Small business owners can communicate plenty of valuable information to potential customers or clients even before a door has been opened, a phone number dialled or a website clicked. It’s all in the visual cues, from stickers, business cards and flyers to a well-curated Instagram account. Whether you’re launching a new product, establishing a small business or promoting a sale event, the right marketing materials are a must-have element to get the word out. But before you make the investment, it’s important to take some time to think about the look and feel of your suite of marketing materials. To help you decide which ones are right for your business and how to create them, we’ve put together this expert guide to help you tell your business’s story to a wider audience.
Tell the Story of Your Business
Marketing materials communicate your business’s story to potential clients. So from the outset it’s important to hit the nail on the head to ensure you are representing who you are. Consider what you want the visual cues of your marketing collateral design to say about your business and how they’ll differentiate your small business from other, similar, businesses.
“Design is a fantastic way to communicate the tone and style of a business,” says graphic designer and educator Jo Wright of Humming Group. She recommends taking the time to find a graphic designer who can help you distil your needs, taking into account your budget, your target audience and your brand’s image. “Factor a brand identity into your start-up costs and do your research to find an experienced designer who communicates well with you,” she says. Keep asking questions about their process and remember: the brief is everything.
“We live in a very visual culture and have a high level of visual literacy, especially with social media such as Instagram being so popular,” Jo says. “A good designer will be aware of current trends and movements; a great designer will be able to create something unique for your business that looks current but not copycat.”
Hot Tip: Officeworks' graphic design services has an expert graphic design team that can work with you to create custom printed marketing materials, logos and more for your business.
Choose Your Marketing Materials Wisely
Selecting the right array of effective marketing materials depends on your business: a glossy brochure or assorted flyers might be right for a jewellery maker, while a cut-out strut sign in the shape of a bottle printed with a logo makes sense for a craft brewery. Likewise, custom-printed T-shirts might be best suited for a personal trainer or gym, but bakeries would benefit from stickers or stamps bearing the business name and logo to emblazon each bag of sourdough carried out the door. You can utilise the Officeworks Print & Copy service to create all of this, as well as materials such as magnetic signs, banners, business cards, greeting cards, postcards and signs.
An online presence is important, too: will potential customers googling your business name find a website with relevant information? Would a carefully crafted Instagram account build a valuable audience? Consider which elements will be most valuable to your brand, rather than just attaching a logo to items that may not resonate with your target audience.
What to Try
- Standard Business Cards
- Magnetic Signs
- Flyers
- Magazines
- Brochures
- Corflute Bollard
- Feather Banners
- Outdoor Metal A-Frames
- Pull Up Banners
- Hybrid Banner
- Life Size Cut Outs
- Colour Posters
- Greeting Cards
SEE ALSO: How to Design a Successful Ecommerce Website from Scratch
Master the Art of Branding
Your marketing materials should all be recognisable as belonging to your business. They don’t have to be completely identical but a sense of cohesion is important to make sure your brand becomes familiar. Branding is about the ongoing communication of your own individual business proposition in an effective way.
“A brand identity is more than a logo,” says Wright. “It will describe the colours, spacing, typography and other elements that combine to identify your business and that potential and existing clients come to recognise. Consider creating a style guide if a team of people are creating assets and marketing pieces for the business.” Ensuring the representation of your brand is approached in a consistent manner – we’re talking everything from paper stock to tone of voice – helps establish it in the minds of your target audience and avoids diluting your brand message.
Define Your Goals
Each category of marketing materials serves a different purpose so it’s important to decide what you want them to do for your business. A big banner or outdoor A-frame sign will alert local passers-by to an in-store sale event; matching branded t-shirts will help customers find staff members in a busy showroom; business cards are invaluable at a trade show or business conference. The teams at the Officeworks Print & Copy service can help point you in the right direction.
“Digital is so convenient and might be how the majority of your audience will see your marketing but there is a great opportunity for surprise and delight via print,” says Wright. “Think about your print items having more than one use, both for cost and sustainability. An obvious one is business cards with an area on the back to write appointment times. Often, an exchange of business cards comes from a conversation that you can extend. Perhaps a space to write some product info, or something that reminds the customer of your chat. Ideally, we want the card to be kept and referred back to.”
