McGraw-Hill: Knowing what they know

A warning not to assume that visitors will know what you know when it comes to in-house references.

The Site

McGraw-Hill, publisher of Business Week and various education and financial information services, has detailed profiles of its titles and services in a Capabilities mini-site accessed from the About Us part of its main website.

The featured menu when the mini-site opens includes a ‘Message from Terry McGraw’. This is a streaming video of an introduction to the company by its chairman/president/CEO. However, both the caption to the video ‘screen’ and the on-screen titling identify the speaker as ‘Harold McGraw III’, while the menu continues to highlight the heading ‘Message from Terry McGraw’. None of the biographical material on either the mini-site or the main site refers to the chairman/president/CEO as anything other than ‘Harold’ or ‘Mr’ McGraw III.

The Takeaway

McGraw-Hill’s apparent confusion over the identity of its leader is not the proof-reading blunder it at first – and embarrassingly for a leading business publisher – looks to be. A search for ‘Terry’ or ‘Harold’ McGraw on Google will quickly establish that they are one and the same person. In magazine articles or reports he is frequently introduced as ‘Harold “Terry” McGraw III’, an indication that he is widely known to friends, colleagues and contemporaries by the more colloquial name of Terry.

Presumably this knowledge goes without saying within the company, and the fact that ‘everybody knows him as Terry’ has created a blindspot on the website. The awkward double-take this provides for the many site visitors who are not this familiar with the company can easily be rectified by a simple edit of either the ‘Message from…’ heading or biographical material and captioning.

But under whatever name, the message for everyone is not to assume that visitors to your site will know what you know when it comes to in-house references, be they to personnel, products or practices.

First published on 02 August, 2005