Create a Gorgeous Visual Timeline to Wow Your Clients
The next time you need to brief someone -- be it a partner, co-worker, or client -- on the progress of your project, don't settle for a soul-crushing render of a Gantt Chart in Microsoft Project. Instead, dazzle them with a beautiful timeline that features text balloons anchored to key dates, floating on a pretty background graphic.
That might sound a little "showy," but the timelines you can build at Tiki-Toki are understated works of art. The design is truly elegant.
Here's how to get started: Create a free account and then open a new timeline. You get to set the background image by choosing an image from Flickr, set the start and end dates of your project, and then create "stories" -- text balloons and affix them to particular dates. You can have a decent timeline outlining your latest project in an hour. Each text balloon can be linked to a different site for more details.
Tiki-Toki is clearly not going to replace your project management software, and it's not supposed to. You'll still want to schedule and manage your project in Project, Excel, or whatever tool you already use. But Tiki-Toki's timeline lets you add a bit of flair to the presentations you deliver about those projects.
It doesn't cost anything to create a timeline and navigate it directly from the Tiki-Toki site, but if you want to embed a timeline elsewhere, you'll need to upgrade (plans start at $5/month for 5 timelines and 5,000 views per month). And while the site makes goergous timelines with little to no effort, it still has some room to grow. Quirks abound, like the lack of a date picker (forcing you to enter dates in a rigid format of DD/MM/YYYY) and the fact that you can't upload photos from your own PC, but must instead use Flickr. Despite the shortcomings, Tiki-Toki is a site you should definitely check out if you ever need to discuss project timelines.
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