Print Design TipsTips and Information About Printing

When you get wrapped up in producing a business communication it is simple and easy to get wrapped up in what you have to say and forget that sometimes, too much information equals a poor result in assimilation for the reader.  Breaking the rules can produce results but in order to get highly effective page layouts and uniformity of message, you need to know what the rules are before you decide whether you should break them!

Nothing shines through a document better than the tell-tale marks of an amateur production and if you leave this stamp on your publication there is only one place left for it – the trash can!

Follow these rules to avoid the design dump and avoid making obvious errors in your design.

Restrict the Number of Fonts You Use

For the vast majority of documents, two to three fonts are more than sufficient – when we get our hands on a word processor we all tend to go mad with the wide variety of fonts available from the esoteric to the completely unreadable!

DON’T USE FULL CAPS OR FUNNY FONTS!

Avoid “shouting” – online media defines shouting as when FULL CAPS IS USED CONTINUOUSLY – it’s bad etiquette and looks terrible online and in print, but then shouting also applies when you use some of the more horrible fonts.

Restrict the Use of Frames and Boxes

If you frames every block of text on a page, single text blocks will lose their impact and become lost in the page composition.  Frames and boxes are a great way to deliver impact and visual attraction for the reader’s eye but you must use them sparingly if you expect to create the visual impact you want for those important aspects of your communication.

Clip Art is Not Cool

Clip art may seem like a kid’s candy store when it’s first encountered but the truth is it’s strictly for amateurs!  Clip art is free for a simple reason – it looks amateurish and has no place in a professional publication.

Clip art is fine for staff memo which is for internal use no-one outside the company is going to see it but, if you are creating a glossy circular or business brochure which decision makers are expected to use in order to help them come to buying decisions, you need to upgrade your image quality.

Learn to Punctuate and Use Good Grammar

If you don’t know whether to use “its” or “it’s, “there” or “their”, “to”, “two” or “too”, or know how to use a semi-colon and a question mark then you need to find someone else who does.  The text is the most important part of your communication because this is where your message is conveyed to the reader – good graphics, good layout and so on all help to attract the reader, the headline gets them to read the first line of text but all these elements exist simply to get the reader to read!  They won’t get far unless you can punctuate properly and know how to spell!