🤝 Engagement and Social Features: The best internal comms platforms don’t just broadcast information; they spark engagement. Look for features like likes, comments, and sharing (so communication is two-way and interactive). Some platforms have built-in recognition systems (e.g., badges or points for contributions, peer shout-outs), which can boost morale. Gamification elements (like quizzes or challenges) and communities/groups for various interests (wellness, DEI discussions, etc.) are also great for fostering a sense of belonging. You want a platform that helps build culture, not just distribute memos.

• 🔒 Security and Privacy: Since internal communications often involve sensitive info, security is paramount. Ensure the platform offers enterprise-grade security – end-to-end encryption, robust access controls, compliance with GDPR or other regulations if applicable, and reliable hosting. Especially if you’re in a regulated industry (finance, healthcare), things like data retention policies, audit logs, and integration with compliance tools might be critical. Also consider permissioning features – you should be able to target messages to the right groups securely (for instance, HR can send benefits info only to employees in certain regions).

• 📊 Analytics and Feedback: As the saying goes, “you can’t improve what you don’t measure.” Good platforms provide analytics on reach and engagement (who read your post, engagement rates, etc.). This data is gold for internal comms teams to refine their strategy. Also valuable is the ability to gather feedback directly – e.g., quick polls, emoji reactions, or pulse surveys embedded in announcements. Some platforms even let you measure eNPS (employee Net Promoter Score) or track sentiment trends over time. One company saw a 20% jump in eNPS participation after moving their survey to a modern comms platform, indicating how a good tool can amplify employee voice.

• 🌎 Scalability and Multi-language Support: If you’re a growing company or a global one, make sure the platform scales and supports multiple languages and locales. Can it handle thousands (or hundreds of thousands) of users actively? Can content be auto-translated for a multilingual workforce? (Some enterprise platforms do offer instant translation, which is a boon if you operate in, say, both English and Spanish or French and Japanese.)

• 💻 Evolution and Innovation: Lastly, consider the vendor’s roadmap and innovation. Internal comms is evolving (AI, new mediums, etc.), so you want a platform that’s keeping up. Are they adding new features like AI chatbots for answering employee FAQs? Do they update the UI to keep it fresh? Also, what’s their support like – do they offer strategic guidance or community forums for communicators? A platform backed by a responsive, forward-thinking team can be a long-term partner, not just a software supplier.

Keep these criteria in mind as you evaluate options. Now, let’s get specific and compare some of the best internal communication tools out there, including how they stack up and where each shines or falls short.

Common Internal Communication Challenges (and How the Right Platform Solves Them)

Even with great tools in hand, companies often face similar internal comms challenges. If you’ve ever banged your head against one of these issues, know that you’re not alone – and importantly, that a good internal comms platform can help address them:

• Reaching Frontline and Deskless Employees: This is arguably the #1 challenge in industries like hospitality, retail, manufacturing, and healthcare. Many frontline workers don’t have company laptops or even emails. Important announcements might be stuck in a corporate email thread that never reaches the store clerk or delivery driver. The result? Frontline teams feel invisible and uninformed. One survey found **85% of frontline employees feel the communication they receive on the job isn’t (Bridging the Communication Gap between Frontline Employees | Rever). A strong internal comms platform bridges this gap by using mobile apps, SMS alerts, digital signage, etc., to meet workers where they are. For instance, a large retail chain I worked with introduced a mobile app (with push notifications and an easy login via employee ID) – suddenly their store associates started engaging with HQ updates daily, where before those messages languished unread on a bulletin board. The difference was night and day.

• Information Overload & Noise: Ironically, the opposite problem is also common – employees drowning in too many messages across too many channels. Ever felt like you have Slack, email, and meeting pings all competing for your attention? It’s overwhelming. An over reliance on email especially can lead to inbox fatigue (and *30% of employees admit to outright ignoring internal (Is Email Still Working? How to Communicate with Frontline Employees). Modern platforms combat this by centralizing communications – a single app for all work-related info can cut down the chaos. Many tools also allow smart notification preferences (so you get alerted for truly important things, but not every minor post). This helps employees focus and reduces the “noise” of less relevant chatter. The goal: important news finds you, and non-urgent info is there when you need it (and searchable later).

• Siloed Communication and Disconnected Teams: In larger organizations or ones that are geographically dispersed, silos form easily. The marketing department talks amongst themselves, the factory crew hears only from their plant manager, and the two groups rarely exchange info. This can breed a fragmented culture and duplicate efforts. Internal comms platforms promote cross-functional visibility – e.g., via company-wide newsfeeds or cross-department groups. When everyone uses one network, it’s easier to share success stories across offices or for leadership to broadcast a unifying message. I remember a manufacturing client where the corporate office assumed everyone knew the company’s quarterly goals – turns out, folks on the production line hadn’t even heard about them! After rolling out an engagement app, they could post updates that reached all locations instantly, and even production-line workers began commenting with feedback on corporate posts. It broke down barriers in a wonderful way.

• Lack of Feedback and Employee Voice: Communication shouldn’t be a one-way street, but many companies struggle to get honest feedback from employees. Traditional channels (like an annual survey) are infrequent and impersonal. The challenge is creating a culture and mechanism where employees feel comfortable sharing ideas or concerns regularly. Internal comms platforms can embed that feedback loop into daily life – through pulse polls, comment threads, or anonymous suggestion boxes. When employees see their input being acknowledged (like leadership responding to a popular question on the platform), it builds trust. A great platform will let you highlight employee stories too, not just corporate news. For example, featuring a frontline employee’s customer success story on the intranet home feed both recognizes that person and inspires others. It gives employees a voice and shows that leadership is listening.

• Maintaining Culture and Cohesion (Especially Hybrid/Remote): “Out of sight, out of mind” is a real worry with remote teams. How do you ensure a new hire feels the company culture if they’ve never set foot in an office? How do you prevent remote employees from feeling isolated? Internal comms plays a huge role here. Challenges include replicating water cooler chats, celebrating wins virtually, and ensuring remote folks don’t miss informal learnings. A good platform can foster a virtual community – with social channels for non-work topics (pet photos channel, anyone?), virtual kudos boards, and live video town halls that include remote participants equally. Some companies create a daily digest or social feed on the platform where anyone can post updates or shout-outs – it humanizes the workplace beyond task-related chat. When done right, your comms platform becomes the digital “office lobby” that everyone passes through, where they can bump into information or colleagues they wouldn’t otherwise.

• Measuring Communication Effectiveness: Historically, internal comms was hard to measure – you could send an email to all staff, but did they read it? Did it resonate? Without data, internal comms folks have flown blind, unable to prove their impact or adjust tactics. This is a challenge when trying to get executive buy-in for new initiatives (“Trust us, it’s working!” isn’t the most convincing argument to a CFO). Modern platforms solve this with analytics dashboards: you can see that, say, 78% of employees read last week’s CEO message within 48 hours, and 60% reacted to it – versus the previous all-staff email that had a 25% open rate. Being able to demonstrate high engagement numbers helps secure leadership support (and budget) for internal comms programs. Plus, if some messages are underperforming, you have the data to pinpoint issues (maybe that lengthy HR policy update needed a catchy summary or an infographic to draw eyes).

• Content Overload vs. Relevance: Another subtle challenge – ensuring employees get relevant information without being flooded by extraneous content. In a diverse company, not every update matters to every person. Without targeting, people either get spammed or critical news gets lost among general noise. The solution is to use a platform with strong targeting and segmentation capabilities. You should be able to send plant-specific updates to plant workers, role-specific info to those roles, and general news to everyone – and employees can ideally subscribe to topics of interest. Personalization (sometimes AI-driven) is emerging to tackle this. We see early signs: some platforms will learn what topics an employee engages with and surface more of that, while minimizing irrelevant posts. That way, a software engineer sees more tech and product updates, whereas a sales rep sees more sales enablement news – yet both see major company-wide announcements. Getting this right means employees feel the intranet is useful, not a dumping ground.

The common thread with all these challenges is that technology alone isn’t a silver bullet, but the right platform coupled with a good strategy makes a world of difference. I’ve watched companies transform from having a disengaged, in-the-dark workforce to one that’s informed and buzzing with dialogue – largely by addressing these pain points with modern internal comms solutions.

Next, let’s examine the major players in the internal comms platform space and see how they line up. We’ll also shine a light on where Pebb comes in as the new kid on the block with a fresh approach.

Comparing the Leading Internal Comms Platforms (Slack, Teams, Workvivo, Staffbase, and Pebb)

There are many tools labeled as “internal communication platforms” or “communication platforms for teams,” but a handful of names come up consistently in 2025. Each has its strengths and ideal use cases. Here’s an honest comparison of five leading platforms (including our take on how Pebb compares):

Slack

Slack is practically synonymous with team communication, and for good reason. It’s incredibly good at what it was built for: real-time messaging and collaboration in teams. Slack organizes conversations into channels (by project, department, topic, etc.), making it easier to keep discussions focused. It also integrates with over 2,600 other apps (think Google Drive, Jira, Zoom). As of 2024, Slack boasts around 42 million daily active users, used in companies of all sizes from scrappy startups to Fortune 500 firms.

Where Slack shines: It’s intuitive and fast. New employees often need little training – if you’ve used any messaging app, Slack feels natural. The search function is excellent, so you can dig up past conversations or files easily. Slack is also great for culture-building in its own way: people often create fun channels (#pets, #random, etc.) that humanize work. For distributed teams, Slack keeps people connected and is far less formal (and faster) than email. Many teams find that Slack reduces their internal emails dramatically (by over 30% in some cases) and even cuts down because quick questions get answered in chat. Slack has also added features over time like audio “huddles” and lightweight video clips, so it’s not just text chat.

Slack’s limitations: For all its strengths, Slack is not a comprehensive internal comms platform in the sense of reaching everyone with top-down communications. It lacks an intranet-like space for long-form content or a way to ensure all employees see a particular announcement. There’s no built-in employee directory or org-wide newsfeed beyond channels you create. Large orgs sometimes find Slack can become chaotic with too many channels, and it can actually contribute to information overload if not well-governed (the dreaded “Slack always buzzing” effect). Also, Slack wasn’t built with frontline workers in mind – it assumes a user who’s at a computer or on their smartphone with an account, which isn’t true for all employees in retail or manufacturing settings. Another drawback: Slack has limited native analytics for comms (it’s more for team usage, not measuring engagement with a CEO’s message, for example). If you need to broadcast an announcement to everyone and ensure they read it, Slack alone won’t do that (people can and will mute channels).

In summary, Slack is fantastic for team-level collaboration and quick communication. It’s often one piece of the puzzle – many companies pair Slack with another intranet or internal news tool. Slack itself has recognized this gap; interestingly, Salesforce (Slack’s parent company) even launched an internal comms tool called Salesforce Chatter years ago for more top-down comms, but it never took off like Slack did. So Slack is almost best at what it started as: a communication platform for teams (the day-to-day doing of work), rather than a holistic employee communications solution.

Microsoft Teams

Microsoft Teams emerged as the tech giant’s answer to Slack and more. It’s part of the Microsoft 365 ecosystem, which means it’s tightly integrated with tools like Outlook, SharePoint, OneDrive, Word/Excel, etc. Teams offers chat and video conferencing, file collaboration, and even telephony in one platform. By sheer distribution through Office 365, Teams has become massive – as noted, around 300+ million people use Teams, including a huge chunk of enterprise companies that were traditional Microsoft shops.

Where Teams shines: Integration, integration, integration. If your company runs on Outlook email and you schedule meetings via Exchange, Teams fits right in. A chat can seamlessly escalate to a video call, and you can collaboratively edit a Word doc within the Teams interface – it’s all connected. For IT departments, having one tool under the Microsoft umbrella can simplify management and security (single sign-on through Azure AD, compliance via Microsoft’s toolset, etc.). Teams also has built-in calendar and meeting scheduling (thanks to Outlook integration), so it often becomes the hub for both synchronous and asynchronous comms. It’s quite powerful for project collaboration with features like Teams sites and the ability to add tabs for other apps (Planner, Power BI, etc.).

Teams’ limitations: While Teams is powerful, many users find it less intuitive and cluttered compared to Slack. The joke “it’s not a bug, it’s a feature (of Teams)” rings true – sometimes Teams feels like Outlook and SharePoint had a baby (and not always in a good way). From an internal comms perspective, Teams shares similar gaps with Slack: it’s heavily focused on chat and small group collaboration rather than organization-wide broadcasting or engagement. Yes, you can create “Org-wide” teams or channels, but employees can (and do) mute those, and there isn’t a concept of a global newsfeed where a comms manager can post an announcement with pretty formatting and ensure everyone sees it. Also, for frontline enablement, Microsoft introduced separate tools like Viva Connections (which is basically a SharePoint intranet in Teams) – but that requires additional setup and licensing. In short, Teams is a great unified collaboration tool, especially if you already use Microsoft products, but it’s not a specialized internal comms/engagement solution out of the box.

Additionally, some companies have found user adoption hurdles with Teams beyond basic chat/meetings. It can do so much that many users stick to core functionality and ignore the rest. The UX can be overwhelming – numerous menus, teams, channels, threads, SharePoint sites, all nested… it’s a lot. From an admin view, Teams can get unwieldy with sprawl (every new Team can create a SharePoint site, etc.), which can lead to a fragmented intranet if not governed. So, while Teams might check the box as an “employee communication platform” in RFPs, in practice it often needs pairing with a more engaging comms solution (or significant customization) to handle things like top-down comms, frontline comms, and cultural initiatives.

Workvivo

Workvivo is a newer entrant (founded in late 2010s) that explicitly positions itself as an employee communication and engagement platform. Think of Workvivo as an internal social network meets intranet. Its interface is often described as “Facebook-like” – employees have profiles, there’s a central news feed with posts that can include images/videos, people can like and comment, etc. Workvivo gained a lot of buzz for achieving very high adoption rates and engagement in the companies that deployed it. In fact, it impressed Zoom enough that Zoom acquired Workvivo in 2023 to bolster their own employee experience. (That acquisition alone is a telling sign: even a video communications giant realized internal comms platforms are crucial in the future of work.)

Where Workvivo shines: Engagement and user experience. Companies using Workvivo report metrics like 90%+ of employees active on the platform, which is huge. For example, A+E Networks saw a 92% adoption rate and a 40% increase in employee retention after launching. The platform is built to foster a sense of community: it has features for peer recognition (e.g., shout-outs that appear in the feed), surveys, virtual “Spaces” for groups, and the ability to publish blog-style articles or announcements that actually get read. It’s also mobile-friendly, catering to deskless workers. Their case studies boast impressive stats – one company got 97% of employees activated within one week, which speaks to its ease of onboarding and relevance to employees. Workvivo also provides a range of content options (videos, podcasts, live streams) to keep comms fresh. Another strength is its focus: it’s not trying to be a full collaboration suite with complex project management; it’s laser-focused on communication and engagement, which means it’s relatively straightforward for comms teams to administer.

Workvivo’s limitations: Since it’s a specialized platform, you might still need other tools for certain functions (e.g., it’s not a direct Slack/Teams replacement for real-time team chats or video conferencing, which is likely why Zoom saw it as complementary to their meetings). Some IT folks may initially worry about “yet another platform” in the mix, but Workvivo mitigates that with integrations (including with Teams, ironically – you can integrate Workvivo into Teams as an app). In terms of content management, Workvivo can serve as a lightweight intranet, but large enterprises with complex document management needs might still lean on SharePoint or others for heavy knowledge bases. Essentially, Workvivo excels at the human side of comms – engagement, culture, recognition – but it’s not an all-in-one for every communication modality (like synchronous chat or deep file repositories). Also, as a relatively newer product, some companies wonder about its long-term roadmap (although backing by Zoom now likely means strong continued investment).

Staffbase

Staffbase is one of the pioneers in the employee communications platform space, especially known in Europe and among large enterprises. They offer an “Employee Communications Cloud” that combines intranet content, employee mobile app, email newsletter tools, and more into one solution. Staffbase really made a name by focusing on internal communicators’ needs – they even merged with an email tool (Bananatag) to integrate internal email campaigns into their platform. It’s used by big brands and has solutions for various verticals (Staffbase often touts customers in manufacturing, healthcare, retail, etc., and has pre-built templates for those). For example, 200+ retail companies like Sephora and Aldi use Staffbase to connect their widely distributed.

Where Staffbase shines: Breadth and enterprise readiness. If you need a platform to reach all employees across channels (mobile app, intranet site, email, maybe even digital signage) – Staffbase can do it. They provide a branded mobile app experience, which is great for companies that want their own “employee app” in app stores. Staffbase is also strong in content management; it allows robust intranet pages, multimedia posts, and even segmentation of content to certain audiences. A highlight is their analytics – internal comms teams can get detailed reports on who’s reading what, which content is performing well, etc. They also offer a nice admin experience for communicators, including the ability to target and schedule messages to specific groups (like scheduling a post to go live Monday at 9am to all sales associates in region X). For organizations concerned with compliance and security, Staffbase has the chops: data is hosted securely (often on Azure), and they’ve got features like confirmation tracking (where employees have to confirm reading a message – useful for safety notices or compliance acknowledgments).

Another strength: Staffbase supports multilingual content and even automatic translation for posts, which is a big plus for global companies. And because Staffbase acquired an email tool, it’s one of the few that lets you coordinate traditional channels (like corporate emails or newsletters) alongside modern channels in one platform – potentially replacing your need for tools like Mailchimp for internal newsletters.

Staffbase’s limitations: With great power comes… complexity. Staffbase can do so much that it may require more effort to implement and maintain, especially in a large enterprise context. It’s not as plug-and-play as some smaller solutions – typically you’d have an implementation project, content migration, etc. The user interface, while modern, is perhaps not as “social-media-esque” fun as Workvivo’s; it feels a tad more corporate (which could be fine depending on your audience). Also, because it’s an enterprise solution, the cost might be higher (especially if you’re adding all the modules like intranet + email + signage). For small businesses, Staffbase could be overkill. Another consideration: Staffbase isn’t really for real-time team chat or project collaboration – so like Workvivo, it might be paired with something like Slack/Teams. It focuses on asynchronous comms and engagement. If you already have an intranet and just need a better “social layer,” Staffbase might replace that intranet entirely; but some companies with established SharePoint intranets, for instance, might hesitate to rip and replace (though Staffbase can integrate with SharePoint too).

Pebb

I might be biased (okay, definitely biased 😄), but I saved Pebb for last because it’s our baby and represents what we see as the future of internal comms platforms. Pebb was created to be a comprehensive communication and engagement platform that employees actually love to use. We saw so many companies struggling with a patchwork of tools – a little Slack here, an outdated intranet there, maybe a dusty HR portal – and employees, especially frontline ones, were disengaged. Pebb’s mission is to **replace those outdated, siloed tools (intranet, chat, calls, people directory, etc.) with one modern, intuitive digital hub that connects everyone from the head office to the frontline.

Where Pebb shines: Think of Pebb as Slack + SharePoint + Facebook Workplace + Zoom, all in one, but streamlined. You get real-time chat and calls (so teams can coordinate just like Slack/Teams), and you get an interactive news feed where company-wide or targeted announcements can be posted (with rich media, comments, likes). It has built-in features for events, calendars, and knowledge libraries – so that company handbook or that training video is just a quick search away, within the same app you use to message a colleague. This all-in-one approach was very deliberate: we want to avoid the scenario of “Oh, the announcement is on the intranet which nobody checks, and the discussion about it is on Slack, and half the people missed it.” With Pebb, you have a single source of truth for internal comms and collaboration.

Another area Pebb focuses on is employee engagement and culture. We incorporated social features (profiles, follow colleagues, recognition shout-outs, etc.) so that using Pebb feels like participating in a community, not just checking off a work tool. The platform is mobile-first, recognizing the need of deskless workers – whether you’re in an office or on a shop floor, Pebb is designed to be just as accessible (and useful). We’ve heard feedback that Pebb “feels like an internal social network” (in fact, one Reddit user said it kept everyone engaged like a mini-Instagram for their company). The idea is when employees enjoy the platform, they actually use it – and then communication flows much more freely. Adoption has been fantastic among our clients; teams from 24 countries are already using Pebb within their organizations, which is exciting to see.

From a features standpoint, let me highlight a few: Pebb has channels and group chats for teamwork (similar to Slack), but also a home newsfeed for top-down or cross-company posts (like Workvivo/Staffbase). It supports video calls and meetings (so you don’t need a separate Zoom or Teams for that, though we can integrate with them if needed). It has a people directory with profiles and org charts, so you can find an expert in another department easily. And it’s integrated – your Outlook or Google Calendar can sync with Pebb, HR systems can feed in org info, etc., to avoid manual upkeep. We want Pebb to be the daily digital HQ for a company.

Crucially, Pebb was built with both frontline and office employees in mind. It’s just as easy for a factory worker to receive a safety alert on Pebb as it is for a developer to share code snippets in a team chat. The interface is clean and modern, avoiding the bloat that sometimes plagues enterprise software. We also launched a free version to help companies (especially mid-sized ones or those with tight budgets) transform their internal comms without cost being a barrier, directly addressing the need to replace expensive, outdated intranets with some thing employees want to use on a daily basis.

Pebb’s limitations: Since Pebb is relatively new on the scene, we’re continually rolling out advanced features (for example, our analytics dashboard is evolving with each release – we’re adding more in-depth metrics as we gather feedback from internal comms teams). Some very large enterprises with extremely complex setups might still opt to keep certain specialized tools alongside Pebb, and that’s okay – we designed Pebb to integrate if needed. One could argue that being all-in-one means if you’re deeply attached to a specific tool (say, you love Slack’s interface or you have a highly customized SharePoint), Pebb replacing it requires change management and an open mind. But our philosophy is that the user experience will win skeptics over once they try it.

In summary, Pebb aims to be the top option by combining the best of all worlds: the immediacy of Slack/Teams, the engagement of Workvivo/Staffbase, and an intuitive, unified experience that doesn’t require juggling apps. As a writer at Pebb, I’m obviously passionate about it – but that passion comes from seeing the impact a unified internal comms platform can have. One client told us that after implementing Pebb, it was like “night and day” – for the first time, their store employees, delivery drivers, and office staff were all communicating in one place, sharing updates and kudos, and it felt like one team. That’s the magic of getting internal comms right.

Key Takeaways

• Internal communication is mission-critical in 2025 – it underpins productivity, engagement, and company culture. Poor communication leads to real costs (lost productivity, low morale, higher turnover), while great communication boosts retention and improve productivity.

• Workplaces have changed (hybrid, remote, frontline emphasis), making effective internal comms more challenging and more important. Reaching all employees – whether they sit at a desk or not – is essential. Modern internal comms platforms are rising to meet this challenge with mobile apps and multi-channel approaches.

• Internal comms tools have evolved dramatically – from static intranets and mass emails to interactive, social, mobile-first platforms. Employees now expect consumer-grade experiences at work (think ease of use and engagement similar to social media).

• When choosing an internal comms platform, look for ease of use, mobile accessibility, integrations, engagement features (likes/comments, recognition), security, and analytics. The right tool should fit your workforce’s needs and make communication inclusive and measurable.

• Common internal comms challenges (reaching frontline staff, avoiding information overload, breaking silos, getting employee feedback, maintaining culture) can be overcome with a thoughtful strategy and a platform designed to address these pain points. The goal is a connected, informed workforce where everyone’s voice can be heard.

• Platform comparisons: Slack and Microsoft Teams are excellent for team collaboration and quick chats, but they have gaps in company-wide communications and engagement. Workvivo and Staffbase are purpose-built for employee communications and shine in engagement and broad reach, though they often complement rather than replace collaboration tools. Pebb combines these strengths into one platform – aiming to replace fragmented tools with a unified, intuitive hub for all communication and collaboration, equally serving frontline and office employees, and ultimately driving engagement and productivity.
  
  

So…

Internal communication is often called the “central nervous system” of an organization – and in 2025, that analogy rings truer than ever. It’s what links your leadership’s vision to every employee’s daily actions, what binds teams together across time zones, and what can turn a company of disparate individuals into a unified community. Investing in a great internal comms platform isn’t just about getting a shiny new tool; it’s about enabling your people to connect, collaborate, and feel that they belong to something important.

We’ve seen why it matters (with data to prove it), how far the tools have come, what to consider when evaluating options, and how the leading platforms stack up. The landscape is rich – from Slack’s ubiquity in fast communication to Staffbase’s enterprise muscle – and the best choice depends on your unique context. But one thing is clear: the days of relying on email chains and bulletin boards are over. To engage the modern workforce, you need a modern solution.

At Pebb, we’re excited to be part of this evolution. (Forgive the slight plug, but we truly built Pebb out of a passion to solve the frustrations we experienced ourselves in past roles with clunky intranets and disjointed tools!) Whether you’re in hospitality hustling to inform staff across dozens of hotel locations, in retail trying to reach young associates glued to their smartphones, in healthcare coordinating across clinics, or in tech managing a hybrid dev team – the right internal comms platform can be a game-changer. We’ve highlighted plenty of examples and even cautionary tales here, and I hope those give you a clearer picture of what “good” looks like.

To wrap up, remember that technology is an enabler. The heart of internal comms will always be human. It’s about empathy, clarity, and listening as much as telling. The best platform is one that fades into the background as employees focus on the conversations and content, not the tool itself. So aim for that: a seamless, engaging internal communications environment where your team feels informed, aligned with your mission, and excited to contribute. When you achieve that, you’ll see the impact not just inside the company, but in your business results, your customer satisfaction, and beyond.

Here’s to stronger connections and successful communication in your team! If you have any stories or questions about internal comms platforms, feel free to share – as a fellow comms enthusiast, I’m all ears. 🙌