Many companies nowadays are shying away from print media, swapping out their glossy brochures for email newsletters and visually appealing social media posts. This is because they believe that, since everyone has a mobile device, print media doesn’t work as well as it used to.  

We at Williams&Crosby know that print media is just as powerful as ever, some even going so far as to say that it’s more impactful than it used to be. In this blog, we’ll explain why, and help you to design the perfect brochures for your growing business. 

What is a Brochure?

Brochures a collection of pages bound together that provide clear information and bold images. For a business, they’re used to explain more about their services, as well as providing an easily accessible overview of what they do. But they’re also much more than this.   

They can portray a mood or style to entice the receiver to immerse themselves in your brand. They can be a standard A5 or A4, smaller for the pocket or an oversized format for more impact. The oversized format is something we’ve used successfully when pitching for work as they allow you to use larger images, and they stand out from the crowd. 

Brochures give you the opportunity to put something tactile in the customers hand. Unlike digital brochure that appeal to just one of our senses, printed brochure can appeal to 4: 

  • Sight, but as we say it can also have scale 
  • Smell, print has a unique smell 
  • Touch, it can have textured, various weights, a hard bound cover, trace inlays and much more 
  • Sounds, as you turn the pages you get the crisp sound of the pages 

 

All these elements enhance the readers experience, after all, humans are tactile beings. 

It’s no coincidence that higher end brands create beautiful brochures to support their products and brands, spending a lot of time considering all these factors to enhance the customers experience and their brand. 

After all, how many of us have seen or received a great looking hotel or car brochure and kept it to review or share with family and friends? You almost feel guilty to throw it away – That’s the power of a well thought through and crafted brochure, and something you can’t achieve with an e-shot.  

Brochures can be handed out at events, as an accompaniment to the demonstrations at your exhibition stands, networking events, or at your offices. Essentially, anywhere that people don’t have immediate access to your website is the perfect time to hand out physical media that sells your brand.  

Brochures for Branding

Speaking of your brand, that’s something that your brochures can help you with. With the opportunity to include plenty of text and images, you can show people what makes you special. You can get your message across, selling your services and your company mentality – something especially important when trying to stand out from the crowd.  

The quality of your brochures is critical for branding. If they’re printed on cheap, thin paper, poorly bound, the images aren’t colour balanced correctly, or the layout is thrown together, you will have missed an opportunity to stand out and make a positive impression. 

Often the costs between a great and a poorly produced brochure is much less than you think as most of the cost should be in the content creation and design. Yes, printing costs will vary depending on the quality of paper and finishes you might include e.g. embossing, foil blocking, lamination, but these they are generally much less than you think and can make a huge difference to the end result.  

Whilst you may be tempted to go to your local printed who may offer to almost give the design and artwork stages away for free, there is generally a good reason for this (more on that in a moment). It’s much better to invest in a design company that knows how to maximise impact, and we’re one of the best.  

We’re experts in all things print media, and help dozens of companies to maximise their brand impact using high quality brochures, posters, and business cards.  

Improving the Impact of Business Brochures

Knowing what to include in your brochures is just as important as the overall quality.  

If you have a clear target demographic, you want the design to appeal to them. For example, if your target audience is mostly people under 25, you want to include images of younger people, either from your team or models, using and enjoying your product or engaging with your services.  

It’s not just images either. You should choose the language of your copy carefully – business owners might not like copy that is too informal, even if all the information is plain to see.  

This is a tricky balance to achieve, but once you’ve established your target demographic many design elements will fall into place, and you’ll have a good idea of what tone to write in. If you aren’t sure who to target, or how to do so effectively, our marketing services will help you set the right goals for your business.  

 

This goes hand in hand with clear messaging. If you aren’t selling yourself clearly, people will be put off. Transparency is key, and you’ll have plenty of space on the page to communicate what you do, how you do it, and why people should choose you over your competitors. Messaging isn’t just done via written content either. Your message is part of your brand, and should come across in every image, and even the structure of your business brochure.  

Last but not least is the formatting. You might know what information you want to include and have a few images in mind, but until you put it all together it can be tricky to imagine how it will look. Planning the formatting well in advance makes it much easier to make your brochure look as good as it should. Text should be plentiful but not crammed into the page just because there is space to fill. Well-crafted copy that is descriptive and concise will have far more impact.. And your images should be sized appropriately too

The Best Brochure Design Services

As you can see, designing a quality brochure for businesses is not as easy as it seems. There is a lot to consider before you start creating content or picking images, and if you’re committing to a large batch of brochures, you need them to be perfect. 

That’s where we come in. We at Williams&Crosby are experts in print media and have been designing and creating effective brochures for years now. Every business is different, and your brochures should reflect that. If you’re just copying a template and adding in your content, your brochures won’t have the desired impact and won’t help you grow your business.  

Print media is best used as a complement to the other features of your marketing strategy. As we mentioned they’re a great thing to hand out at events to improve your outreach and boost enquiries. That’s why it’s important to choose a print media provider who understands all aspects of marketing.  

We’ll not only design high quality brochures for your business, we’ll back them up with valuable marketing know-how and any other services that will help you grow. This includes: 

Whatever you need, we can provide. We’re just as invested in our clients’ growth as our clients, doing all we can to help them outpace their rivals, feeling a sense of pride when we see them succeed in their industry. 

If you need brochures to promote your business, a few pointers on what to include, or are interested in any of our other marketing services, please don’t hesitate to get in touch. We look forward to hearing from you.