Annual reports take a lot of work. Sometimes it seems like a good idea at the time to skimp on them to save time and resources for more “meaningful” needs. But today we want to make a case for annual reports.
If you haven’t caught wind of it yet, we think annual reports are extremely important. They not only set the tone for your organization’s success but they also foreshadow what the upcoming year might look like. At the very least, they set expectations for your upcoming impact.
But perhaps most importantly, annual reports showcase your credibility to current donors and gives them reason to stick around for another year. And that, my friend, is reason enough to invest in a good annual report.
Yes, these bad boys demand a lot of work in research and writing and design, but they deserve a job well done since they’re the one full piece that shows your donors annual evidence of everything that you have accomplished with the help of their resources and partnerships.
At the same time, annual reports don’t have to be made up only off long, windy write-ups. They can be fun and colorful. They can be short. They can show the top-level view rather than the buried-in-the-weeds detailed view. It all comes down to knowing your audience and figuring out which format, style and tone works best with them.
Here are just a few examples that we really love:
1. Mailchimp’s 2016 interactive digital report
2. Another digital report chronicling Kickstarter’s 2016 year
3. This clever print report from Podravka
4. A print report on Austria Solar that is powered by the sun.
As you can see from the examples, an annual report doesn’t just have to be an 8x11 print desert of text with a few dots of graphs here and there. They can be interactive, colorful and showcased in different ways beyond just traditional print.
Here’s a few keys to a good report:
- Make it interactive. Interest the reader in the numbers and the happenings of the organization. For example, if you do youth camps, include the number of s’mores consumed during the camps and send a personal s’mores package along with your annual reports.
- Provide a variety of versions. Some people want print versions; others want digital versions. Why not provide both or more? Here are just a few of the ways that you can provide your annual report to your donors and followers: traditional print version, online PDF download, video, digital version (bonus points if it’s interactive!), postcard version showing the best highlights or an email comprised of your top highlights from the full report.
- Keep the numbers simple. Don’t go overboard in what you provide to your audience, especially if you go digital. You can always follow the Kickstarter model and include the option of clicking through a certain part of the report for more information rather than listing everything right off the bat. Give people the bird’s eye view of your year.
Here’s our last little tip that makes annual reports ten times easier than before:
The ease of creating an annual report all boils down to ease of access to your donor data. How easy is it for you to pull reports, compare campaigns and measure different kinds of growth and success? We think it should be incredibly easy and only require a few clicks of your mouse for you to get the data you need. Because with all the hats that you’re already wearing, you don’t need to be wasting time figuring out how to make sense of your donor data.
That’s why we created Donor.com. It’s easy to use and comes with all the reporting you could ever dream of! Schedule your demo today and see just how good donor development can be!
