10 Tips on Designing Brochures

8.  Spend time on the layout and design.

Whether you design yourself or hire a professional, here are some points to consider from Mel, our expert.

• Each page should have enough white space and margins for easy reading and a clean look.
• Text or headlines do not need to span the spread but can be broken into columns. Using a layout grid (columns and rows) helps determine the placement of text and graphic elements and gives order to the composition.
• Selecting the appropriate typeface makes a big difference. For example, when dealing with a heavy copy, serifs like Garamond can make reading easier since they have a well-proportioned width. Also, adjusting suitable kerning, leading and justification can help but may vary depending on the amount of text and space available.
• Widows are lines of text containing only one word, whereas orphans occur when one to two lines jump to the next column. Both of these should be avoided. Adjusting the kerning of a paragraph can solve this.
• To properly showcase your product or service it is critical that your images are the right resolution , are staged properly, and do not look stretched. Would you order a blurry pizza? In addition, low quality implies a low price. If you expect a premium rate from your customers, invest in good photography and high resolution. The 72 dpi (dots per inch) that works for an e-brochure is very inadequate for printed brochures. The images should be at least 300 dpi to print well.
• Do not use images with low resolution, bad lighting, and/or lack of compositional techniques. With so many stock images easily available, there's no excuse for a bad image in your brochure.

9.  Provide contact details.

It may seem obvious, but I've reviewed brochures that leave me guessing how to ask questions or request more details. You should include both a telephone number and an email address. Ideally, the number should be for a person versus a mail box and the email should also be a name. This conveys the idea that the reader will get a live person and fast response (even more important the higher the cost of your products or services). Don't forget your website and social media URLs.