In our efforts to best serve our clients, we like to poll them both before and after a project, to learn what works, and what we can do better for them in the future. We find it incredibly helpful when they are willing to share their experience and lessons learned along the way, which we are happy to pass along to you in today’s blog (with their permission, of course). Having been awarded United Way of Acadiana’s Creative Partner Award recently (above) for our contributions to their 2014 annual report, we interviewed Jennifer Raggio (left), their Director of Marketing and Communications, about “all things annual reports.” Pictured on the right is Shift Key CEO, Jan Risher.
Q: Why are annual reports so important? What kind of opportunities do they give the organizations?
A: Well, the true purpose of an annual report is to issue your organization’s financial performance to interested parties, but it is widely used to tell your organization’s story. For United Way of Acadiana, our annual report has been a great way to share our success stories and progress toward our goals. It gives us the opportunity to highlight our partners, donors and volunteers and show the scale of our collective efforts. It’s also a great way to tell the stories of those who have been helped by and have benefitted from United Way of Acadiana.
Q: What aspects of your annual report tend to get the most response or feedback — positive or negative — from readers?
A: Different people respond to different elements of the annual reports. People learn or absorb information and stories differently. I guess the lesson there is to have a mixture of good photography, good narrative or stories, infographics, data and graphs. All of those elements can tell a story in their own ways. I have noticed that over time, people are wanting a shorter, less wordy annual reports – something pithier.
Excerpt from United Way of Acadiana’s 2014 Annual Report
Q: What lessons have you learned developing more effective annual reports?
A: One year we “went green” and posted the annual report online-only. We learned that a large portion of our audience missed having the hard copy — sort of like how there are many readers who just can’t switch to the Kindle yet. We would love to get to a place where the annual report is online-only and is digitally interactive with video links/embedded and with some sections being sharable for social media.
Q: You approach your annual report with a real vision. What steps do you take to develop that vision?
A: I’m always thinking about the next annual report throughout the year. I gather content or bookmark special events, accomplishments and stories throughout the year. When developing the vision, I first think about what the audience cares about. I think about the stories they might want to read about, as well as what stories must be told. I also try to research the latest annual report trends. I turn to the whole staff for input and ideas. I hold a brainstorming session with my leadership team. However, as much as I try to develop a vision, I ultimately need to rely on experts like Shift Key to take that vision to the next level and execute it beyond what I might have envisioned.
This article originally appeared in the May edition of our e-newsletter, Beyond the Keyboard.
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