Given an annual report is sent out to many relevant people, and used later by sales people and on the company website, it is more than a list of financial figures and should be treated as a marketing tool. However, I am also aware that many people see ‘annual report’ as a title and put it aside ‘to read later’ or just throw it out – often without even opening the envelope to see it. ARs are often perceived as boring  and/or propaganda by the general population.

At a very basic level, what if you cut up some interesting bits and incorporated easy mechanisms into the page (Feedburner options et al like Twitter, Digg etc) that allowed readers to share the content.

There has got to be an opportunity here – sharesville, anyone?

The AR used to be much more important than it is now, in the age of the Internet and Sarbanes-Oxley, and week-over-week retail sales reports. At least, its less important for what we all understood was the intended audience for it — stockholders, investors and Wall Street.

One certainly can argue for a wider communication that can be used by salesforces, employees, retirees, etc., but does it have to be as complex and expensive as your usual annual report? How would you measure the effectiveness of such a piece?

Now, if you want to move that sort of robust and interesting content to the Web, including multimedia, I think you’re on to something (though the commercial printers would curse my name for making such as suggestion.)