New Year, New Blog

Art courtesy George Arents Collection, The New York Public Library. 
Retrieved from http://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47e4-8261-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99

Starting January 4, 2016, we invite all Blogger.com and Blogspot.com readers -- and everyone interested in corporate history and business anniversaries -- to follow us at our blog's new home, http://www.corporatehistory.net/blog/

The CorporateHistory.net team sends best wishes for a superb New Year's weekend!

Microsoft Stories

http://news.microsoft.com/stories/index.html
Echoes the classic company print magazine but optimized for online reading.

Remember company magazines and employee newsletters? All of us corporate history researchers and archivists have paged through them. They proliferated through the 20th century as the chief means of internal and external communications, and they remain a source of memory-keeping for companies without formal archives or annual reports. These publications were usually quite good, with news and features by top-notch writers (often journos who jumped ship) and strong photography to match. The Microsoft Stories blog is today's version of these mags: the requisite C-suite foreword (Brad Smith's "In the Cloud We Trust" is as long as a keynote speech and may have been one), numerous well-written profiles, and clever cartoons by Hugh McLeod that I particularly enjoyed (example below). Compared to 20th century print publications Microsoft Stories actually goes one better, as it can function as a recruitment tool as well. My only cavil is that it may offer too much of a good thing, at least in one place. The home page scrolls down to offer dozens of articles. I'd rather have a pull-down list of extras to choose from. But, all in all, a great example of corporate storytelling.

From cartoonist Hugh MacLeod’s "illustrated guide to life
inside Microsoft," part of the Microsoft Stories site

 

Turning Customers Into Cultists

Illustration (c) Matt Chase from The Atlantic, December 2014

"Turning Customers Into Cultists" by Derek Thompson ran in The Atlantic and is

well worth a read or re-read. It explains why the release of a new iPhone rouses buyers to "squat for hours outside the nearest Apple store like Wiccans worshipping before Stonehenge" (ha!). Thompson also explores how brands are learning to cultivate identity and community in their corporate storytelling -- not quite to the extent of cult-ivating, we hope.

150 Years at Shaw University

Kudos to Shaw University, the US's first historically black college, on its upcoming 150th anniversary. Shaw has obviously put time and thought into a far-reaching campaign. Business anniversary tip: These key elements, highlighted on a dedicated section of Shaw's  website, are worth emulating:

• Timeline with good photos and visuals
• Invitation to alums and friends to Share Your Story
• Events such as a 150 Voices concert, Bear Witness gathering, Founders' Convocation, and gala dinner dance  
• Blount Street Mural Project in the surrounding community
• Invitation to donate--straightforward, well-written--a must for nonprofits

The only thing that may be missing is a print component. Is there a book or publication to mark this momentous landmark? I'm especially curious because Shaw has been open to all races, creeds, and genders from Day One, a most unusual attribute for a college founded in 1865. (The photo below shows the class of 1907. My own alma mater, Rutgers College, was founded in 1766 but did not admit women until 1972.) Shaw alums include New York State's first black legislator, Edward A. Johnson (class of 1891), pioneering pilot and flight instructor Ida Van Smith (class of 1939), and Angie Brooks, president of the UN General Assembly (class of 1950). 

 

How Authentic Is Your Brand?

Consumers say they want 'authentic' items and brands, but what does that mean? Corporate  storytelling plays a big part in backing up those words. The New York Times makes this point: "You could argue that these stories are a reaction against goods delivered by container from China, to be bought at Walmart." http://nyti.ms/1BdFGfA.  

In the bracingly sardonic style that The Economist musters so well, a November 14, 2015 article by Schumpeter states: "Shoppers at Whole Foods can peruse scintillating biographies of the chickens they are about to casserole . . . . authenticity is far easier to pull off when your product has some real-world qualities that its competitors lack. The most striking recent example is that of America's craft beers." http://econ.st/1Oe5LTc (Illustration copyright 2015 Brett Ryder; it appears with the The Economist piece.)

Your brand storytelling develops authentic muscle when it's based on your corporate history.

 

Stay Tooned for King Features' 100th Anniversary Gift

On Sunday, November 15, King Features Syndicate will celebrate its company anniversary with a fun freebie for US newspaper readers: a 16-page insert featuring KFS strips from Krazy Kat and Popeye to Flash Gordon, Beetle Bailey, Blondie and Dagwood (my personal favorite), Prince Valiant, and dozens more. Business anniversary tip: Could your organization do the equivalent, using its own legacy images and distribution system? 

Better yet, King Features also commissioned a substantial anniversary book, shown above. 

Mainstream cartoons in newspapers have gotten a bit soft in the past decade, but great stuff can still be found in the monthly Funny Times and elsewhere. And, of course, artists/writers such as Alison Bechdel have transformed the genre. Cartoonists with a bite are among the undersung heroes of American culture.

50 Years of Space History in 20 Pages

While space travel isn't my favorite subject, I'm nonetheless impressed with this 20-page publication covering 50 years of what's now known as the Neil Armstrong Flight Center. It came to our attention as a fellow winner of an 2015 APEX Award. The cover is a bit busy and hard to read, but the interior is organized magazine-style. Business anniversary tip: Test your cover for readability at small sizes.
 
Per the APEX Awards judges' review: "This special issue, focused entirely on the 50 year history of the Neil Armstrong Flight Research Center, carries a lot of appeal. Interesting spreads, dramatic, well-chosen photos, in-depth captions — and writers and editors who know how to convey often complex technical and engineering subject matter in a very interesting and engaging way — make it a keeper." 

See the whole publication here: Flight Loads Lab at 50. Congrats to creators Jay Levine, X-Press Editor and Christian Gelzer, NASA Armstrong Historian, Jacobs Technology/NASA Armstrong Flight Research Center, Edwards, CA

CorporateHistory.net now mobile-friendly

We're celebrating our own 10th business anniversary with a fresh new website. Check out http://corporatehistory.net on smartphone, tablet, or good old desktop and tell us what you think. Kudos to our intrepid web designers at cdeVision in Holyoke, MA -- Bill and Antonio, you're the best.

How to Write a Great Website Timeline (Part 3)

History faces tough competition on the Net: when was the last time you shared a website timeline? Before we talk about the details of General Electric’s timeline, let’s note that not only were we intrigued enough to look through each of the 12 pages of the timeline (starting with 1878), but we spotted two items so irresistible that one of our writers shared them on Facebook.

What makes General Electric’s web timeline so great? Let’s look at it in terms of the questions and guidelines in our first post on this topic.

1. Audience(s). The timeline is focused on GE’s spectacular achievements across a wide range of fields, over more than a century. There’s no mention of mergers and acquisitions, but after reading a few pages, we were sorry we hadn’t invested in its stock a century or so ago.

2-3. Major events and structure. If you want a quick overview of the company history, the leading paragraphs of the 12 segments combine to form a coherent story. The breaks in the timeline are irregular (1878-1904, 1905-1912, etc.) - presumably so that major events can be featured in the segment’s leading paragraph.

For those who want more information, the second section -- below the leading paragraph on each page -- offers a series of 8 or more major events in a slideshow of a very superior sort. Each major event has a well-chosen photo and a brief description of the event and its importance. (See #4 below.) The navigation bar beneath each event (with simple, obvious left and right arrows) summarizes this major event in a few words, and states how many events are in this particular sequence. Someone at GE knows how to work with short attention spans!

4. Context. The text for each major event puts corporate history in the wider historical context. For example, from 1913: “GE develops the hot-cathode, high vacuum X-ray tube. By replacing the cold aluminum cathode with the hot tungsten filament in a high vacuum, the company could provide tubes with better control and greater output than had ever been achieved. The development greatly facilitates the use of X-rays for diagnosis and treatment.”

5. Images. The leading paragraph on every page has an image, and so does every single major event. The images are large enough to see, but small enough to flip through easily: a tricky balance to achieve.

Below the leading paragraph and the major events is a wonderful third section: a series of GE advertisements from the period. As a brief history of advertising styles these are great fun. But even better: every single one shows how cutting-edge GE’s products were and still are. (1939: “General Electric Television Receivers! Thrilling reception of exciting events as they happen!”)

6-7. Layout and navigation. The three-part layout for each page of the timeline is easy to grasp: leading paragraph, series of major events, sample GE advertisements.

The layout is the sole point where the GE website timeline has a flaw. The header image is a photo of Thomas Edison, with links to his bio, GE’s research, and GE’s past leaders. On a laptop, this header is so large that it takes up all the above-the-fold screen real estate. We assumed this was due to the fact that the page was designed to be mobile-friendly ... but then we discovered that on a smartphone, too, the header image is so large that the tabs and leading paragraph are pushed to the next screen.

This would barely matter, if it didn’t discourage visitors from finding the excellent content below the header image. Fortunately there’s an easy fix: make the header shorter top to bottom (much wider than its height).

But that’s a minor quibble. Overall, GE provides a great example of a website timeline done right.

How to Write a Great Website Timeline (part 2)

Last week we offered guidelines and suggestions forwriting a great website timeline. This week, CorporateHistory.net looks at the timeline on the website of Pepsico, a corporation that has plentiful resources and more than a century of company history. Sadly, Pepsico’s timeline isn’t spectacular.

Pepsi’s timeline is a single series of dates and events, with the most recent date at the top. A tab option at the top allows readers to skip from decade to decade.

Kudos to Pepsi’s designer for the layout, which is simple and elegant. The font for the years is easy to read, and a vertical line indicates the direction of the time flow. More kudos for the well-chosen and plentiful images. Of the 70 or so entries, 28 have illustrations.

Unfortunately, the text of the entries is subpar. We have no clue which of the 70-odd events are most important in Pepsi’s corporate history. For example, the inauguration of the first Pepsi-Cola operation in China (1982) is immediately followed by Frito-Lay’s introduction of Tostitos (1981). Given this mix of topics, we don’t even know whether the timeline is aimed at consumers or potential investors.

But much worse comes (or doesn’t) at the end of the timeline. Pepsi was founded in the 1890s, but the company history from then until 1966 is summarized in one very short paragraph. Most of that paragraph consists of names of CEOs, rather than storytelling. There’s not a single image. What a waste of a great history! If people have been loving your product for over a century, why not flaunt that fact with vintage ads, logos, and photos?

Next week, we’ll see how another major corporation handled its website timeline. (Hint: much better!)

How to Write a Great Website Timeline (Part 1)

Like a well-written corporate history, a well-written website timeline can be a great marketing tool: it can set your organization apart from its competitors, let you brag a little, and tell your story in a way that makes your company memorable. In decades of writing corporate histories, we’ve created dozens of timelines and looked at hundreds more. (For some examples, see our blog posts tagged with “web timelines.”) In the next two weeks, we’ll look at the website timelines for two corporations that have more than enough resources to make wonderfully effective timelines ... But did they?

Here’s CorporateHistory.net’s series of questions and guidelines for writing a great website timeline.

1. Consider your audience(s). Will your readers be your clients or possible investors? In other words: will they be more interested in your products, or in your mergers and acquisitions history? Consider separate timelines, if appropriate.

2. Use major events as centerpieces. Given your target audience, what are the six to eight major events in your company history? Make sure these don’t get lost in a barrage of less important data.

3. Build story into the structure. Given that website visitors have notoriously short attention spans, can you make your timeline a connected story? A series of problems and solutions? A brief history of a niche subject, with your company in a starring role? A humorous escapade, like Kentucky Fried Chicken’s timeline narrated by Colonel Sanders?

4. Layer in larger timelines—maybe. Do you want to keep readers laser-focused on your company, or will you set your company’s achievements in the wider framework of science, business, politics, or pop culture? Will your framework be your company, your community or industry, the United States, or the world?

5. Add images and captions. What will you use for visuals: current or archival photos, logos, advertisements? Any item with an image will get more attention than an item with only text. Captions will get more attention than text. Choose your visuals and captions accordingly.

6. Strategize the structure. Will you have one long timeline, or split it into or sections? If sections, what are the best divisions? Decades are easy and obvious, but if your major achievements came in 1932, 1939, 1955, and 1959, consider breaking the timeline in a way that gives those dates get more attention. Don’t forget to mark business anniversaries!

7. Make navigation easy. Is the layout easy to understand? (In July, we commented on Boeing’s bafflingly complex timeline.) If you’re using tabs for sections of the timeline, can readers see that option on both laptop and mobile screens?

Next week, we’ll analyze how one major corporation handled its website timeline.

Easiest Marketing Tip Ever

For marketing purposes, the end of one month equals the next month. Today is September 30, and in the past three days I've received five marketing e-newsletters dated "September." "Yikes," I think to myself, "these folks do run late and are desperately playing catch-up." But if they'd changed the date on the masthead to October, I'd think, "Congrats, these folks are on top of things by issuing their newsletter a few days early." 

So what if changing the date means skipping a month? Get out in front of your marketing instead of falling far behind it.

This advice applies in spades to corporate history. History doesn't happen overnight and it can't be reconstructed overnight. Business anniversary books, websites, timelines, and campaigns take time to develop. When your organization has a milestone coming up in a year or two or three, allow plenty of lead time. Your project will go more smoothly and it will cost less.

Graphic Design USA Award for CorporateHistory.net's BAYADA Book

BAYADA history book at company's annual Awards Weekend. Clients extraordinaire!
Left to right: BAYADA manager Janice Lovequist, author Chris McLaughlin,
editor/publisher Marian Calabro, and BAYADA senior associate Stephanie Smith.

Thrilled to report that BAYADA: 40 Years of Compassion, Excellence, and Reliability, created and published by CorporateHistory.net, is a winner in the Graphic Design USA Health + Wellness Awards competition. Honors went to just 125 of the 1,000+ entries. Kudos to art director and production manager Chris Reynolds, who embodied excellence and reliability through many long nights and right up to the press run; the pros at Penmor Litho and Riverside Bindery, who fussed over every detail down to the curves of the debossed dove’s wings under the book jacket; author Chris McLaughlin, a model of dedication; and our phenomenal clients, including the awesome Baiada family and ace in-house project runners Janice Lovequist and Stephanie Smith. Thank you for letting us tell your story!

Fred Harvey: Rise & Fall of a Pioneering Brand

What does a corporate historian do for summer reading? Mine included Stephen Fried's fascinating business history Appetite for America: Fred Harvey and the Business of Civilizing the Wild West--One Meal at a Time. (The subtitle is a bit overstated. There were native civilizations in the west for millennia; they just weren't WASPs like British immigrant Fred.) It was named one of the 10 best books of 2010 by both The Wall Street Journal and the Philadelphia Inquirer, yet it might well be difficult for such a book even to find a mainstream publisher today. The level of detail is exhaustive.

The hospitality company that bore Fred Harvey's name really did pioneer "the chaining of America" well before Howard Johnson, McDonald's Ray Kroc, and all the other chains that now proliferate. The company is best remembered for its female employees, fictionalized in a novel and an MGM musical with Judy Garland. I enjoyed learning about them via Leslie Poling-Kempes's The Harvey Girls: The Women Who Opened the West (1989), a narrative built around oral histories done in the 1980s. I'm looking forward to downloading a one-hour Harvey Girls video by Assertion Films (2014), cover shown above.

How sad that the Fred Harvey Company never produced a corporate history. Nor did the execs or heirs invest in proper archiving. Chunks and bits of Harvey history are scattered across histories of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, physical locations, and numerous websites. Too many of the latter yield "Page Not Found" error messages -- including, inexcusably, that of Xanterra, the conglomerate that now owns the Harvey name and the historic Grand Canyon South Rim holdings. There's a nod to Harvey on Xanterra's one-paragraph About Us page, but that's all. What a wasted opportunity! Commandment 3 of CorporateHistory.net's 10 Commandments of About Us Pages: Reveal Thy Personality.

Happy 100th, National Park Service

For its 100th anniversary, the U.S. National Park Service has erected a handsome if glitchy centennial web portal. Readers can delve into: 

• Stories of individual parks (Find Your Park)
• Future plans (Building on Success) 
• Visionary Leaders (such as environmentalist Marjory Stoneman Douglas, shown above with a feline friend; Douglas's book, The Everglades: River of Grass, published in 1947, describes "the natural treasure she fought so hard to protect").
• and a call to action (Get Involved); this is always a good idea, especially for a perennially underfunded institution such as NPS

Unfortunately the centennial page's back button seems to lead to dead-end error messages. And NPS would benefit from a clear link to a separate batch of wonderful organizational stories. Last but not least, why no Timeline? Maybe it's in there, but we couldn't find it. Business anniversary tip: Honor Commandment 7 of our 10 Commandments of About Us pages, namely Keep Navigation Easy.

Airline Visual Identity

From "Airline Visual Identity
1945-1975," Callisto Publishers

Can your organization tell its story in a single image? For inspiration, look to Airline Visual Identity 1945-1975 by M. C. Huhne, new from European fine arts publisher Callisto. The book costs $400, but consider that the trim size is 12 x 16 inches. As we like to say at CorporateHistory.net, a book is not truly a coffee table book until it's the size of a coffee tables. Also, per Callisto's website: "To reproduce the outstanding work of that era as precisely as possible, a total of 17 different colors, five different types of varnishes, and two different methods of foil printing and embossing were used, resulting in a book of exceptional vivacity that highlights the state of the art of today’s printing technology."

A 17-color print job! This is no mere business history. Instead it's the visual chronicle of an industry in a golden age of transportation and design--truly a historical timeline. 

Happy 75th, Col. Sanders

Colonel Sanders is out of retirement after 21 years. KFC has given him a cool new 75th anniversary website of his own, in which the Colonel (at six stages of his life) talks about Cuban donkeys, strums a mandolin, and of course fries up some chicken. The animatronics are cute, with SNL alum Daryl Hammond playing the Colonel. Business anniversary tips:
1) It's refreshing when the Founder as Great Man is presented with a sense of humor.
2) It's fun to have a person or character narrating the corporate timeline.
Great work by agency Wieden+Kennedy.

L.L. Bean: “About Us” Evaluation by Corporate History.net

L.L. Bean was founded in 1912 in Freeport, Maine, by Leon Leonwood Bean, to sell a single product – the “Maine Hunting Shoe.” The company now has about 5,000 employees, and annual sales of $1.61 billion. Its headquarters is still in Freeport, Maine, and it is still privately owned. The main About Us page is Company Information.

OVERALL GRADE: A

Products/Services: A minus

The Company Information page looks at first like a raging bore: long, dense, and with headings that are less than enticing (“Current Corporate Information,” “Products,” “Manufacturing,” etc.). In fact, however, the page is great corporate storytelling. It explains what the company does, and where and why and how. As a series of bullet points this sort of information would be unreadable. It’s fascinating here because we’re given a backstory (for example, the reason behind each expansion) and provided with several engaging quotes from past and present leaders of the company.

One quibble: many people read on their phones, where it’s easy to be interrupted and to lose one’s place on a very long page. A simple solution would be to split this page into separate pages for Products, Manufacturing, etc. – with copious links between pages, so that visitors would still be guided to read them in a certain sequence. Our Commandment 6 of About Us pages is, “Honor thy visuals.” Shorter pages on a specific topics could be made even more interesting by including photos from L.L. Bean’s century-long history.

There are numerous, excellent photos on the timeline, 100 Years and Counting. It’s cleverly compiled so that reading the blurb on each decade gives a visitor a short company history. The focus is on L.L. Bean, Inc. – as it should be - but enough national events are listed to set the context. There’s even an option for customers to share their own L.L. Bean stories – a great idea. Unfortunately, during our four visits to the site, the interactive aspect wasn’t working, so we’re not sure we’ve seen all of it.

High marks to the Newsroom page, which puts company press releases front and center, but has a sidebar, “As Seen In,” with links to products featured in sources as diverse as Redbook, Elle, and Field & Stream.

A downgrade: Yes, the company commissioned a centennial anniversary book, entitled Guaranteed to Last: L.L.Bean's Century of Outfitting America, by Jim Gorman. (CorporateHistory.net was not involved with it in any way.) Alas, there’s no reference to it on the history pages. To find it, we had to enter “book” in the product search box. If you’re still selling your corporate history book, why not make it easy to find?

Personality: A

The Company History page is also long, dense, and excellent. It begins as the story of an outdoorsman with wet feet, and tells how he solved the problem with the original “Maine Hunting Shoe.” Bean’s early trials and tribulations – 90 of his original 100 pairs were returned – establish the company’s dedication to quality and customer satisfaction. This is business history at its best.

Quotes from the founder and from later leaders liven up the text, as do occasional fascinating factoids. We learn, for example, that by the 1930s, L.L. Bean’s mail-order business comprised more than 70% of the volume of the Freeport post office, and that the flagship store has no locks, because it’s open for business 24/7.

The list of awards at the end of the Company History page would get more attention if it were on a separate page, with logos, but it’s great to see so many confirmations of L.L. Bean’s status collected in one place.

In a lovely change from celebrating one’s centennial and then forgetting about company anniversaries for 10 or 25 years, the Company History page ends with highlights of L.L. Bean’s centennial year. Here you’ll find quick bullet-point references to the aforementioned centennial book, as well as the timeline—but these should be hyperlinked.

The Leadership page is top-notch. Why? Because the bio of the founder and his three successors all focus on the values that drive them as leaders of L.L. Bean, and on the results they achieved there. Even the philanthropic activities and hobbies mentioned reflect the values of the company: for example, membership in the Audubon Society and the Nature Conservancy. Our Commandment 3 of About Us pages is, “Reveal thy personality.” We’ve seldom seen that done better than on L.L. Bean’s site.

Accessibility: A

How many times have you flinched from phoning a company’s Customer Service line because you were worried that the representative wouldn’t be able to speak English? L.L. Bean’s Customer Service page begins with a characteristically forthright note: no matter how you communicate with the company (there are options for Phone, Call Me, Chat, Email, and more), you’ll be speaking with a person in Maine: “because Maine is more than just an address – it’s part of who we are. It’s tough winters, Yankee ingenuity and a unique character you just won’t find elsewhere.”

TAKEAWAY

Your company may not have the size or the hundred-hear history of L.L. Bean, but it’s unique in who founded it, where it’s been, and where it’s heading. Make your About Us page reflect that uniqueness with great content, well told.

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?). To talk about your About Us page, contact us!

Today’s example was chosen at random; CorporateHistory.net has no ties to this company, although we have been satisfied customers for years.

Healing History

Belated kudos to Communication Design Inc., which produced the marketing materials for the Healing History conference hosted by Initiatives of Change USA in Richmond, VA. In CDI's words, "The theme of building bridges became the basis of a cohesive brand identity centered around an iconic illustration of diverse figures working together to support a common cause--crossing a great divide." 

The conference coincided with key anniversaries of landmark civil rights events: the Emancipation Proclamation, the end of the Civil War, the Selma to Montgomery March, and the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Given the truly momentous events that have happened since the conference -- the tragedy of Charleston and the removal of the Confederate flag by South Carolina and other states -- the importance of the Healing History effort takes on added urgency.

Dockers: “About Us” Evaluation by Corporate History.net

Dockers, established in 1986, is the division of San Francisco-based Levi Strauss & Co. that’s devoted to khakis and casual accessories. It’s a leading brand of business casual clothing for men and women. We were curious to look at Dockers because it’s part of a larger company, but has its own brand. The main About Us page is here.

OVERALL GRADE: C minus

The biggest flaw in this set of About Us pages is that we found them via a Google search, and can’t find a link to them on Dockers’ own site.

The main page has two headings, each with a distinctive tagline: Our Products (“Well-crafted comfort to help conquer the day,” with links to pages on size and fit) and Our Company (“A rough and tough work ethic is deeply rooted in our family tree”). Below these are links to Contact Us and Careers. It’s a simple, clear layout that works almost as well on a desktop as on mobile. (In fact, these pages are among the least offensive mobile-friendly pages we’ve seen, in terms of layout, because the header images are much less high than wide. Hence on a desktop screen, they don’t fill all of the prime above-the-fold real estate.)

Products/Services: A

Under the Our Company heading on the About Us page are links to About Levi Strauss & Co., History and Heritage, and Social Responsibility.

About Levi Strauss & Co. has a pithy statement linking the current brand to the long corporate history of Levi Strauss. One minor glitch: this opening statement says the first blue jeans were created in 1853. Further down the page, under “Our Values,” the “Originality” blurb gives the date as 1873. Our Commandment 9 of About Us pages is, “Worship clarity.” An error such as this leaves the impression that someone isn’t minding the details.

The Timeline (“History and Heritage”) is good corporate storytelling. It focuses on the long history of khaki pants at Levi Strauss, then offers nostalgic glimpses of pop culture (Seinfeld) and advertising history (“Nice pants!”). Haute couture and culture are represented by names such as Alexander Wang and Vanity Fair. Each timeline entry has an intriguing headline, a short blurb, and an archival image – all large enough to see easily. Having done a timeline or two ourselves (such as this one for California’s State Compensation Insurance Fund) we appreciate the design and content of the Dockers example.

Personality: D

The Timeline is excellent for showing where the company has been, but not for showing what its current goals are. No information or links are given for the company’s leadership. Mentioning Levi-Strauss as a parent company doesn’t fill this gap, since there are no links to Levi-Strauss’s leadership team, either.

Accessibility: E

The Contact Us page (accessible via the main About Us page or the Help link in the footer) is elegant in layout but quite confusing. The options are “Find a Store” or “Get Help.” Clicking “Get Help” sends us to a page with the options “Contact Us,” “Send Feedback,” “Find a Store,” or “Top Reads” (a FAQ). But clicking either “Contact Us” or “Send Feedback” takes us right back to the Contact Us page. So in fact, the only ways to reach Dockers are via the 800 number in the footer and the online email form that is (we eventually noticed) below the fold on the Contact Us page.

Our Commandment 8 of About Us pages is, “Remember to make yourself and your organization easily accessible.” Dockers, do you really want to hear from us?

TAKEAWAY

Have a fresh pair of eyes (or two or ten) look at your About Us pages for obvious errors, including whether those pages can be easily discovered and whether visitors to the site can contact you easily.

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?). To talk about your About Us page, contact us!

Today’s example was chosen at random; CorporateHistory.net has no ties to this company.