For new businesses, printed advertisements can still be just as effective as online or digital marketing campaigns. Plenty of professionals realize this fact – but too few of them know how to use it to their advantage. Here are some tips when you design a printed ad for your start-up:
Color Scheme
Even if this fits perfectly with the sleek, cutting-edge logo you’ve just had designed, resist the urge to print with light text on dark background. The whole point of a printed advertisement is to ensure that your products or services end up on the desks of your potential customers. Use color schemes that go easy on the eyes, usually dark text on a light background.
A Bold Headline
Your ad needs to display a prominent headline, the first thing a potential customer reads. Make sure that it’s succinct, yet detailed. In a single sentence give your audience a clear idea of what it is that you offer.
Positivity & Glamour
Your new business might be lucrative, but it might also be boring. Most people do not want to read about your fresh new business start-up. While you should always be truthful in the headline and content, you should also glamorize what your new business does. Use positive phrases as headlines, rather than matter-of-fact statements.
For example: Supplying cement to construct buildings. ‘Six Ways ABC Cement Can Save Your Construction Project’ reads a lot more positive than ‘ABC Cement Is Good for Your Building Project’
Be Wary Of Images
A picture is indeed worth a thousand words. However, when designing a printed advertisement, do not throw in an image for the sake of including an image. This may damage your advertisement’s effectiveness. Use images that are relevant to the offer or the message you are trying to put across.
Clarity Is King
Don’t feel obliged to fill every square millimeter of advertising space that you have with content. Research has shown that shorter, clearer bullet points leave a longer lasting impression on a reader than an essay making the same point. As long as the key points you need to convey to your readers have been included, you don’t have come up with more content. You don’t have to use a hundred words to put across something that could be conveyed in twenty words.
Be sure that your content is detailed, but not needlessly long – you don’t want to overload your potential customers. You need to make sure that information given in the advertisement is both clear and interesting.
About the Author
Dan Hart writes on behalf of Mail & Print , a print media and direct mail marketing company.