As greater transparency, more sustainable practices and faster turnarounds are demanded from corporations, online annual reports present themselves as a cost-effective solution. With the rise of the ipad and tablets as portable reading and presentation devices, the days of hard copy documents presented online as static PDFs are numbered. Floate Design Partners together with Carter Digital  are responsible for the online representation of the ANZ Shareholder and Corporate Responsibility Review 2010. The website is the subject of a nomination in Desktop magazine’s Create Awards. Accessible via desktop, ipad and android devices, the site brings annual report data to life for an outstanding user experience.

The ANZ report was created in just under three weeks by the team headed up by Ross Floate, James Noble and Paul Beardsell. Noble has a particular interest in user experience. “The advantage of using an online version is we can incorporate video, as well as audio, as well as making things more interactive.” Organisations which have embraced online reporting, including ANZ and Origin Energy, see the advantage of sharing information with their stakeholders online. “They want to show they are forward-thinking, not only with their shareholders but with getting people to sign up with them,” says Noble. “So you can watch a video or you can leave notes, or if you’ve got something you want to refer back to, you can use the tool box.” The added functionality allows users to keep notes, to share notes with the brands (which are communicated via email) and rate the functionality of the site.

“You can actually collect quantifiable data of what they want, how they want it and why they want it,” says Noble. Distribution can also be tracked more readily. Rather than reports being sent in the mail, an email can be sent with a link to the site, and referrals and popular sections tracked. Sharing tools are also incorporated into the sites, allowing for particular sections to be shared on Facebook and Twitter. “It was nearly all PDF and mail two years ago and three years ago,” says Noble, but he sees the trend towards online reports increasing sharply.  “The massive peak is the first week of it coming out. So, for 2009’s [ANZ] report, the first day was maybe 900 – 1000 people and then the following year, that more than quadrupled because everyone was expecting it.”

The information from the report is completely reproduced in the online version and arranged under tabs, with primary, secondary and tertiary information appropriately arranged in accordion structure, together with data represented in animated graphs. “Every single thing that is in that printed document is on the website,” explains Noble. “That’s what makes us good at this. How do you figure it out? It’s a printed document, it's not like a book that has chapters, it’s very segmented and there are so many different sections to it. That’s the UX [user experience] side of it, encouraging it to be intuitive and easy to follow.” The online version also includes a glossary, which isn’t included in the original report, to make understanding the information accessible to the general public.

Noble sees online becoming the primary form of distribution of reports in the not too distant future, foreseeing an invitation to view the report being sent to key stakeholders before it is released publicly. The result is richer information, greater sustainability benefits, lower costs, and a quicker turn around.

Whilst the frenzy of turning around annual reports has calmed for another year, Noble looks forward to next years round. “It’s interesting and it’s fast-paced and I get to save a few trees,” he says of the work. “When we host it, we do it all on the green servers and there are lower carbon emissions. Big companies have a lot of paper, so we can do some good and we can help the corporate world become more transparent with people like us. Until I started doing this three or four years ago, I would never even have known to think to look to find out what’s going on in that world. It was closed and now you can just press the button and have a look. I like that you can make it cool, make data look interesting, it’s what I do, I figure out how to make something user-centric rather than just documenting.”

The digital reports are increasingly being used for presentations by executives to external stakeholders, using iPads. It's a fast-growing trend, which sees the days of carting kilos and kilos of annual reports and brochures numbered. As more organisations move towards digital presentations of their reports, organisations like Floate Design Partners and Carter Digital are sure to see demand increase.