 Is your company story building business—or boring?
A company history or backgrounder is pretty much a requirement these days, whether for your website, a tradeshow piece, a prospect leave-behind, to accompany a press kit, or all of the above. Whether you’re writing it for your own company or another’s, remember that telling the company background is merely the overt purpose of the backgrounder. Its real raison d’être is to build credibility and support business development. Keeping this in mind will keep you out of the rabbit-hole of self-indulgence and cloying detail. Let’s dive into some best-practice pointers, then, shall we? Consider the audience. If you’ve been reading these posts for a while, you’ll recognize this refrain, and either groan or smile. But it’s the underpinning of all communications. Before you begin your backgrounder, think: Who will read this? Who might they pass it on to? How many ways will it be distributed? In what context? On your site? In a press kit? At trade shows? What will accompany it? Consider the versions. Given your answers to the questions above, you may need more than one. Which is fine. It’s like fine-tuning a resume for different audiences. You might have different “consumer” and “trade” backgrounders, tailored to each audience. Do the hardest one first. Then use it as the basis for the others. Dig. Before you begin, scour your sources and find all previous versions. Unless you’re the sole founder of the company, you may be surprised by what you unearth. Build. Depending upon what you find, you may need to create a “knowledge bank” to keep your facts straight/ferret out redundancies/catch discrepancies between versions/facts, etc. Update. Find everything that’s out of date in the material you’ve found. Get help from knowledgeable sources to do this. Organize. Once you have your knowledge base created (especially helpful for complex histories), you can organize it into “digestible chunks,” simply for your own reference, such as “Humble beginnings,” “Early growth,” “The big merger,” etc. Use a Word doc, an Excel sheet, Evernote, a bar napkin… whatever works for you. Consider the length. This gets back to the audience: How much do they want or need to know? You can probably write volumes about any company (especially your own), but you must keep in mind the audience’s attention span, and what they want to accomplish by reading this. Will a reporter need to write a quick one- or two-sentence overview? Will a prospect want to be convinced of your company’s staying power during trying times? This will help you cull the “keeper” points from your list. Structure. Generally, inverted pyramid works well, i.e., if someone only reads or uses the first paragraph (or stops at any point in your backgrounder), they’ll still be well-informed. In other words, don’t save big information for the end, since it might get skipped. There are some subtle exceptions to this rule: High-end brands, for example, will often take a more philosophical/teasing/tone-setting opening to “set the stage.” Break it up. Longer backgrounders/histories can benefit from subheads, which make them less intimidating and scan easier. Don’t make the subheads obvious or redundant (e.g., “First warehouse opens”); rather, make them teasers that invite the reader to discover what’s next (e.g., “A surprising success”). End with a call to action. Don’t ever think you don’t need one. If someone has read the whole thing, invite them to contact you. Give them a reason to. Never pass up this platinum opportunity. Consider getting help. Very few people sit around writing corporate backgrounders all day. Since you may not get much practice at it, it could prove harder, or more time-consuming, than it should or could be. You can save time, and rededicate yourself to core activities, by enlisting professional help. The results will be the best you can get, and the investment will pay strong dividends. Contact us and let’s get a quote in your hands.
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