Current Feed Content from 4 Sep 08 10:26
Ogilvy and Formatting Basics
Thu, 28 Aug 2008 23:14:00 +0000Few people, especially my fellow bloggers, are aware of David Ogilvy. And heaven knows that most bloggers could use help with basics such as formatting of their blogs. The founder of Ogilvy and Mather, the biggest advertising agency in the world, David Ogilvy had a lot to say about advertising. Not just philosophical and ethereal ideas either. Mr. Ogilvy was very practical with his advice about advertising.
For example, Ogilvy talked extensively about layouts, typestyle, and headings. These topics form the foundational principles upon which a blog could be built. All content aside, the formatting of a blog is essential for retaining readership.
Take Ogilvy’s principles of layout, for instance. For those new to the term, layout refers to how pictures, titles, headings, and the copy are arranged on a page so as to improve readability. Ogilvy taught that the eye looks at pictures first, then at the headline, next at the caption under the picture, and then the content. So, the ideal layout starts with a picture, which has a caption under it, a clear title, followed by the content.
Ogilvy was also strict about the typestyle. Typestyle refers to the kind of font used. The most general categories for fonts are serif and sans-serif fonts. Serif fonts, such as Times New Roman, include small tags and flags to help join the letters on a page. In contrast, sans-serif fonts, such as Arial, are simple in design and do not include the tags and flags. Ogilvy taught that all content or copy should be in serif typestyle, as his research showed this greatly improves readability.
Finally, headings were of great importance to Ogilvy as well. Headings include the title, descriptive phrases between the title and the copy, and subheadings that break up longer passages of content. Ogilvy believed that it was important to have a title, followed by a short heading, and to use subheadings throughout long passages of copy.
These basics, as taught by David Ogilvy, would serve the modern blogger well. As more and more people turn to the Internet for documenting ideas and research, let’s all hope basic formatting becomes common knowledge and standard practice.noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)The Customer’s Role in Brand Success
Mon, 25 Aug 2008 08:12:00 +0000
Have you ever known someone who tried to come up with a nickname for themselves? You don’t come across people like that very often, but if you have had the honor, or seen this concept mocked in a show or movie, you’ll probably understand the general idea.
And the way this almost always ends is in failure. The person who wanted everyone to call them something specific achieves nothing but convincing everyone not to. After all, other people give you a nickname, and everyone knows it.
There’s a lesson to be learned in this when it comes to branding your company. Now, the example of giving your company a brand name isn’t quite the same, because you will be the one coming up with the logo and pushing the brand concept. The similarities lie in the fact that it will be the public who accepts or rejects your brand name.
You aren’t giving yourself a brand, but offering one to the public and doing your best to get them to accept you. As Lynn B. Upshaw states in the book Building Brand Identity: A Strategy for Success in a Hostile Marketplace, “the brand is actually positioned by the customer. How successfully brand teams can persuade a prospect to positively position a brand depends on how credibly the brand is presented and how relevant the brand benefit is within that individual’s own reality.”
This means that your job is to gain trust from your customers. Every business brochure you print up, or every marketing postcard you send through the mail is going to be attempting to guide the image of your brand name. Your job will be to convince the customer that you can be entrusted with their businesses.
One thing you don’t want is to have people begin to do just the opposite. If customers find you un-trustworthy, or unreliable, you’re going to suffer damage to your brand name.
That’s why you need to back up all of your marketing material with a strong push to define and keep your brand name strong. A full color business card needs to do more than just hand people your name, but push your brand name as well. You need to make sure your brochures or postcards are always reflecting the strengths of your brand.
Branding is not an easy process because of how much rests on the shoulders of your customers. Of course, my point isn’t to try to say you can’t develop a strong brand name, or that you don’t have a strong hand in it. The way you present your company will impact what people think. Every piece of marketing you have printed will give people an impression of your brand.
But a company needs to be aware of the role the customers play in making that brand strong, because if you aren’t focusing on developing a strong relationship with your customers, you’ll struggle to make a good brand no matter how hard you try.noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)Don’t Limit Yourself
Thu, 21 Aug 2008 03:43:00 +0000If it isn’t broken, why fix it, right?
This is the mentality of a lot of companies when it comes to their marketing. We’re getting by with a postcard strategy, or those brochures are generating us enough sales, so why bother branch out into another commercial printing venture.
But while one method of advertising might be working, if you haven’t tried other styles you can’t know that they won’t work just as well, if not better.
Each style of advertising has different advantages and disadvantages. If all you do is focus on one you’re accepting the disadvantages just as much as the advantages, whereas if you used multiple forms you’d be able to compensate for the shortcomings of one form with another.
Take the postcard strategy as an example. Postcards are great at getting a message directly into your customer’s hands, and giving them something they’re more likely to see in the pile of mail. But the drawback is that postcards are meant for short messages. Postcards don’t have the room to explain a longer, more in-depth service.
Brochures are nearly the opposite. They can go into better detail about exactly what services you offer and what those services mean to the customer. They hand people a much longer, more organized message, but then, they require a lot more time and attention to get the message.
If your company offers multiple services, some of which can be explained quickly, while others need to be worked through in greater detail, using only postcards or brochures would stop you from properly advertising both of these services.
On another note, some people simply prefer one style to another. There is a charm to a really nice looking poster that I don’t think I’ve ever really felt from other forms of advertising, especially if the poster is placed in that perfect spot to garner the most attention possible.
Sometimes a postcard just can’t get me as interested as a detailed brochure, and sometimes a brochure takes more of my time than I feel like reading. My mood alone can change which application of commercial printing appeals to me the most.
I’m not particularly unique in this regard, either. No matter how many people you’re sending those postcards to or handing those brochures out to, you’ll never get as many people interested if you’re only using one form.
Start mixing and matching with your advertising to build the biggest marketing plan you can. Appeal to people of all tastes. And I’m sure you’ll find that some forms just don’t work for your particular market period. This will happen, and that’s why you should test each strategy out before going all out.
Dabble in each and see what the results are. I think you’ll find that variety in your commercial printing will lead to much better exposure and sales.noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)What Makes You Special?
Thu, 21 Aug 2008 03:34:00 +0000If you’re opening up a new business there has to be something you feel you can offer people that other companies can’t. If you’ve been in business for a few years than you have to have something you offer people that the competition can’t match.
Do you know exactly what that is?
This is the question you need to know if you want to make the most out of your marketing.
What exactly is marketing supposed to be about? You’re paying for that commercial printing to accomplish a very specific goal: gain more business. But how do you go about doing that? You tell people why they should entrust you with their business.
All marketing consists of you convincing people that you are the best person among all the different competitors for them to hand their business to. But why are you the best person? If you can’t tell a person that they’ll go to the company that can.
Of course, the nature of what you can give to people will dictate the type of marketing you’ll focus on. Take this example: say you’ve been in business for years based on a low price marketing push that says you can give people a better deal than the competition. To accomplish this you’ll be best served by a smaller, shorter style of marketing.
Postcards, flyers, or posters will best let people know you give the best deals. All you’ll likely need to do is show your prices with a comparison to your competitors to best prove that you can provide a better deal.
But if the things you do better involve a more in-depth reason, such as better services provided, a greater selection of products or services to choose from, and so on, you’ll want a much longer advertisement.
Here brochures or booklets might serve you better. Brochures give people an abundance of information on a company and what they can do.
In order to figure out exactly what your commercial printing will consist of you first need to answer that initial question. If you aren’t positive yourself do a survey with your customers to see what they like most about your company. From this information you should be able to gleam what people enjoy most about what you do.
Of course, you can also try to guide this message by focusing on something specific to offer people you know the competition can’t match. This way you’ll know for a fact that you’re able to provide people with something the competition can’t.
No matter what you settle on you just need to be sure that you know what gives you an edge in the market place. A company who doesn’t realize their greatest strengths will fail to properly capitalize on them. Make sure you’re marketing yourself in the best way possible.noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)Shine a Light on Your Achievements
Thu, 21 Aug 2008 03:32:00 +0000What I’m talking about here extends beyond just letting people know about how good your company is. People expect that from you. They know you’re going to pay for commercial printing to send out a bunch of advertisements telling them that they should shop at your company, and that’s exactly what you’ll be doing, too.
But there’s more you can do that goes beyond just telling people you’re good. The point is to let them know through more tangible evidence that you’re successful, because a successful company got that way for a reason. They were good at what they did and they’re sales proved it.
The first method to improve your promoting is obvious but still very effective: testimonials. This is the tried and true means of ensuring people know that you’ve pleased plenty of customers in the past. A strong testimonial does wonders to show just how good you are at what you do.
And those testimonials should be as focused as much as possible on the issues you’re trying to promote most about your company. If customer service is your thing, make sure those testimonials directly relate to your skills at customer service.
Awards are the next way of highlighting your skills. If you win anything be sure to mention it in your advertising and showcase it to the world. I’ve seen plenty of companies who always make sure to mention in their advertisements the awards they’ve won within their industry, and it gives off the image of success.
If you’re company is helping out the local community, or helping out a national charity, add something to your marketing that emphasizes that point. You might simply have a reference in your posters or postcards that a portion of your profits goes towards one charitable organization or another.
Economic growth or success with a certain product is also good for letting people know how strong your company is. Right now the video game World of Warcraft regularly states in its marketing material that it has ten million subscribers. This lets people know just how popular the game is, and encourages them to give it a chance. After all, if so many people enjoy it, there must be a reason.
Do the same with your marketing. Let people know which products are popular and just how popular they are. If you’ve had a lot of growth in a quarter, put that information on your brochures or postcards.
Trust in a company comes from knowing that the company will do the best job it can for you. Being aware of all the other people who are happy with the company is the best way of accomplishing this. Your commercial printing should deal with more than just upcoming sales. You should shine the brightest light you can on your achievements, and start building confidence in your company.noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)Graphic Design Samples: Flyers
Mon, 18 Aug 2008 06:58:00 +0000Because flyers are traditionally a cheaper form of advertising, they aren’t always used to the best of their abilities. People make a page that gives only the basic information it needs to with a simple picture and decide that they don’t have to do anything else.
Part of what adds to this is how often people design their marketing flyers themselves with programs like Illustrator, and because they don’t have as much design experience, they go for the simplest thing they can.
The flyer is capable of being just as visually striking as any other form of advertising. You can add in a strong graphic design nature to your event flyers to make them more eye catching. When I’m handed a flyer on the street I don’t often put much thought to it because it isn’t a very good one most of the time. Instead of handing me color flyers I get a faded, non-descript image that does nothing to gain my interest.
But if I’m given something bright, something colorful, I’m going to look because it’s so much different from what I was expecting.
A website with a decent amount of variety and examples of good flyers is http://www.kristofcreative.com/. The nice part about this selection of examples is the varying nature they supply you. The first three flyers shown all have a stronger, more striking visual aspect to them while still providing plenty of information for a person.
They also have flyers that focus almost entirely on the visual with only a small message on the flyer itself, almost more like the page of a magazine ad than an actual flyer, and by giving it such a quality design they ensure people will have interest in looking at it.
But they also have two flyers shown that have almost no strong visual element and focus entirely on the writing to drive the point home. One of them still uses colors for the borders and titles of the different sections, while the other is in black and white and meant for those on a smaller budget. The black and white flyer still has pictures used in it to help get a person looking at what the flyer has to say.
And, the flyers without many pictures are able to say a lot more. These are best for a context where you don’t have as much of a concern for whether or not people will read them, such as flyers printed up for already loyal customers, where all you need to do is provide them with information.
The choice is up to you as to what kind you choose and what budget you have. My point here is to say that you do have a lot of options out there waiting for you. Don’t think that you can’t make a great, fully colored flyer. All it takes is a desire to.noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)What A Niche Means For Your Designs
Sat, 16 Aug 2008 03:51:00 +0000Niche marketing can have a very big impact on the way you present yourself with advertising. It goes beyond just deciding that, “Hey, I think I’m going to focus on X people rather than everyone else.”
I swear though, I’ve seen some advertisements that were sent through advertising flyers to a very specific group of people, but the flyers themselves were designed as if they were meant to target just about anyone. This means they failed to really build upon what the great part of a niche market can offer.
To go with a niche is to say that, “I’m going to give all of my time and attention to this one, core group of people.” This also means that your advertising can have a level of focus that you just can’t achieve through any other means. Those full color brochures you have printed up should be through and through a product of the niche market you’re after.
So why do companies not bother to do it? Because making a unique custom brochure for one market is a lot more difficult than making a broad, generalized brochure for anyone. And, to be honest, I think some companies just don’t have their heart in it.
They might be sending all those advertisements to one group, but really they’re still going to be courting people from the general public as well. If you try something like this people are probably going to notice and call you on it.
Embrace the niche you’re after and make sure that the defining visual aspects of your advertising are based off of the things that that niche likes.
The visuals are the key to this. A strong visual look is what makes color printing what it is. The word color is in there for a reason, because people like to see colorful and interesting advertisements. But certain colors work best for one group more than they do others, just like certain pictures work best for only some people.
Make those custom brochures as interesting as you can and as niche specific as you can. Go to the people you’re after and ask them about the things that they like. Research is the heart of a strong niche marketing campaign and should never be forgotten.
If you want people to take the time to give you a chance you have to take the time to give them a reason to. All someone has to do is look at the image you’re presenting to know whether or not you’ve really gone to all the effort you could to appeal to them.
You need to make sure that when they do look at your advertising they don’t turn away with a shake of their head because you weren’t trying hard enough. Make them light up with a smile, and pick up your advertising to read more.
noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)The Fine Art of Updating
Wed, 06 Aug 2008 01:47:00 +0000No brand can go without updating. Have you ever noticed a company that was big fifteen, twenty years ago that fell out of popularity, and you realize that they’re still using the same logo and brand image that they were using all those years back?
Society has a way of leaving behind the fashions of yesterday, and sometimes even poking fun at them. When was the last time you took a look at something you used to like and said, jokingly, “How could I have ever liked that?”
What you don’t want is for someone to say that about your company. This means you need to be sure to be aware of the amount of updating you need for your brand name.
Now, this is especially true if you’re designing your own advertising, because you’re going to be in complete control of the image you present to people. After all, your commercial printing is the best way to get your brand name out to people, and if you aren’t keeping up with the times when it comes to the designs you’re favoring, you’ll end up as a thing of the past.
It isn’t hard to recognize color posters that were made during the seventies or eighties, because the look, the colors, and even the word choice are a reflection of the era they were made in. You need to figure out what people are looking for today in order to improve your image accordingly.
Take a look at what other successful companies are doing with color flyers before making some yourself. That way you can get a good idea of what you need to do with your own design to have the most success.
One pitfall to avoid, however, is updating your brand too often. Think about this in relation to a color business card. If you make a new business card every month, people are going to start to have a lot of trouble remembering what your brand name really is. They’ll be getting a constantly updated, slightly different versions of it, until it’ll all blend together and be forgotten.
Judging exactly when you need to update is not easy, and there isn’t any one way to tell if it’s time for your company to try something new. You’ll have to keep a close eye on the market in order to stay connected with what people think.
If you notice a shift in how people perceive your company, it might be time to get some new commercial printing done with a different, updated look.
Maintaining a strong brand can be one of the hardest things a company will do, but the rewards that come with a strong brand is more than worth the struggle you’ll go through keeping yours going.noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)A Primer on Commercial Printing
Fri, 25 Jul 2008 01:58:00 +0000Anytime you start a marketing strategy, one of the key components is your print materials. You need to know what kind of materials you need (brochures? flyers?) who’s going to design them and most importantly, who’s going to print them.
Generally, most businesses don’t have the resources to print their own marketing materials, so they rely on commercial printers. To be most efficient and effective, it’s a good idea to get to know the commercial printing industry.
What is a commercial printer?
There are many definitions of a commercial printer, but the following points are common among all of them:
• Primarily produce print runs of 5, 000 items or more• Produce a wide range of products, ranging from flyers to brochures to billboards
• Provide printing services on a job order basis
• Use lithographic (offset) printing methods (see more about this below)
So basically, a commercial printer is a company that gets paid to print things, generally on a large scale – quantity-wise or size-wise.
How many commercial printers are in the U.S.?The latest numbers state that there are about 35, 000 commercial printers in the U.S. who generate over $100 billion of revenue annually. The largest printer in the U.S. is RR Donnelley. Their largest competitor, Quebecor World, is in Canada. They both have multibillion revenues, but most “large” printers have revenue streams of less than $1 billion per year.
Most of the commercials printers are small and midsized local businesses that have less than 20 employees. Many larger printers are buying up the small guys, so the industry spread is quite uneven. The largest 50 companies eat up about 30% of the market.
Products Included in Commercial Printing
Commercial printing companies produce catalogs, phone books, labels, direct mail pieces like postcards and brochures, promotional materials and corporate reports. Book publishers and magazine publishers are not included.
Services Provided
You can have your pick from four main services when hiring a commercial printer:
• Prepress services, including design
• Actual printing
• Finishing services, including folding, cutting and binding
• Fulfillment services, including packing, storing and shipping
The most common commercial printing method: offset lithography
Offset lithography is based on the principle that water and ink don’t mix. Words and art are put on plates which are dipped in water to dampen them, and then the plates are dipped in ink. The ink sticks to the image area and the water sticks to the non-image area. The image is then transferred to a rubber blanket, and then from the rubber blanket to paper.
The reason this type of printing is called offset is because the image doesn’t go directly from plates to paper.
Those are all the basics you need to know to make an educated decision about commercial printers. There are plenty of other articles out there that go into detail about the printing process and offset lithography. By knowing the basics presented here, you know that when you Google a commercial printer to check out rates, you have many choices. You also know what type of products and services to expect. Now you can make educated decisions about your printing needs.noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)See What Others Are Doing
Thu, 17 Jul 2008 05:28:00 +0000The tricky thing about design is the sheer volume of what you’re capable of. There is no guaranteed right or wrong, and every company out there is going to have their own standards for what it is that they like and don’t like.
If you have a company and you’re trying to decide what kinds of looks are going to work for you, the best way to figure that out is by looking at what other people are doing in order to get a feel for what can be done.
For this entry I’m going to focus on the website www.ddonovandesign.com to give a representations of a more artistic style for color printing
Their portfolio has a wide selection of different areas that they’ve done designs for, and each carries with it different specifics you might want to consider for your design work. If you plan on having a logo designed to make a unique business card you might want to take a look at some of the styles they have.
The logo for The Schott Corporation is a basic yet memorable looking design. It tells you the name of the company, the image beneath the name gives you a nice hint of style and art, and the logo can be blown up or shrunk to any size and still maintain its design.
If you wanted something for maybe a color brochure, they have a grouping of images, which show weather patterns. The reason I mention this isn’t necessarily because of what they show, but for the nature of the images. One shows what looks like a stylized painting while another shows a photograph and yet a third shows a more realistic drawn image. All three have a distinctive look and feel.
If you were planning to buy posters, you might consider these different techniques, along with some of the more abstract images they feature. Consider the three paper stand ups labeled Donovan Design’s, which have a very unique look that you won’t see many other companies using. If you can take something like this and combine it with your color printing you can come up with a truly interesting advertisement people will be a lot more inclined to remember.
As I’ll always say, there are a lot of different options out there waiting for you. I picked this site because it shows a nice variety of styles that are a lot different from each other. They also have some more practical designs for postcards and brochures that you’re more likely to see from a company.
Take a stroll through the web some time and see what kind of sites you can find. I’m betting you’ll hit on that perfect graphic style that will just jump out at you. There’s no better way to find what you like than by seeing what’s out there.noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)Those Ads Aren’t Meant for You
Tue, 15 Jul 2008 23:55:00 +0000Unless you just happen to be apart of the target audience, the odds are against you actually designing an advertisement meant to appeal to you. So why is it so many different people designing so many different advertisements seem to only have themselves in mind when it comes to what they make?
I know someone wasn’t really thinking when I see an ad for a product that I just know should be aimed specifically at me, and yet I don’t get anything out of it. It’s kind of sad when someone in the target audience doesn’t know who it is that you were trying to reach with that color brochure.
That is the mark of a designer who really wasn’t paying attention to their audience, and I see it happen quite a bit. Don’t get me wrong, I understand where it comes from, and it isn’t always an easy thing to avoid.
I mean, when you’re actually sitting in front of your computer with CorelDraw open and you’re coming up with some postcard designs, you don’t have the audience in there with them. You can’t turn around in your chair and just ask them, “Does this image look good to you, or would you prefer something a little different?”
The only person there is you, and so the only opinion you’re able to get is your own. Most advertisements at larger companies are going to go through multiple departments before they end up reaching the consumers, and that means there will be a lot more sets of eyes to scrutinize the work and ask who it is the ad is trying to target.
But for those with smaller companies and a lot fewer people to look at those color posters you made up, you have to make sure while designing them that you’re really considering who will enjoy it the most.
You don’t want to waste money on color printing only to realize that the only person who really likes the ad is you, or maybe a completely different audience than the one you intended. That is a pain I think most people would prefer to do without.
All you really need to do to avoid this is number one, try to ask yourself over and over again, what would the consumers like. What is it about this product that would appeal to them, not me. The second thing is to make sure to show your finished product to as many people as you can before you get that color printing taken care of.
Now you can know what other people think, and know if it’s what you had intended it to be. Only after you know for certain that your ad says what you want it to, and that it appeals to the right people, should you spend the money to get it printed.noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)How to Improve Your Market Share
Tue, 15 Jul 2008 23:41:00 +0000The time will always come for a business to decide how exactly they need to improve their share in the market. If you aren’t doing anything to improve your standing then you might find yourself getting the rug swept out from under you by the competition.
The real issue here is how do you go about improving that market share? When it comes time to get your commercial printing taken care of you need to know what kind of focus to have on your advertising, and this very focus will be connected to how you’re trying to expand your business.
There are two primary ways you can go about increasing your share. The first is expanding your market and the second is trying to steal customers away from your competition.
In relation to the first of the two options, you have to take a moment to step back and take a good look at your market before you make any decision. The truth is that some markets just don’t have very much room for growth. For products that have been around for years, the market is already going to be as saturated as possible, leaving you with little room to expand out. Think about something like the tire market. These days there isn’t much new or revolutionary about the tire market, and there isn’t a lot of growth, but that doesn’t mean a tire company can’t expand.
However, if you’re in a market that is still constantly evolving you’ll have plenty of room to grow. The tech industry is a prime example of this. New innovations are constantly being made and more and more people are buying into it.
So for those in a market that doesn’t have nearly as much room for growth left in it your primary option will be to focus on your competition. In a growing market you can make a viable case with your commercial printing that people should buy from you without having to mention your competition at all. There are enough people for every business, after all, but in a market with little growth you simply need to set your sights on your competitors.
Focus on the ways you’re better than them and what you can give your customers that they can’t. Set up a compare and contrast between your company and there’s to highlight all of the advantages you have.
If you aren’t keeping your eye on them you might face the issue of them stealing away all of your customers because you chose to ignore the fact that you had competition. This also means that expanding in a market that is already fully developed is a lot harder than making your way in a market that is still new and growing, but that doesn’t mean you don’t have any opportunity for growth.noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)The Importance of Understanding Graphic Design
Tue, 15 Jul 2008 23:23:00 +0000Just because you won’t be doing the designing, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t know at least a little about what goes into the process.
Okay, now this comes from experience within the field of graphic design, and I’m quite sure that anyone who has done any kind of design work is probably aware of it. The people I’m going to be talking to here are those who hire people to design different kinds of color printing but don’t know anything about the process.
The reason you should really know at least a little is because then you’ll know more about what it is that you want and what can really be done.
I’ve designed stuff before, but when I showed it to the person who had hired me they said it wasn’t at all what they were looking for. Well then, I asked them, what is it that you’re looking for? I received only vague, largely unhelpful descriptions on what they wanted.
The issue was that they didn’t really know anything about graphic designing. They might want an art postcard, but they don’t know what look, or even what styles are out there.
I’m not saying that everyone should be so well versed they can design things themselves, but it isn’t that difficult to get a basic knowledge of the field. Go online and look at some different samples of brochures or flyers or whatever else you might have interest in. If you want a 4 color postcard, have an example of what you want ready.
Also, it isn’t that hard to get your hands on some basic graphic design software. Search through a copy of Adobe Photoshop and mess around with some of the features. Get a feel for what the program is capable of. Not so you can design one yourself, but so you can ask your designer to do specific things that you know the program can handle.
It’s always easier to communicate with a person when you know a little bit about the job they do. I’ve noticed that every time I work in a certain industry I find it a lot easier to talk to and deal with other people in that industry even if I haven’t worked in it for years. Just getting a feel for what it takes to do a job makes you appreciate it more.
This is so true for graphic designs as well because quite often the person is trying to design something you will like. It isn’t easy to make a great business brochure for a person when you don’t have any clue what they’re looking for. They tell you to just do whatever you think will look good, and then they don’t like what you ended up giving them.
And this isn’t just about making things easier for the designer either. Think about it. If you have to get something made up and you hire someone else, the project will go a lot smoother and things will be finished a lot faster if you can hand them a sample of something similar to what you’re looking for and say, “Make it similar to this.” You’ll get exactly what you want without any time consuming corrections.
If the people organizing these things know enough about it to tell me exactly what they want, I can get to work and take half the time it would take with no direction, and in the end both parties are a lot happier. I know because I’ve been there before.noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)Trade Show Trends 2008
Mon, 14 Jul 2008 21:10:00 +0000Trade show trends change every year. And anymore, those trends require more and more from trade show exhibitors. You can’t just stand in front your booth sign with catalogs and brochures in hand, you need to do more to get attendees’ attention.
Here are some of the latest trade show trends:
Experiential Exhibits
Demonstrations that include attendees just watching aren’t cutting it anymore. You need to provide an experience for the attendees – get them involved with your product and business. You need to create a positive, memorable experience that the attendees will associate with your product.
Basically you need to create a cutting-edge and inviting event for attendees to take part of. Any kind of interactive computer game or TV game show-type of game works best. Lately, the show Password has been revived. You can use this game in your trade show booth by making the passwords the names of your products, or qualities associated with your product. Whatever you do, make sure it’s fun!
Use Fabric to Create Your Booth
Fabric is the new wood. Metal and wood aren’t used as much anymore for trade show exhibits because of their weight and inflexibility. They’re hard to move around and if you need to or want to redo your booth space, you can’t do that very easily with either of these materials.
A popular fabric is the Allure tension fabric banner. These banners come in different shapes and vibrant colors. You can get them in an hourglass shape, or they can curve at the top or bottom (one design reminds me of Gumby’s head. Remember Gumby? The green claymation guy with the head that was slanted to the right?) Anyway, these fabrics are much lighter than wood or metal and are a cinch to put together. Most of these fabric displays are less than 15 pounds for easy portability.
Use Extra Lighting
The lighting at trade shows is generally fluorescent, and not very flattering. Lighting can set the mood for your space – into a relaxed atmosphere or a fun, party type of space.
By using wash lights or filtered lights, you can create a mood that contrasts the glaring trade show lights. Or, you can use spot lights on your products.
Use Testimonials
Use testimonials in all of your marketing materials – brochures, flyers, etc. but it’s also a good idea to show videotaped testimonials. Have a video running on a flat-panel TV that just shows person after person giving your product a great testimonial. TV is always an attention-getter, especially at trade shows where most people only have print materials!
Trade shows can create a tremendous amount of leads, if you use the right display tactics to attract people to your booth. By using one of more of the trends discussed here, you’ll be able to create a memorable experience for attendees that will make follow-up easy.
noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)Your Brand is People’s Impression of You
Thu, 10 Jul 2008 08:22:00 +0000You may think you know what your brand is, but do you really? Your brand is not your logo. It’s not your product. It’s not even your marketing. Your brand is people’s impression and thoughts about you.
Your brand is your business’s personality, and your logo, product, marketing materials, business cards, company name and everything else about your business are just parts of your brand.
Your brand is people’s perception of your company and the experience of working with your company, your employees and experiencing your product. It’s a culmination of all these things.
Your brand defines you, no matter what kind of product or service you sell. The way you build a positive brand image is twofold:
1. Keep your promises. Promises are great, but companies that break their promises aren’t trusted companies. Those are the companies that fail. If you let down a customer once, don’t fulfilling their expectations which were derived from your promises, that customer is not coming back. People trust people; they don’t trust companies.
2. Create awesome experiences for your customers. Awesome experiences can be classified as experiences that go beyond customers’ expectations. When people don’t expect terrific customer service and they get it, or when they have fun every time they enter your store, that’s an awesome experience and enhances your brand in their minds.
You have probably built your brand in many ways without even knowing it:
- If you’ve transferred a customer on the phone to three different people and none of them solved the customer’s problem, that’s your brand.
- If you don’t honor a sale that was advertised on the wrong weekend (through no fault of the customer’s), that’s your brand.
- If your Web site is confusing to navigate, that’s your brand.
How People Create Their Impressions of Your Company
People make decisions on many things in life by drawing comparisons. It’s no different when they are deciding what kind of brand image you have. Even if someone doesn’t know who your competitors are, they’re comparing you to some other company. Here’s a sampling of how people think when it comes to brand impressions:
- The other company called me back the same day. Your company took two days. Your company is lazy and slow.
- I spend over $50 per week at my dry cleaners and I only spend $5 buying a cup of your coffee every Friday. You know me by name and the dry cleaner doesn’t. Your company is caring and attentive.
I could give you more examples, but they’d all be the same: they all have to do with promises broken or kept, and the customer’s experience. These experiences are filed away and used to build up or tear down your brand in people’s minds.
Your brand is a very important component of your business. You should make it a priority to build and protect your brand as best you can. Think about how you think of other companies and their brands. Your perception is all that matters, just as your customer’s perception of your brand is all that matters.
noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)Things to Remember: Business Cards
Wed, 09 Jul 2008 09:09:00 +0000There’s nothing worse than getting involved in something, investing a lot of your time and money in it, and then realizing you forgot some important step that could’ve easily been taken care of if you’d just been aware of it.
My hope is that this basic list of things to be aware of will help make sure that this doesn’t happen with anyone else when it comes to business cards. I know a lot of people like to design their own cards, and more power to them, I just want to make sure they’re aware of what all goes into it. So let’s start.
Info: The first thing you need to know is what you plan on putting on your card. I’ve seen people before who didn’t realize they’d forgotten something important until they’d gotten their newly printed card and noticed some tidbit of info was missing from it. This is a very annoying experience that hopefully you’ll never have to deal with. Take the time to make a list of everything you want to put on the card. Writing it all down should do a good job of getting you to think about it enough that you won’t forget anything.
Design: Do you want something really creative or do you want something that’s basic yet dignified? There is no single best business card design, and each person is going to have their own ideas on what appeal to them most. You also want to keep in mind the industry you’re in. Sometimes the basic look is what people are looking for and what they want. If you get complicated you’ll only turn them away from your card. Only you will know your industry enough to know what people will be drawn to.
Paper: This ties into the design except in a different way. There are a lot of options you’ll have when it comes to the actual paper you use. That is, if you want to use paper at all. Some people use metal, plastic, and so on. You might want a folded business card to give you more to say. Or you might want a thick, double sided business card. Once again, I’d look at everyone else first to get a feel for what people like, but hey, buck the trend and go for something unique if you want to.
Numbers: How many cards are you supposed to order? I put this because a large order can be a lot cheaper than multiple small orders. You don’t want to lose money simply because you didn’t do a big enough order of cards.
These are just some of the things you should consider before you start to print any business cards. As for designing the card itself, if you want to handle that yourself you have plenty of graphic design programs such as Open Canvas to choose from. Find one that works best for you, and get your designing started.noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)Be Prepared: That’s the Boy Scout’s Marching Song
Thu, 03 Jul 2008 06:41:00 +0000Back in the days when I did debate on a regular basis, there was a familiar cycle I’d always go through when each new season started.
As soon as I knew the topic the research would begin. I’d spend multiple hours a day on the internet looking for every kind of article I could talking about the subject matter. It didn’t matter how obscure it was or how meaningless it appeared to be. If someone else brought it up I wanted to make sure I knew about it.
All of those hours of research might be largely meaningless. I might never even bring out sixty or seventy percent of the information I had gathered, but the mere fact that I had it meant I had a wide safety net for if the information happened to come out.
So the question needs to be asked: how prepared are you?
There are all sorts of different things that can go into getting prepared for various business meetings or events. And really, going beyond the set events like trade shows or other meetings, are you prepared for when you meet a random person on the street who might be a good prospect?
These are the question you should be asking yourself.
How you prepare is going to be partially dependent upon the kind of business you’re in. Of course, there are certain principal things that are likely to apply to most industries, the first being business card printing.
Is your card something that says everything it needs to? Is it interesting enough to get people talking about it, makes them want to show it to their friends? Does your card need to be interesting or does your industry prefer cards to be more formal and dignified?
Start answering these questions. Business cards can be a big part of that first introduction people will have with you.
Along with the card comes knowing what you plan on saying. I’ve talked to people who seem to stumble over their words or start rambling on when I ask them about their business. They have too much to say and they aren’t quite sure how to get it all in without boring me to tears.
Think about the back cover of a DVD or book and the description they give of the movie. Can you offer a similar description for what it is that you do for a living?
Keep things streamlined and only about the most important details about your business. You don’t want to go on too long and you don’t want people to be confused.
You might consider also thinking about other key talking points, especially if you know you’re going to be talking shop in the near future. These might be about your company or about how you got into your particular career. Think of it as a job interview.
The things I mentioned here are just a few of the things you can do to be prepared for any kind of encounter. If you plan on going to a tradeshow, do some research about who else is going to be there and what all you might need to know to answer people’s questions.
The more prepared you are the more confident you’ll be able to be, and trust me, people will see it.noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)The Real Question
Thu, 26 Jun 2008 08:40:00 +0000Every kind of color printing no matter what the style of advertising is needs to answer a single, simple question.
Why should people buy from you?
This is what I’m looking for from a company, and I’m guessing this is what you’re looking for from another business. What reason do I really have to come and buy anything from a company? If I’m not given a good enough reason I’m not going to bother shopping there. That’s all it really comes down to.
The problem I have with many advertisements is that they’re more preoccupied with looking great and not enough with answering this single question. It leads me to think that maybe the company doesn’t have a reason for me to buy anything from them.
The delicate balance you face is that you need to make sure that people look at your advertisements. This comes first for the simple fact that if someone doesn’t look at your ad, nothing else it says matters.
Because of this most companies pour the bulk of their advertising resources in designing something that people simply have to look at. They’ll find some kind of image that people will be immediately drawn towards.
It wasn’t long ago I saw a poster at an airport that showed a big picture of a small, cute dog. This company didn’t deal with anything related to animals. The point of the ad was to form a contrast between the company and the dog, but the thing of it is, I can’t even remember what the company did. All I remember is the picture of the dog, which is what made me look over to begin with.
Sure, the cute dog made me look, but what good was it if I walk away without any memory of what the company did, or even the name of the company? I don’t expect I’ll be giving them any business any time soon.
This is a prime example of what I’m talking about. If your color printing is too centered on grabbing a person’s attention without worrying about what the message is once you have that attention you won’t get anywhere. You need to give them a great reason why they want to buy from you.
What this reason is will vary depending on what kind of advertisement you have and what kind of business you’re in. Ask yourself why people should walk into your store and not your competition. If you can’t immediately answer this question than I doubt your advertising will answer it.
Figure this out first and then decide on the kind of images you need to get people to look at your advertisements. The more you try to bury your message behind too many images the weaker your message becomes until people can’t even remember it anymore.noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)Oy! What Catches Your Attention?
Wed, 18 Jun 2008 20:51:00 +0000Is it the words in the ad or the images? I'd say it depends how the advertiser has laid out these elemtents. An image can be attention-grabbing if it's given ample space and of substantial size over other elements in the ad. In this case, images shout more to us above anything else in the poster or flyer. However, sometimes we see ads like "Got Milk" where the text is specially bigger than anything else. And with this latter example we can say that text wins the argument.
But take them both in equal proportion--same size, same color perhaps, etc.-- and it's no contest that images speak louder, faster and leaves more of an impression than words do. Hey, I enjoy a catchy headline just like everyone else, but when I’m flipping through a magazine, it’s the picture that’s going to make me stop and check an ad out. Pictures can just grab people more than words ever can. So it's only sensible that businesses maximize this fact and turn their ad content to visual representations for more powerful and more appealing ads.
But another thing to point put is we don't usually pick up a magazine to look at the ads but also to read about stuff we can use or might even need. The right kind of picture can hook you up to a product or service but text still has the leading hand in elaborating every detail. It's also quite frustrating for the readers if all you can offer them is an image that says something interesting but not exactly everything. Words can bridge this gap.noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)The Importance of a Trade Show Follow-Through
Thu, 12 Jun 2008 06:14:00 +0000Everyone has fun at trade shows. However, not everyone is productive. Attendance at trade shows by representatives of your company serves several purposes. Firstly, it presents an opportunity to solidify your network within your industry. It is often very helpful to discuss common concerns and share war stories with competitors.
Most importantly, trade shows are for generating sales leads. All the wining, dining and schmoozing should end with a large pile of business cards. A trade show presents an ideal opportunity to get your product or service in front of many who would never otherwise see it.
The work doesn't end when you board the flight back home. In fact, the work only begins when the trade show ends. Leads aren't worth the paper the business cards are printed on if they are left to gather dust. Effective and immediate follow up is required right upon your return back to the office.
There are many avenues whereby you can touch base with all the new prospects met at the show. Many companies find post card marketing to be the most economical route. The mailing can be followed up with a subsequent phone call to fully exploit the lead.
Trade shows can be both fun and productive. Key is not to drop the ball after the show ends. Right upon your return back to the office get the post card printing started. Follow up turns leads into sales.noreply@blogger.com (365-Day Ideas)
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