6 Steps To Design Effective Brochures
6 Steps To Design Effective Brochures
This could happen after you see a brochure from another business (maybe a competitor) and you think “I need one of those too”.
Usually the first thing you will do is visualise what it will look like. How big? The colours? Where will you put your logo?
Stop right there! Colours and size of the brochure should be among the last things you consider.
If you want to create truly effective brochures and marketing material, follow these six steps.
1. Define Your Purpose.
Why should your prospect choose your business? What is their problem? What action do you want the reader to take? You need to have a distinct purpose for your brochure. Focus the content on answering the key questions your prospects will have.
2. Define your Audience
Hand-in-hand with Defining Your Purpose, you need to have a clear picture of who your audience will be. Segment the market to make sense of the different types of clients – try to picture the type of person you are writing for. Identify what they need to know. Understand what else they are reading. That is, review samples of competitor communications for style and content.
3. How Will Your Customers Use Your Brochure?
Is your brochure to introduce a new service? Is it to provide technical data? Is it to generate sales via a ‘fax back’ order form? Remember to focus on the action you want readers to take. The content and design should support that objective.
4. What Is The Message?
Make sure the text (also called the ‘copy’) of your brochure uses strong sentences, that are easy to read. Avoid using clichés like: “Latest equipment”; “Highly trained staff”; “xx Years of experience”. Focus on the benefits you can provide. And make sure you use an attention-grabbing headline. Headlines can make or break a brochure.
5. Which Format?
The size of the brochure must be sufficient to communicate your message. Clearly this will vary from business to business. Common sizes are A4 (nearly US letter size); A5 (half of A4); DL (common business letter size); or as a stand alone insert, sometimes with multiple pages.
These page sizes can be folded to create multiple panels, such as folding an A4 page using a tri-fold to create a DL sized finished item.
6. What Will It Look Like?
Now you can consider the paper stock, colours, type styles (fonts) used, and the use of ‘white space’ to make the brochure easy to scan and understand. Never use more than 3 different font styles, and keep the size at 10pt or above. Be aware that using reversed text (like white words against a dark background) can be difficult for people to read.
Remember - The ultimate outcome of your brochure is to get people to take the action you desire. Design your brochure to achieve that purpose.
6 Steps To Design Effective Brochures - To learn more about this author, visit Stuart Ayling's Website.
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Have you ever decided you need a brochure or other piece of printed marketing material?
This could happen after you see a brochure from another business (maybe a competitor) and you think “I need one of those too”.
Usually the first thing you will do is visualise what it will look like. How big? The colours? Where will you put your logo?
Stop right there! Colours and size of the brochure should be among the last things you consider.
If you want to create truly effective brochures and marketing material, follow these six steps.
1. Define Your Purpose.
Why should your prospect choose your business? What is their problem? What action do you want the reader to take? You need to have a distinct purpose for your brochure. Focus the content on answering the key questions your prospects will have.
2. Define your Audience
Hand-in-hand with Defining Your Purpose, you need to have a clear picture of who your audience will be. Segment the market to make sense of the different types of clients – try to picture the type of person you are writing for. Identify what they need to know. Understand what else they are reading. That is, review samples of competitor communications for style and content.
3. How Will Your Customers Use Your Brochure?
Is your brochure to introduce a new service? Is it to provide technical data? Is it to generate sales via a ‘fax back’ order form? Remember to focus on the action you want readers to take. The content and design should support that objective.
4. What Is The Message?
Make sure the text (also called the ‘copy’) of your brochure uses strong sentences, that are easy to read. Avoid using clichés like: “Latest equipment”; “Highly trained staff”; “xx Years of experience”. Focus on the benefits you can provide. And make sure you use an attention-grabbing headline. Headlines can make or break a brochure.
5. Which Format?
The size of the brochure must be sufficient to communicate your message. Clearly this will vary from business to business. Common sizes are A4 (nearly US letter size); A5 (half of A4); DL (common business letter size); or as a stand alone insert, sometimes with multiple pages.
These page sizes can be folded to create multiple panels, such as folding an A4 page using a tri-fold to create a DL sized finished item.
6. What Will It Look Like?
Now you can consider the paper stock, colours, type styles (fonts) used, and the use of ‘white space’ to make the brochure easy to scan and understand. Never use more than 3 different font styles, and keep the size at 10pt or above. Be aware that using reversed text (like white words against a dark background) can be difficult for people to read.
Remember - The ultimate outcome of your brochure is to get people to take the action you desire. Design your brochure to achieve that purpose.
6 Steps To Design Effective Brochures - To learn more about this author, visit Stuart Ayling's Website.
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Kim CastleWith nearly two decades in the advertising and design business, with clients like Domino's Pizza, General Motors, Direct TV, Pedigree, Wolfgang Puck, Higher Octave Music, Hollywood Celebrity Products, Disney, and Paramount, as well as thousands of entrepreneurs around the world define, structure, communicate, and position their business for greater profits, BrandU(R) co-creators Kim Castle and W. Vito Montone discovered that entrepreneurs could experience the same power that big brands command for a fraction of the cost with the world's only process-based results-drive Integral approach to business creation. BrandU(R) is helping entrepreneurs grow with the power of extreme clarity from idea...to brand...to market(TM) and helping one million entrepreneurs become successful and whole so that they can make a difference in the world. Are you one of them? If you want to experience clarity all the way to the bank(TM), get started now at http://www.brandu.com. - Visit Kim Castle's Website |
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Staging DivaDebra Gould, aka The Staging Diva®, is President of Six Elements Inc., an internationally recognized home staging company. Inspired by many requests from aspiring home stagers wanting to start similar businesses, Gould created the Staging Diva Home Staging Business Training Program. Gould has trained over 1000 Staging Diva Graduates worldwide to start staging businesses. Buying decorating and selling six of her own homes in four years lead to an interest in real estate staging which she turned into a career with the launch of sixelements.com in 2002. Since then she has staged hundreds of homes in addition to teaching home staging training. Gould is the author of several home staging resources including a series of popular ebooks made up of a Design Guide, Color Guide and Portfolio Guide. For more information about Debra Gould visit stagingdiva.com. - Visit Staging Diva's Website |
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Stephanie RobeyStephanie Robey is President and CoFounder of Pivot Positive, LLC - an Internet marketing business focused on helping people start work at home ventures. Previously, she was employed at The Search Agency with over 20 years experience in graphic design and 10 years experience in online marketing. She was responsible for launching the Conversion Path Optimization (CPO) unit where she and her team have conducted hundreds of optimization tests for online companies across multiple verticals. She is a successful entrepreneur having started and sold 2 companies and remains on the board of directors of the third, PhotoSpin.com Stephanie began her career in the direct marketing realm creating and producing direct mail for many of the major cable television companies and directly attributes her understanding of Internet marketing to those early offline experiences. Stephanie is a graduate of San Diego State University with a BFA in Graphic Arts and also holds an Executive MBA from the Graziadio School of Business and Management at Pepperdine University. Read Steph's Blog Meet Steph and Dave Sign up for our Free 7-Day BootCamp: Self Employed & Rich - Visit Stephanie Robey's Website |
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