Conversations about benefits plans are some of the most important ones that happen in your workplace. You want your employees to take advantage of the open enrollment seasons and sign up for the health plan that fits them best, as quality benefits plans can help keep your employees happier and more loyal to their jobs. However, when the open enrollment time starts approaching, many organizations struggle with messaging. Finding a way to balance concise messaging and comprehensive information can be challenging, leading to confusion and frustration among employees.
Let’s explore more closely what businesses should know about open enrollment communications.
Why Open Enrollment Communications Often Miss the Mark
When companies set out to communicate with their employees about open enrollment and benefits options, they often fall into three major pitfalls.
- Using too much jargon. These businesses forget that their audience is their employees and not insurance companies or HR teams. Excessive jargon becomes difficult to weed through and the personal connection and value of the benefits gets lost.
- Unclear instructions. If you focus too much on providing technical information to the employees and not enough on accessing those benefits, people will miss out.
- Overwhelming employees with too much information. Throwing too much information at your teams can lead many people to feel unsure about what to do next. This can result in missed deadlines or misunderstandings about plans.
To combat these struggles, you need to strike the proper balance of providing the necessary details without overwhelming your recipients.
Best Practices for Crafting Concise Yet Comprehensive Open Enrollment Communications
Let’s look at a few best practices you can implement to help you better engage your employees during the healthcare enrollment period.
Segmenting the Audience
Start by tailoring your messages to different employee groups based on their needs and options. For example, you might have certain messaging for part-time versus full-time employees. You might also tailor your messages based on whether a particular person has signed up for the benefits plans in the past.
As a part of segmenting your audience, also consider how you can use targeted communication channels to connect with your audience. This might include emails or workplace tools that allow you to reach particular groups of employees.
Clear, Simple Language
As you create messages surrounding your benefits offerings, avoid using benefits jargon or assuming that people know what complex concepts mean – such as high-deductible plans or HSAs. Instead, break down these concepts in easy-to-understand terms where you provide people with examples so that they understand their options.
Visual Aids and Infographics
To make your information about your benefits plans even clearer, consider using visual aids and infographics. These elements can help make certain information very clear, such as how much each plan will cost per month or how much people will need to pay when they visit a doctor in different types of scenarios. Graphics can help people compare the different plans side-by-side so they see which one fits their needs.
Reinforcement with Multi-Channel Communication
As you send out your communication, reinforce the message across multiple channels of communication so you know that your employees have all received and absorbed the relevant information. For example, you might use email and employee portals to send out notifications and relevant summaries. During in-person meetings, you might reinforce key messages and dates, such as the deadlines for enrollment and how to find more information about the different options.
Throughout the messages, regularly highlight critical dates and deadlines. Write out the registration deadlines in a way that catches the readers’ eyes. Make the deadlines clear and prominent in all communication.
How Technology and Streamline Open Enrollment Communication
While you devise your plan for communicating with your teams about open enrollment and how they can register, technology should play an important role. You can incorporate technology like benefits administration software to help keep everyone up-to-date with the latest information. These tools allow you to reach everyone at once and verify that the information sent out is accurate and easily digestible by your employees.
ASAP Payroll also offers Human Capital Management (HCM) tools that improve your ability to manage employee benefits communication. This management feature makes it easy to keep benefits information organized and ensures that everyone at the company can enroll and engage with their benefits in a straightforward way.
Measuring the Effectiveness of Your Open Enrollment Communication Strategy
While you develop your communication plan to keep everyone updated and fully informed about the plans and all the applicable dates and deadlines, the true gauge of whether you achieve this goal is to ask your employees themselves. Measuring the effectiveness of your open enrollment strategies for communication is critical so you know if you need to make adjustments in the future.
Send surveys to your employees to solicit their feedback and learn about their impressions of the communication you sent out. Ask them about how clearly you communicated and what they found helpful.
You should also track participation and engagement rates during the open enrollment period. This will help you better understand whether or not people read your materials and how many responded by engaging during the open enrollment period.
Conclusion
Open enrollment periods make it easy for your employees to evaluate the benefits plans they receive and if they want to make changes. Communicating effectively with your team during this period can enhance everyone’s experience and ensure that people can find the benefits plans that fit them best.
ASAP Payroll offers businesses like yours the tools and resources needed to administer benefits and communicate clearly with employees. Learn more about what we can do for your business and how we can help with clear benefits communication today.
Make your open enrollment communication process seamless with ASAP Payroll’s employee benefits administration tools. Contact us today for a free consultation!
