Marketing Manner

When designing your brochure, be sure to take into account the type of font you use. Different fonts are more appropriate for certain types of brochure printing projects, and choosing the right font for your message will not only make your brochure more appealing but also more noticeable.

There are several versions of Garamond; Adobe Garamond is the most popular. It is an easy to read font that is great for brochures with a lot of text.

Trajan is great for brochures having to do with history or religion. It would also be perfect for any dramatic brochure printing message such as one describing a movie or play.

Futura is often used in a corporate setting. It is very geometrical and modern looking — great for communicating forward thinking.

Frutiger is somewhat geometric in design, but not as much as Futura. It is a very reader friendly font that was designed so that each character is easily recognizable. It would be great for a less formal brochure printing piece.

Helvetica is another easy to read font. It is very popular with graphic designers for all purpose brochure printing projects.

Continue reading »

Advertising is important in creating your brand presence, but a strong brand is more than a name and a logo: it must generate an emotional bond with the customer to keep them coming back. It must be memorable enough to gain the attention of potential customers and differentiate it from other brands. What is it about your brand that is special? Why should a customer choose your brand over others? Your advertisements should build and then communicate these things to the customer. A strong brand should seem relevant to the lifestyle of the customer to keep them coming back even after they have made an initial purchase.

Continue reading »

Brochures are everywhere; you can’t get away from them.  Every store you go to has them on their counter.  Every time you open your mailbox, two or three of them fall onto the ground.  Salesmen hound you in the mall (or, even worse, at your doorstep) trying to shove another brochure into your hands.  

Still, as annoying as those brochures may be, they do indeed play a role in our business culture.  Otherwise, why would there be so many of them?  Would companies continue to create brochures if they did not work?  Probably not.  So if you own your own business, you certainly need to look into creating and printing brochures of your own.  If you don’t, you are missing out and allowing all of those other companies to gain a competitive advantage on you.  

Be careful, however, that you don’t simply make up a brochure just for the sake of doing so.  You want to be absolutely certain that the brochure you create is one that will do its job, which is to spark interest in the reader.  To do that, you will have to avoid the common mistakes that companies make when they print their brochures.  Let’s take a look at some of them.

Brochure Printing Mistake Number 1: Getting too Fancy

Sure, bright and colorful brochures draw attention.  And there is no reason not to include full color in your brochure, since doing so is no longer an expensive venture.  But be careful not to overdo it.  When it comes down to it, customers want to see substance over style.  The colors and designs will draw them to the brochure, but it’s the content that you include inside that will close the deal.

Continue reading »

Every company needs an Internet presence and marketing plan. A company without these marketing strategies is a company that is missing out on valuable opportunities to reach a nation or world-wide customer base. Even for those businesses who only want to keep their customer base small or local, an Internet marketing plan gets them in touch with the perfect customer they may otherwise never have come across. A dynamic website design, the use of search engine optimization, social marketing, and even print media are all a part of making your presence known on the web.

Dynamic Website
The design of your website needs to be professional, which is why many businesses opt for a web designer. A professional designer knows the current trends for website design and can combine these trends with the image you want to portray. If you are a do-it-yourselfer, you can build your own website, but be sure to keep some design tips in mind:

• Keep it simple – most websites today are leaving a lot more white space around text and images and breaking up text into columns for readability purposes.
• Use large fonts – the larger your headline font, the more quickly customers will notice it. It should be noticeably larger than the rest of your text, including any subheadings.
• Include vivid, bold images – the more attractive your graphics, the more attractive your website will be. 3D graphics are very popular, as well as enhanced photographic images.
• Study your favorite websites – get inspiration for your website design from those that appeal to you the most. Not sure where to look? Check out these 16 Sites for Web Design Inspiration.
• Use tutorials – especially if you are a beginner with web design programs, using a web design tutorial will help you get the professional look you need.

Search Engine Optimization
Even if you design the most attractive website out there, no one will find you if you don’t show up in the first few pages of Google or Yahoo. Getting your website to meet SEO standards requires more than can be discussed in this article, so your best bet is to hire a professional. Or you could teach yourself some of the basics and at least get the ball rolling until you can afford to hire a professional. Many free SEO tutorials are available and provide both the information and tools you need to get started.

Social Marketing
Keeping up with your customers through social marketing sites builds strong loyalty. Social marketing helps your customers feel like you are there for them no matter the time of day. Posting regular articles through Facebook and Twitter updates customers regularly in regards to your company. Any relevant useful tips are also great posting material. Starting a blog and allowing customers to leave comments allows them to feel involved in your day-to-day operations, and builds a relationship with your customers.

Print Materials
What, exactly, do print materials have to do with Internet marketing? Everything, in a sense. Even if your business is solely Online, you have to have business cards to hand out at business conventions or to the prospect you meet at the grocery store. Even brochure printing, flyers, poster printing, or any other print media will help spread the word about your website. If you have an office or storefront, advertise this information on your website, and advertise your website on print media. This technique gets you more results for your marketing dollar.

In short, no online presence equals an old-fashioned appearance. Keeping your company image updated with current marketing trends will show that your business can handle your customers’ needs more efficiently than your competitor who barely has a working website.

With the advent of the spell check tool in Microsoft Word and now in most blog applications online, it seems that more typos are turning up than when copywriters had to edit the old-fashioned way. Today, we see writers relying too much on spell-checking tools and completely skipping good ole’ manual editing, resulting in many typographical errors both in online and print advertisements.

The problem with too many typos and consistent grammatical errors is that people won’t see you as the professional brand of excellence you claim to be. How many people do you think believed the Stratford Hall Catalog when it mispelled a word right on the front cover of their printed catalog, “Reliability…always upholding the highest standards for every detal.” It’s downright embarrassing.

Sometimes you may use the wrong word completely, but the wrong word spelled correctly. This happened to the student newspaper from Brigham Young University when a front-page caption referred to leaders in the Mormon Church as “apostates” rather than “apostles.” The newspapers were pulled from the stands as quickly as possible, as you can imagine. Blog and Twitter updates, brochure and catalog printing – any marketing piece that holds too many grammatical or spelling errors can give your brand a bad reputation.

The “Typo” in Spellcheck
Because the spell checking tool is only programmed to alert you to words it doesn’t contain in its “memory,” it won’t let you know when you’ve used the wrong spelling of the word, such as “it” and “it’s.” Nor will it let you know when you’ve missed a letter and typed a completely different word altogether, such as leaving out the “o” in the word “hello.” And as with the catalog printing mistake mentioned above, spell check does not catch when you unknowingly use the wrong word. Even worse, it doesn’t let you know when your message implies the wrong meaning. Without thorough editing, it can be easy to let such errors slip through, only to show up blatantly after you’ve already printed a thousand posters.

Tips for Better Editing
Here are some methods you can use for a more thorough editing of your writing. Combine the use of at least three of these methods for the best results.

• Continue to use spell check, as this tool will quickly eliminate the most basic spell errors in your document.
• Use the grammar check tool in your word program to help you catch basic grammar issues.
• Wait to edit your article after putting it aside for awhile.
• Read the article out loud while editing.
• Have someone else proofread your copy.
• Print the article to edit it one last time before sending to your printer or posting it.

Bottom line: don’t rely solely on the spell check tool in your word software. Take the time to edit everything you write for your brand, so that you don’t end up with a newspaper caption or tagline for your catalog printing that gives readers the wrong impression.

The concept of a print and mail service is simple: you send a digital ad file to a company that will print and mail your ad, usually along with many others to make up a packet of ads, and the company will use their own mailing list for your ad. Bam! – thousands of new clients, just like that. You pay them one fee and they do all the work. If you use a few services at a time, you could potentially mail your ad to thousands of prospective buyers within weeks.

Sounds good, but unfortunately, it doesn’t work quite that smoothly.

Many print and mail companies don’t have a high level of return on the offers they churn out. I say churn because these companies often take as many advertisers as they can without care about the quality of the ad presentation. That means that you’d have to reach tens of thousands of people to get the same return on your offer that you would if you mailed out your postcard or print ad yourself. If you get a 3 percent return from mailing your offer by itself, you can expect to get about .5 percent return if you use a print and mail company, and oftentimes it’s even lower than that.

Why Such a Low Return?

The reasons for the low return rate are speculation from many differing Web sites and marketing experts. No one has done any official research into why the print and mail companies have such a low return rate. Here are a few reasons:

They have a non-targeted mailing list. For products or services that only a chosen population needs, a print and mail company’s list won’t do just because it’s not targeted. The list might be geographically targeted, but that’s about it. The mailing list is one of the most crucial, if not the most crucial, part of a successful direct mail campaign. Your ad can’t do any good if you don’t get it into the hands of the people who are likely to be interested in it.

Poor quality materials. Many print and mail companies use the thinnest paper they can and don’t use quality inks or quality printers. Many of the ads come out looking amateurish or even worse, smudged from the printer.

Double-sided printing. To cut costs and make a bigger profit, many print and mail companies will use double-sided printing, with two ads on one piece of paper. This makes the consumer have to choose between the two ads if there are coupons on each side: which one will the consumer give up? There’s a good chance it’ll be yours unless your product or service appeals to everyone, which is pretty hard to do.

Dishonesty in number delivered. There is no way of knowing if the company actually sends out as many ad packets as they say they do. If the company says it’ll charge only $3 per 100 ads sent out, how do you know that they are actually sending out 100 ads? Many companies cut costs and pocket profit by sending out a smaller number of ads than promised.

With all of these negatives associated with print and mail services, it’s smart to research the company before you hand over any of your hard earned money. Your best bet is to look for complaints on forums and Web sites and to compare the price of the print and mail service with the separate prices of using an online printing company (which is generally cheaper than an offline printing company) and mailing the ads yourself. It might take some time, but time is money and you don’t want to waste either element.

When a customer or prospect calls your customer service department to get some information, is your first gut instinct to say “Thanks for the call. Let me send you our brochure for more information.”?

But is a brochure really the best answer for a service-based business? Not always and here’s why.

When a prospect contacts you, this is a great chance to show your knowledge and understanding of your industry and your services. By speaking with the customer directly, you can help your customer make a more informed decision about your services. With service-based businesses, developing trust with your customers is crucial to the success of your business. Customers must feel as though you know what you’re talking about. Customers don’t want to get service from a Joe-Schmoe who doesn’t seem to know what he’s talking about.

Brochures are often about the “why” and “what” of a product or service. A brochure does not invoke trust.

Brochures are also too hard to fill with targeted info. If people just want prices and not detailed product descriptions, is pretty hard to fill an entire brochure with just prices.

What can you use instead of brochures?

Marketing a service-based business requires more thought than a product-based business. You don’t have a product to show, but you can show before-and-after results of your service, and you could give out handy info that customers are most likely looking for. Also, by giving customers info they’re looking for, you become a trusted expert, which helps bump that trust level up more.

So instead of a brochure, or in conjunction with a brochure, give your customers:

• A fact sheet: a 1-page sheet on why a certain problem occurs and how you can fix it.
• An informational sheet: a 1- or 2-page sheet that gives facts about your company, including success stories, history, testimonials and maybe even case studies. Only include info that the customer will want, not facts that will simply toot your own horn.
• A checklist: a list of all of your services, broken out into categories of when which service is needed to help customers determine which services they really need now.
• A folder or postcard with important info related to your business jotted on it. (An accountant could put tax rates or important tax dates on a postcard for customers to keep handy.)

All of these alternatives to brochures are less expensive than printing brochures and you can customize all of these for each customer easily. By creating a fact sheet for each type of problem you can help with, you send out only those fact sheets that people need.

By using these informative alternatives to brochures, you’ll be trusted by your customers and seen as an expert. Brochures have their place, but in service-oriented businesses, brochures can’t be your only marketing piece. When someone needs more info on a specific problem, you can impress that prospect by sending her just the specific information she was looking for.

When you think of tourism, you think of brochures. Right? When you go to a tourists’ center or a visitors’ center in a new town, the first thing you’ll see is a big rack of brochures. People don’t want to spend time in a tourists’ center – they want to get out and about and look at a brochure as they’re on their way to the tourist destination.

You must plan your tourism brochures to focus on one place, feature or region – trying to cram 12 sites into one brochure won’t allow sufficient space for the destination details and benefits. Don’t lose money by short-changing your tourism brochures. Be aware of the mistakes you need to avoid to create good brochures:

Mistake 1: Making your brochure your only sales tactic. A brochure should be part of your marketing plan; it shouldn’t be your entire marketing plan. You still need a Web site as well as other sales materials, like sales letters, postcards and flyers. Get your marketing materials to your prospects while they are still at home, mulling over where to go on vacation. Your brochure coupled with your sales letter and a visit to your Web site is much more convincing than just your brochure alone.

Mistake 2: Not using headlines. People skim brochures. Only a small percentage of people actually read all of the words in a brochure. People look to the headlines to guide them to the

competition. Give people a reason to stay with you over “the other guy.” Do you include a breakfast info they want. If the headlines don’t have the wanted info (or if there are no headlines at all), the person will throw away the brochure. Give the reader clear, enticing headlines to point them in the direction they need to go.

Mistake 3: Only listing a few of your destination’s attractions. If you don’t include a complete list, the reader will assume you don’t have that attraction. If your site includes a pool and an entrance into a lake, include both. Family members may have different preferences – a couple people prefer the pool, others prefer the lake. Don’t take it for granted that people will only want one or the other. Don’t clutter your brochure with attractions, but do include as many as you can. Using short, clear descriptions formatted in a bulleted list is an easy way to include a lot of info without overwhelming the reader.

Mistake 4: Not telling people how you differ from your competitors. You need a unique selling proposition (USP) that sets you apart from your buffet that no one else does? Do you have free transportation to a destination that others charge for? Be sure to let readers know. If your customer service has earned awards that none of your competitors have won, play that up in all of your marketing materials. That’s a great USP right there!

Mistake 5: Using text only. You have to use photos in a tourism brochure. There’s just no way around it. People want to see where they’re going. They want to envision themselves at the destination. You know the old cliché about what a picture is worth; clichés are clichés because they are true. Don’t make this important mistake. This could be crucial to your sales, so always include a photo.

1.       Keep it interesting.  Obviously, your readers are not going to like your newsletters much if you throw in a bunch of junk material.  Make sure you use fresh and interesting content in each and every newsletter printing campaign that you send out. 

2.       Write short articles.  While all of your newsletter content must be interesting, it also should be short.  The simple fact is that most people have very short attention spans, especially when it comes to advertising literature.  Write short, interesting articles that your readers can digest quickly.

3.       Use some interesting visuals.  As important as the words are within your newsletters, the visuals are just as important.  Add some visually stimulating images that will attract the readers.  Be careful not to overdo it, though.  Too many images will simply overwhelm your readers.

4.       Organize your newsletters.  Make sure you design your newsletters in an organized format.  Use headings and subheadings, lines and bulleted lists.  Keep everything structured.  If you allow your content to look disorganized, it will confuse your readers and make you look unprofessional.

5.       Utilize lists.  Bulleted lists are easy for the reader to see and read.  If you can put some of your content into list form, it will really stand out to your readers.

6.       Offer free advice.  If you can add in some advice for your customers, and make it relate to your company in some way, your newsletters will be more effective.  People like to read things that help them improve some area of their lives.  This is especially true if you can offer money making advice.  That is always in demand.

7.       Make white space your friend.  A lot of businesses try to fill up every millimeter of available space when they design their newsletters.  Do not make this mistake.  White space is what makes the pages readable, so do not be afraid to leave plenty of white space in there.  Leave some room between all of the portions of your newsletters, and it will be much easier to read.

8.       Calendars are nice.  If you can add some type of calendar to your newsletter, it will make it more useful for your readers.  If you write a monthly newsletter, simply throw in a month-long calendar and list business related events on it.  Many of your readers will use the calendar for their own purposes, meaning your newsletter will be looked at quite often.

9.       Don’t forget the offers.  Every one of your newsletter issues should include some kind of benefit for your readers.  Include a special offer or a coupon or something that will make reading the newsletter worth their while.

It’s easy to get carried away when it comes to advertising.  As business owners, we want to put as much information as we possibly can into every piece of marketing material that we produce.  But that can be dangerous and, even worse, counterproductive.

I am going to run through some of the most common forms of advertising literature, and explain why simplicity is so important for each one of them.

Brochure Printing

Yes, brochures are expected to be packed full of information.  But it is very easy to overdo it.  Try to focus on just one or, at most, two aspects of your business that you are trying to convey to your target customers.  If you are trying to get the word out that your prices are better than those of your competitors, keep the emphasis of your brochures on that topic.  Do not stray into a lot of other areas, and keep the design of the brochure relatively uncomplicated, too.

Postcard Printing

Postcards are nifty little tools because they are ready to mail and you can really do a good job of reaching target customers with them.  However, because there is not a whole lot of room on a postcard, it is especially important to keep things simple.  Do not try to add too much information to your postcards.  Be straight and to the point.  Customers can be quickly overwhelmed by too much advertising info, so be careful not to do that to them.

Business Card Printing

Now, it is a good idea to make business cards that stand out from the crowd and look unique.  But, at the same time, avoid giving the customer information overload at all costs.  It is fine to have a somewhat outrageous business card design, but keep the content on them to a minimum.  At most, they should display your business name, personal name, and a few forms of contact information.

Media Ads

For this, I am talking about radio and television ads.  If you can afford to run an ad like this, you certainly do not want to waste that money by overloading your listeners or watchers with too much information.  Again, pick one of two aspects that you are trying to emphasize with your advertisement, and stick with them.  Television watchers will quickly ignore a commercial that tries to do too much.