Being a marketing communications manager is never an easy job, especially if you join a company when it is time to prepare its annual report. The first concern was that my new company left it to me whether to opt for a print version or go digital only.
Since, in my view, printed annual reports were required in marketing to serve as a corporate brochure, I asked a leading design to print agency to come for a meeting and discuss my needs and expectations.
I was pleasantly surprised by their positive attitude, enthusiasm to know about our company and quick understanding of what I wanted to highlight in our annual report. But it was when they showed me an annual report of B.R.N.L that they made last year that I felt really excited.
What shook me was that, in spite of being a printed annual report, it was moving as it had Augmented Reality (AR) embedded in it. The interactive component caught my mind and I was convinced to go for a printed AR embedded version of it. After all, the amalgamation of two mediums will always deliver better results than one. As a marketing tool, it would also have the essential wow factor.
I wasn’t very sure about which paper to choose. Honestly, I did not have enough information regarding the options available. Left to myself, I would have chosen some regular paper but then the agency recommended some different types of paper that felt quite premium at only marginally higher cost. We finally opted for Mont Blanc paper.
My boss is very particular about the content of any document, and when it is regarding such an important document as an annual report, any mistake on the content, was simply not acceptable. Fortunately, the agency was quite meticulous and headache was reduced to some extent. Inevitably the design of the cover page had to go through various iterations but the Board passed it eventually
Everything was going great and the annual report was nearly ready. In fact it was scheduled to proceed for printing in a couple of days when the agency executive pointed out that the Chairman’s speech was missing. To my horror I learnt he has gone for a holiday. Instead of a speech I got a lecture!
There was all round panic. Since the chairman was in no mood to write speeches in the middle of his holiday, we had to work out the draft internally with the agency copywriters. Whatsapp messages flew back and forth, and finally we got his approval and the page was made ready.
Thankfully, there were no goof ups in printing and it came out exactly the way I saw on screen. The added AR element was mind blowing, to say the least. Most people did not know that an annual report could be interactive, and my colleagues were quite stunned by it.
Now, was the time for my real test. Will the chairman be happy with the end result? I left a copy of the annual report on my boss’s table and waited for his feedback. As the hours went by, all possible flaws sprang to my mind. Finally, at the end of the day, I was summoned.
There was a big smile on his face. The chairman had liked everything, starting from the design, the inside pages, the content, the choice of papers, the embellishments to the binding. But what swayed him completely was the AR embedment.
Those five words “Great job, proud of you” was a bigger reward than the promotion I got a few weeks later.
If you are a product manager or a marketing communications manager, you can relate to almost everything I said. And, if you ever have sleepless nights about how to get the annual reports done perfectly, contact Anderson Printing House.