Ford: Weaving opinions into the web

Clever integration of independent testimonials into an online corporate responsibility report.

The Site

Ford’s group site has a Corporate Citizenship area accessible from the Good Works section highlighted on every page. This is the web version of the Corporate Citizenship Report 2003-2004, and includes a link labelled ‘Voices’. This in turn leads to ‘Ford Voices’, which contains 13 opinion pieces from managers around the group and eight ‘Outside Voices’. These come from a range of people, running from the director of corporate sustainability of a large supplier to the superintendent of Flat Rock Community Schools. All subject matter is related to an element of CSR, such as safety and the environment.

As well as being corralled into a special section, the different Voices pieces are placed prominently within the appropriate area. For example, the Safety section has a link labelled ‘Outside Voice – Avoiding Accidents’ that leads to a piece by a past chairman of EuroNCAP, the safety organisation.

The Takeaway

Ford is using quotes effectively – there is nothing quite like an independent testimonial to underscore credibility. But the real interest lies in the way it is weaving them cleverly into an online corporate responsibility report.

While many companies are now using the web as the primary outlet for such reports, there is still a tendency to create the print version first, then – perhaps – reconfigure it for the website. Ford is clearly treating the two media independently – as witnessed by the slick integration of Voices into different sections of the site while still providing a central area for them. It has accepted something that many companies resist – that neither paper nor web versions should come first: they can draw on the same content, but should be created as separate beasts.

First published on 08 September, 2005