Choosing the right intranet platform in 2026: 10 steps for high adoption and maximum ROI

How to choose an intranet platform in 2026 

The global investment in digital workplace tools is massive, with spending expected to reach $160 billion by 2030. But with 57% of employees seeing no purpose in their company intranet, a common challenge still persists…the underperforming intranet. 

Many organisations choose a platform based on a long feature list only to watch it become a digital ghost town that’s clunky, unloved, and unused. When choosing an intranet platform in 2026 the goal is to implement a thriving employee experience platform (EXP) that connects your workforce, streamlines communications, and drives measurable productivity.

Fear not, we'll provide you with a 10-step, strategy-first framework designed to help you choose an intranet platform that your employees will actually use, delivering a clear return on investment (ROI).

Defining strategy and requirements (The 'why', 'who', and 'what matters most')

Step 1: Define clear business goals and measurable KPIs

Before you look at a single piece of software or start to consider intranet vendors, you must define your intranet’s primary purpose. Have a think…what is the single biggest communication or business problem you need to solve?

• Knowledge discovery: Do employees struggle to find the latest policy, form, or document? If so, prioritise robust search and content management.

• Community & culture: Are employees disconnected, especially across different locations and sites? If so, prioritise social features, recognition tools, and two-way communication.

💡 Tip: Tie your problems to outcomes. Examples include: Reduced help desk tickets (knowledge discovery), increased employee engagement survey scores (community), and reduced time spent searching for information (productivity).

Step 2: Involve all stakeholders (IT, HR, and the frontline)

One of the key ways to guarantee intranet adoption is to involve users in the selection process early. Your intranet should cater for everyone, but their needs can be vastly different:

• IT: IT's primary focus is on security, infrastructure, and technical integrations. They are your gatekeepers for compliance and enterprise architecture.

• HR & internal communications: HR and comms are the primary content owners, focused on content governance, easy publishing, and communication reach.

• The frontline challenge: Your employees, which unfortunately can sometimes be the crucial but often overlooked segment. If a large part of your workforce is retail, logistics, or operations, you must ask: Do they have corporate email addresses? If the answer is no, a system tied exclusively to a Microsoft or Google account will fail. Your requirement must be mobile-first access with flexible single sign-on (SSO) options.

Step 3: Conduct a digital workplace audit and define your key integrations

Analyse your existing digital landscape. An intranet should be the digital home for everything employee focused, not just another disconnected system.

💡 Tip: Look for fragmentation and information siloes. If employees use Slack for comms, SharePoint for documents, and a separate HR system for forms, your intranet must successfully integrate and simplify access to all your key processes.

Define your must-have integrations (e.g., Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, ServiceNow, Workday). The seamless exchange of data and single-click access to tools will dramatically increase daily usage.

Essential features and user experience

Step 4: Prioritise user experience (UX) and mobile access

Another big factor of high intranet adoption is ease of use. If it’s clunky, people will stop using it.

• Mobile-first design: For maximum reach and continuity of experience, the platform must feel native and fast on any smartphone. This is non-negotiable for modern organisations.

• Intuitive navigation: Can an employee find your payslip portal or a company announcement in two clicks or less? The design must be clean, modern, and easily personalised based on an employee’s role, location, or department.

• Search functionality: An intranet's search function is its backbone. It must be smart, federated (searching across integrated systems), and deliver relevant results instantly.

Step 5: Secure critical technical requirements and content ownership

The platform must support your organisation’s size and structure.

• Scalability: Can the intranet easily handle 100 users or 100,000 users without degrading performance?

• Cloud vs. on-premise: Modern platforms are almost always cloud-based (SaaS), offering better agility, lower maintenance, and automatic updates.

• Accessibility: Ensure compliance with accessibility standards (WCAG) to serve all employees equally.

Step 6: Determine core content and collaboration features

While features are secondary to strategy, certain ones are essential for a modern, dynamic platform:

Evaluation and selection (Build vs. buy)

Step 7: Decide: Build, buy, or extend? (TCO and risk assessment)

The first choice in vendor evaluation is determining which path you want to go down:

The modern consensus: For speed, innovation, and manageable TCO, buying a scalable SaaS platform or extending a core system is the recommended strategy.

Step 8: Evaluate vendors against key use cases and product roadmaps

Seeing all the features that vendors have on offer can become exciting when thinking of all the potential communications possibilities. But it’s important to not get carried away with lists of features, and to focus on your key problems you’re trying to solve. Ask vendors to prove they can solve your specific problems.

1. Use cases: Provide the vendor with your top 3 most common employee tasks (e.g., "A new employee needs to complete onboarding forms," "A remote worker needs to find a contact in the Paris office"). Have them demo the solution to those exact tasks.

2. Product roadmap: Ask for their innovation plan or key milestones on their roadmap. Are they looking ahead? A good vendor should be investing in the future of work (e.g., AI search optimisation, personalised mobile workflows). If a vendor is stuck on legacy features, it’s a sign they might quickly fall behind the needs of your business and your people.

Step 9: Align the solution with budget and TCO

It’s important to always look beyond the initial pricing plan costs and consider any extra costs that might impact budget. 

• Implementation costs: Include data migration, configuration, and training.

• Support model: What level of dedicated support (implementation and ongoing) is included? Choose a vendor with a reputation for strong support, especially during the crucial launch phase.

• Licensing: Understand if the cost structure is based on active users or total employees, which is critical for organisations with many frontline staff.

Launch and long-term success

Step 10: Plan for governance, adoption, and measurement

It's important to think beyond contract signing and consider the long term success of your intranet.  

• The pilot phase: Before full launch, run a pilot with a diverse group of stakeholders and a small sample of end-users. Gather honest feedback on friction points, fix them, and turn your testers into launch champions.

• Governance model: Establish clear ownership for every type of content (HR owns policy, Marketing owns brand guidelines, Comms owns news). This prevents the "content rot" that kills long-term value.

• Continuous engagement: Adoption requires a dedicated strategy. Use the platform’s analytics to track top searches, popular content, and adoption rates. Adjust your content and communication strategy based on real-world usage data.

Conclusion: Your modern intranet journey starts here

By prioritising a clear strategy, a mobile-first user experience, and a laser focus on your unique frontline and corporate needs, you will choose an intranet that becomes a vibrant, essential part of your digital employee experience.