In this digital world, one might expect printed anything to be passé at best, if not outright obsolete. But printed stationery design is still a not only a thing: it’s a necessity. Digital stationery isn’t a replacement but an addition to an individual’s or a company’s list of corporate identity needs. I have branded and rebranded 50+ large and small organizations nationwide, including full print and digital stationery.
Brochures and hand-outs share many aspects with other effective marketing design pieces. They’re similar to flyers in that they are left behind to catch viewers’ eyes. They’re like sales sheets in their capacity to convey a lot of detailed information and a clear call-to-action. They can act like hand-held posters or oversized business cards in their eye-catching simplicity. Since they’re sturdy and cheap to produce, they should be part of any smart marketer’s tool kit.
Brochures
Beyond the obvious production considerations, brochures require unique design planning when it comes to where and how they will be displayed. If handled correctly, brochures can be a very power vehicle for your offerings and for awareness of your company.
Handouts
The main differentiator between handouts and flyers is that handouts are frequently handed directly to a prospective customer. However, in cases when they aren’t, they still need to stand on their own.
Let CMD design your brochures and handouts so they can do the job they were intended to do: to convert customers from “prospective” to “paying”.
Postcards and flyers differ from other types of advertisement in that they often will be viewed “cold”, meaning they won’t be handed directly to a prospective client—besides band promotion and protests —but be viewed without introduction or context. So these special designed pieces can be more of a marketing challenge than most other types of advertisement. The designer must communicate a clear, engaging message that resonates with its targeted demographic before the viewer instinctively flicks it into the trash.
Postcards
Yes, postcards are still useful, effective marketing pieces. Admittedly, it’s a numbers game, but it’s an arguably good investment because you know that your advertisement will be in the literal hands of your prospective customer. And since postcards are cheap to produce and mail, they start to look like a very attractive marketing option.
Flyers
Like postcards, flyers are a numbers game. They can be sent but are more commonly placed strategically where the highest number of eyes from your target demographic are ensured. However, marketing using flyers presents two additional challenges postcards don’t present:
You’re competing against any other flyers in the area rather than against the other pieces of mail as postcards do. So there are potentially more competitors; and,
Since you’re competing for viewer’s eyes, you’re design for viewer attention. But this must be achieved tastefully. The temptation may be to go bold and garish, but doing always compromises corporate identity. It’s like wrapping the organization in a skimpy club dress: it’s not the type of attention they need. Use of white space and simple messaging does a better job, if only by standing out from the other bad designs near it.
Event/Holiday Card Design
Cards are similar to brochures and flyers, but the feelings around them are usually friendlier. They’re less “marketing”—at least at first glance. It’s important not to get lulled into thinking card design is a complete design reprieve. Though it may seem like it in this case, there’s always a marketing angle to any design, and cards are no exception. The only meaningful difference between brochures, flyers, and other print advertising and cards is that the former are overt and are intended to build sales, while the latter are subtle and intended to build good feelings…which, like it or not, is aimed ultimately at building sales, even if only in part. At the very least, cards are a method of communication that touches the soft underbelly of business. If only out of sensitivity to this vulnerable position, the tone and message of a card design should be taken as seriously as any other design project.
Let Company Man Design protect your corporate identity and deliver your message.
Graphical elements are usually graphics that are functional, utilitarian, or supportive in nature. That is not to say they are unimportant. They are the backup singers, the hidden heroes, of the design world and should be given the credit (attention) they deserve.
As the hidden heroes of graphic design, icons, icon sets, graphs, charts, decorative touches, and data visualizations bring clarity and interest to whatever environment they’re placed, whether for web or print.
Header text is fine, but how much time can be saved by distinguishing text blocks of similar subject matter with carefully crafted or selected icons? How much clearer is data presented in a chart or graph? How much easier is it to communicate a potentially complex process with a detailed illustration or infographic?
If your content is running on or you’re detecting a lag in user/viewer interest, or if you’re having a difficult time simplifying your product, process, or concept to a client, maybe it’s time to consider value-added graphics. Maybe it’s time to consider Company Man Design.
Billboard Design: Special graphic design considerations
At a glance, billboard design appears to be a seems simple task. But that is an illusion. And there are considerations unique to billboard design at every point in order to achieve that illusion of simplicity—while marketing, during design, and throughout production.
These facts apply to any designed piece:
The time required to adequately take in a design—to comprehend its who, what, and how—is directly related to the design’s simplicity and logic of its layout; and,
Viewers only act on what they take in.
Billboard design is especially vulnerable to this truth.
The Who, The What, And The How
On average, viewers have 5 seconds or less to take in billboard details, so they must have ultra-simple designs—simpler in fact than business cards. A viewer can take in about three design elements in five seconds. These are almost always the company name/logo (the who), the message (the what), and the call-to-action (the how).
The Company Name/Logo
It’s beneficial to speak quickly about the importance of a clear, simple corporate logo design. If viewers spend half or more of their time deciphering all the layered detail of a complex logo, there’s little time to get to the other two important elements. They’d know who the client is, but miss the message or how to engage—the what and how.
The Message
All that billboard space can lead one into message bulk. “Well that’s part of my message, too.” “Seems like we have plenty of space for , too.” “How about we add…” are common requests, even understandable, but they should be seen for what they are: temptations into the Forest of Ineffective Design.
Imagine you have only 5 seconds of battery life to tell your rescuer how to save you. Would you ramble like an auctioneer, trying to get in as many details as you could quickly. Maybe, but you’d be wiser to include only a couple key details in as clear a fashion as possible. The same is true with billboard design. Rather than filling the space edge-to-edge with information, it’s wiser and more effective to limit the message to one thing whenever possible—one service, one special, a short pitch. And that one message should itself be ultra-short:
Fun for the Whole Family
Free Drink with Fill-Up
Best Mexican in the County
Next Stop 50 Miles
Free Estimates. Always.
The Call-To-Action
The call-to-action is what the viewer needs to do to become a customer. Like the message, it needs to be singular and concise:
Phone number
Web address
Exit 250 / 1 mile
Stop In. Next Exit.
Since this unique ad space is expensive and because attempts are being made in every market nationwide to phase it out, let Company Man Design concept, design, and deliver your attention-getting, effective, and targeted billboard.
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