Internal Release Notes: What They Are, Why They Matter, and How to Organize Them

Internal release notes are short, bulleted documents that tell your own team what changed in a software release: new features, bug fixes, and known issues. They exist so that product managers, marketers, executives, customer success, and support all learn about a change at the same time, without a meeting. Public release notes cover only what customers need to see; internal release notes cover everything the team needs to know.

Communication problems show up in companies of every size. Keeping stakeholders informed about product updates and release notes is usually the product manager’s job. You have to explain internal product changes to your team and also communicate product updates to your customers. One document cannot serve both audiences well, which is where internal release notes come in.

Before going further, it helps to define the stakeholders in question. Internal stakeholders are the people who care about every product update. Customers are stakeholders too, but not every customer wants to know what changed. Product managers, marketers, the CEO, COO, CTO, customer success, and customer support need detailed information about what changed and what is going on.

Table of Contents

• What are internal release notes?
• Why do you need internal release notes?
• Who prepares internal release notes?
• How to organize an internal release notes process

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What are internal release notes?

Internal release notes are a bulleted document that ships alongside a software release to tell internal stakeholders (your team) what has changed. Typical entries cover bug fixes, new features, and sometimes known issues. The goal is simple: inform the team about recent releases and keep everybody on the same page.

They are the private half of the changelog. If you are deciding whether one log can serve both audiences, read why you need both an internal and an external changelog.

Why do you need internal release notes?

Keeping a product changelog for your users is already a demanding task. Why maintain a second one for your team? Can’t they follow the same changelog? They can’t, because internal stakeholders have a different set of needs.

Public release notes summarize updates in a brief form. That means leaving out improvements and changes that do not concern end users. For example, a user reports a minor bug and your development team fixes it quickly. You would not publish a public release note for that. You should still tell your team, so you post an internal release note.

Now the customer support manager knows right away that the bug is fixed. The user who reported it can be notified directly, which leaves them with a positive experience.

It is easy to underrate internal release notes. Over time you will notice how much meeting time and empty conversation they save. As a bonus, there is no more small talk in between.

Writing public release notes is also more complicated. It often involves humor, company branding, special styling, and polished visuals. Internal release notes are like the first pancake you cook. It always turns out ugly, but it is just as delicious.

Who prepares internal release notes?

Technical writers usually prepare release notes together with other teams, such as marketing, because a release note is a team effort. In most cases, product managers own internal communication as part of product release management. If your team is still choosing its stack, this list of tools for product managers covers the options.

How to organize an internal release notes process

There are two ways to run the process:

• Use SaaS release notes software that supports authentication and privacy. The notes must stay private.
• Create an online document and give everybody access.

Create different release notes for different teams, and categorize each note by what the reader is most likely to care about.

For example, you could break release notes into sections like these:

• New features that could impact them
• Bug fixes that could impact them
• Feature updates they need to be aware of
• New features that could impact them in the future, but not now

Some audiences want detailed, technical release notes. Others only need an overview of how the company is performing. The goal is to give each stakeholder helpful, relevant information.

The rule of thumb: order release notes by importance, and use labels to separate new features from bug fixes.

Then segment your release notes so each stakeholder sees only what applies to them. You could create user segmentation groups such as Development, Marketing, Support, and Top Management, and show each group the updates it cares about most. See segmentation and internal communication for how this works in AnnounceKit.

Pro tip: Send internal release notes to your team by email.

Internal release notes can look like one more unnecessary task. Done right, they save hours of meetings and hallway questions about what changed. A release notes tool can save even more time, and you can automate release notes so the internal version is produced as part of every release.

With AnnounceKit, you can create your own internal private changelog and keep your stakeholders informed about recent changes and improvements.