1-888-WOW-1DAY guarantees to paint your house (interior or
exterior) in one day. The Vancouver, British Columbia-based company was founded
in 2010 and expects to have franchises in 50 cities by the end of 2012. Its About
Us page (“Our Company”) is here.
OVERALL GRADE: B
Occasionally we want a hard copy of a web page, to discuss
with the family over dinner or to hand to Grandma. The 1-888-WOW-1DAY About Us page
prints with the icons for Facebook and other social media covering part of the
first paragraph, and the phone number at the left masked by the CEO’s photo. The
same problem occurs with other pages on the site. If it’s too difficult to make
the page print properly, at least offer a PDF of facts and contact information.
Products/Services: A
The summary of the company’s business is brief and specific,
and it’s reinforced by a bulleted list of the important points: well done. The grammar
does need some work: “Instead of enduring 5 days of painting in your home, we
do the same job in 1 day!” Few people have dared imply that being in our home
is so repugnant.
We appreciate when companies send us to favorable news
stories, rather than letting us turn up Google-knows-what. 1-888-WOW-1DAY’s News page offers summaries of
articles about the company and links to those articles, plus a press kit and a
phone number for media inquiries. The page would probably be visited more often
if it were on menus: we reached it accidentally by clicking on the news logos
at the upper right of the About Us page.
Accessibility: C
Since the company name is the company phone number, it
appears on every page. The Contact
Us page is an online form for other inquiries. We’d like the option of
choosing “other” for the subject, and as always, we’d like the option of sending
a copy of the message to ourselves.
Personality: B
The leaders who appear on the About Us page are dressed
in the 1-888-WOW-1DAY uniform and wield painters’ tools: very clever. The bios could use polishing. Brian
Scudamore’s, for example, focuses less on his achievements than on media
coverage of him; there’s a name-dropping feel to it. Another example: Jim
Bodden’s bio mentions that he sold the assets of his company to the Franchisor,
which strikes a legalistic tone in an otherwise casual paragraph.
TAKEAWAY
We’d like to see more work on the details (leadership bios,
print layout), but these are minor. The site is a model of sorts for franchised
companies: it conveys what the company does, gives a sense of who runs it and
under what principles, and makes it easy for potential clients or the press to
get in touch.
Does your Web site’s “About Us” section
accurately convey your organization’s history and capabilities? Every two weeks
we evaluate one example, grading it in three areas that are key to potential
customers: Personality (Who are you?), Products/Services (What can you do for
us?), and Accessibility (How can we reach you?). Contact us if you’d like to
have your site evaluated—there’s no charge and no obligation.
Today’s example was chosen at random;
CorporateHistory.net has no ties to this company.
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