How about a favico-style icon in front of certain links? Say, Windows icon for Microsoft links, that kind of thing. Kind of like this:

![Thingy][1]

 [1]: http://sysadmin1138.net/images/mickysoft.png

Oo! I know! Some kind of animated lightbulb whenever anyone has "any [thoughts|ideas]?" in a message. We get that a lot.