SWOOP Analytics’ 2024/25
Viva Engage Benchmarking Report
Download your free copy of SWOOP Analytics’ 2024/25 Viva Engage Benchmarking Report – How to get the most from Viva Engage.
We’ve analysed more than 15 million Viva Engage interactions from more than three million employees across 70 enterprises and 3,751 Viva Engage communities.
This is SWOOP Analytics’ 10th annual Viva Engage Benchmarking Report. Supported by a decade of Viva Engage (formerly Yammer) data, this report boasts the world’s most comprehensive, long-term analysis of Viva Engage usage and behaviour patterns, based on real-time interactions.
The benchmark goals we suggest throughout the report come from 10 years of measuring best practice behaviours from multiple millions of employees across hundreds of organisations, so you can be confident that following our benchmark goals will give your Viva Engage network the best opportunity to thrive.
In this year’s report, we’ve refreshed our traditional format to make it a one-stop guide for Viva Engage. We’re addressing the questions and issues faced by you - all backed by a decade of data research and the latest real-life analytics available.
This 2024/25 Viva Engage Benchmarking Report is a go-to resource for anyone using, or launching, Viva Engage.
We address:
✔ The business value/business case for Viva Engage
✔ The role of Viva Engage in your internal communications strategy
✔ How to nurture Communities on Viva Engage
✔ How to get leaders on board and flying with Viva Engage
✔ How to get your people engaged and acing Viva Engage
✔ Goals to aim for when using Viva Engage
✔ Migrating from Workplace from Meta to Viva Engage
✔ Enterprise Social Network Maturity Model
We’ve also identified the world’s top performing Viva Engage networks, and the top performing communities, and been fortunate enough to interview many of these organisations so we can all learn from their best practices and experience.
In a first for our Viva Engage benchmarking report, we have tapped into the wealth of experience and knowledge from people we believe to be the world’s experts in managing and facilitating Viva Engage networks.
We share brand-new research in this report, including the best time of day, and day of the week, to post on Viva Engage, and do a deep dive into how different job titles are collaborating on Viva Engage, including executives and senior leaders. The results might surprise you!
The good news is, people are using Viva Engage extensively. Viva Engage readership levels are high, with 78% of all employees reading posts. The top 10 posts on Viva Engage get, on average, 30% of all registered users reading them, making it an essential part of the internal communications channels mix. And 55% of replies to Viva Engage posts come within the first 24 hours.
We’ve also seen an upward trend in responsiveness to Viva Engage posts. This means more people are reacting, replying and commenting on their colleagues’ posts.
It’s not all good news, however, with our people-to-people engagement measure, which measures collaboration between colleagues, trending downward. Interestingly though, tagging others into conversations through @mentions has been on the rise, which brings colleagues into conversations.
2024/25 Key Insights
Understand your audience
Viva Engage readership levels are high, with 78% of all employees reading posts. However, active participation is at 29%, meaning 49% of all employees are reading but not participating in Viva Engage conversations.
The peak time to post and reply on Viva Engage is 9am on weekdays, with Wednesday and Friday being the most popular days. That said, any time between 8am and 2pm on a weekday receives strong engagement. Drop off in readership starts about 4pm each weekday.
People are reading and engaging on Viva Engage. In fact, the top 10 posts on Viva Engage get, on average, 30% of all registered users reading them, making it an essential part of the internal communications channels mix.
55% of replies to Viva Engage posts come within the first 24 hours. While Viva Engage responses may be slower than Microsoft Teams chat, 18% of replies still come within an hour. The remaining 45% come after 24 hours.
Almost 50% of Viva Engage users are “Responders”, meaning they nurture conversations by primarily replying or reacting to posts. However, if these people initiate more conversations by starting a new discussion in a post, they are more likely to become “Engagers”.
Write for impact and engagement
The power of asking questions: SWOOP Analytics’ benchmarking data found you get almost 150% more replies when you ask a question on Viva Engage, but only 12% of posts or replies include a question.
Don’t forget to @mention colleagues: SWOOP Analytics’ benchmarking data found you receive 120% more replies when you @mention a person in a Viva Engage post, but only 14% of posts include an @mention.
Add an attachment: SWOOP Analytics’ benchmarking data found you receive 82% more replies when you add an image to a post and 168% more replies with a video. 50% of posts and replies include images but only 4% of posts and replies have a video attached, so if you want to stand out, think about adding a video.
The top performing Viva Engage communities in this year’s analysis had one thing in common – they bring the fun to work. “Fun” posts receive the most engagement from a broad audience. These are work-related posts, but with a fun spin. Think about putting an engaging spin on your corporate comms to make it more appealing.
Where to post
Communities is where the conversations are occurring. Using Viva Engage Storylines isn’t where the action, or interaction, is happening. However, it could be useful for popular leaders. 82% of our benchmarked organisations had enabled the Storyline feature, and for them, Storyline activity made up just 1%. The average response rate to a storyline post is 35% compared with 49% for a community post. On average, you get one reply to a post on a storyline, compared with two replies on a community post.
Most Viva Engage conversations are held in public (80% public and 20% private) and most conversations are positive. 63% of all sentences are somewhat or very positive compared with just 14% being somewhat or very negative. 23% is neutral. Note that “negative” sentiment does not necessarily mean people are complaining but they could be, for instance, using Viva Engage for internal support to ask about why something doesn’t work.
Govern your network: Governance of Viva Engage networks is likely an issue for many as 63% of communities benchmarked were not active during the six-month period analysed by SWOOP Analytics.
Viva Engage trends
People in roles like HR, legal, finance, marketing, consultant, advisor, specialist and communications are the best Viva Engage performers, while executives and senior leaders fall behind. However, executives and senior leaders are stronger performers reading news on the intranet than they are when it comes to using Viva Engage.
Viva Engage has shifted from a collaborative focus towards a more communication-centric broadcasting platform. Perhaps the introduction of Microsoft Teams as the prime collaboration platform during the COVID-19 pandemic has been responsible for this trend, with Viva Engage taking on the role of a corporate communications channel.
Get your own custom Viva Engage Benchmarking Report.
This custom report compares the results of your Viva Engage network with all other participating organisations. We will identify the top collaboration champions in your organisation, along with the best departments in your organisation, so you can learn from those within your own business. SWOOP Analytics Chief Scientist Dr Laurence Lock Lee will provide a qualitative summary of your organisation’s strengths and areas for improvement.
SWOOP Analytics is here to help.
How does your Viva Engage network compare with the best in the world?
Are you collaborating across your organisation to achieve business value?
Get a free demo of SWOOP Analytics for Viva Engage to see how you compare and to identify the top performing communities, most engaging posts and the most influential people in your organisation.
