Get ready to spread some holiday cheer in your organization with a fun digital Advent calendar! In this easy-to-follow guide (and video!), we'll show you exactly how to bring the magic of the Holidays to your Haiilo platform by creating your very own digital Advent calendar.
Whether you want to engage colleagues with daily surprises, fun facts, or festive activities, this setup will help keep the Holiday spirit alive all December long!
Want a simple and enjoyable way to share holiday joy on your intranet? Use Kudos to send digital Holiday cards directly through your platform! Learn more in Example: Kudos as holiday cards!
Aim of the Advent calendar
A digital Advent calendar is a great tool for workplace culture, achieving several key goals:
- Boost Employee Engagement: Daily surprises, activities, or messages can increase employee morale and foster a sense of belonging, making your workplace feel more festive during the holiday season.
- Promote Company Values: It's an excellent opportunity to reinforce your organization's values by incorporating messages or activities that align with your company's mission, culture, or social responsibility goals.
- Reward and Motivate: Daily small rewards or incentives, like gift vouchers, recognition, or even time-off perks, can help keep motivation high as the year comes to an end.
Content Examples
| Vibe | Low-Effort Content Idea | Haiilo Feature to Use |
|---|---|---|
| Fun & Playful | Holiday "This or That": Ask a silly question (e.g., "Eggnog or Hot Cocoa?", "Tinsel or Lights?"). | Poll Widget. Type the question and two options. Set to close the next day and show results. |
| Fun & Playful | "Guess the Song" Emojis: Post a series of emojis that represent a holiday song (e.g., 🤫🌃). Colleagues guess the title in the comments. | Rich Text Editor for the emojis and leveraging Comments for interaction. |
| Fun & Playful | Seasonal GIF Surprise: Find a funny, cheerful, or beautifully animated holiday GIF (like a crackling fireplace). | Teaser Widget. Instant cheer, zero user action required—perfect for a weekend door! |
| Fun & Playful | Cookie Recipe: Share a holiday recipe for delicious cookies. Ask your team to share their best recipes in the comments. | Rich Text Editor for both the recipe and visual. Comments for interaction. |
| Meaningful |
Video Message – "Courage in Action": Have the CEO or a leader record a 90-second video (recorded on their phone for authenticity!) sharing a personal story from the past year where they saw an employee or team embody a specific company value (e.g., "Innovation," "Customer Focus," or "Courage"). Follow up with a poll: Ask employees, "How did YOU live this value this year?". |
Rich Text Editor for both the video and a short text summary. This adds authenticity and personal connection to the calendar. Poll Widget or Comments. This ensures the message is a two-way conversation, reinforcing the value. |
| Meaningful | "Thank You": Spotlight anonymous "Heroes of the Day" nominated by peers (or recent kudos you've found around your intranet), sharing a quick story about how they made a difference. | Rich Text Editor to tell the story and a User Profile Widget to link to the recognized colleagues. |
| Practical | Desk Hacks: Share a GIF or image with a simple, practical productivity or wellness tip (e.g., a 2-minute stretch routine). | Rich Text Editor for both the brief explanation and visuals. |
| Practical | Find the Policy! Challenge users to quickly locate a specific, important document on the intranet. | Poll Widget with options for where the policy can be found, and an image in the Rich Text Editor with a picture of the prize. |
Set up your Advent calendar
Making your calendar easily accessible is key. The best locations are a global company page (like News, HR, or Internal Comms) or a globally accessible community.
⚙️ Prep
To present your Advent calendar in an attractive way, you need to make a few simple preparations:
- Create Your Content Spaces: On the page or community you chose to host your calendar, set up a content app to display your Advent calendar "doors" and a blog app to serve as the hub for each door's content. Keep both deactivated while you build them.
- Split or Number Your Images: Prepare 24 small images or split a single festive image into 24 parts. Each will act as the numbered "door." Or you can download our example images below 😊
- Prep 24 Pieces of Content: This is the fun part! Create a separate blog article for each day's content. This is where your polls, videos, recipes, or challenges will live.
- Plan Your Content: Think of stories, competitions, recipes, and quick polls. Avoid requiring participation on weekends and use those days for simple greetings or content that doesn't require action (like a fun GIF). See our ideas above!
Need ideas? Ask your team! Use a form for content submissions, and set guidelines like keeping ideas festive, simple, and quick to execute. Set a mid-November deadline to ensure you have enough time to set it all up.
🏗️ Build
The "magic" of the Haiilo Advent calendar is linking a numbered "door" widget to a hidden content page.
- Create the Doors: In your content app, place a row with 4 equal-sized columns. Into each column, place 6 separate teaser or image widgets. Each one should display a number (1-24) or one part of your festive image. In the end, you should have 24 doors.
- Create the Content for Each Door: In your blog app, add content for each of your 24 blog articles so they're all set and ready to go for each day. Schedule each blog article to publish in the early morning on its specific day, for example, 6 a.m. Copy and save the links to each day's blog so you can update the calendar.
- Link the Doors (Reveal Strategy): For the best user experience, it's a good idea to keep all 24 doors unlinked so they aren't clickable until the day they should be accessible. But if you're short on time to update the links daily before the reveal, no worries — you can simply link the blog articles in advance since they'll be scheduled to be available automatically on that day.
📣 Launch
The calendar won't succeed if no one knows it's there!
- Make Some Noise: Prepare a timeline post that will bring attention to the start of your Advent calendar. Share information and links to where the calendar is located, when the door will be available every day, and in the case of challenges, how winners will be announced and rewarded.
- Highlight Promptly: Depending on your calendar's location, use the hero teaser, teaser, or a link button on your homepage to link directly to the calendar and make it easily accessible.
- The Daily Check-In: On the day of the door, return to the calendar in the calendar to either update the day's link (if using the daily reveal method) or simply verify that today's door is working properly, the blog article has been published, and the content is accessible.
Video tutorial
Downloadable assets
Don't have time to create your own images? We've got you covered! Use our regular holiday-inspired images. There's one for each door.
Here's what they look like:
| Image package 1: | ||
| Image package 2: | ||
You can easily download these by clicking on the link below: