Brochures have an important role to play in promoting your company. They are generally used to provide additional information on your business, products or services that supports your other marketing activities. When you are about to start creating a brochure it is important to consider all your marketing activities and how the brochure will fit in the mix. How the brochure fits with your other marketing material Your brochure can be used to support your other marketing activities in several ways, you can:

• Leave the brochure with potential customers after meetings.
• Include your brochure with direct mail advertising to provide supplemental information on your organisation.
• Send your brochure in response to requests for more information on your organisation.

How your brochure will be used will help you decide what information to include in your brochure. For example, if your brochure will be included with direct mail advert for a specific service you offer, you may want your brochure to include more information about your company and how you work. The direct mail will provide information on the service you offer and the benefits for potential customer, and your brochure will provide information illustrating your company’s track record, how you work and generally reassure the client that you are able to handle this type of work.

Not all brochures are the same

Brochures come in a wide variety of shapes and sizes, from a simple two-fold design to elaborate pocket folders containing multiple pages and insert sheets. Your organisation may have one brochure or one brochure for each product. The brochure may provide additional information on your organisation or a specific product. The type of brochure that is best for your organisation will depend on the nature of the information, your budget for creating the brochure and how it will be distributed. For example if your brochure will be mailed out to prospective clients then a large brochure printed on quality card is likely to increase your postage costs. While if this brochure is for handing to potential customers at tradeshows and after meetings then the postage costs will not be an issue. So it is important to focus on how you will use your brochure, the best layout and weight of paper to use.

What information to include

When you have decided where your brochure fits with your other marketing material and decided on how it will look regarding size and paper quality, then you can start to focus on the information that it will contain.

Consider the audience. Who will be reading the brochure? Careful analyse your target market and imagine the types of question the people viewing your brochure are likely to have. Decide if the other marketing material will answer their questions sufficiently or is additional material required. This will give you an idea of the information that you want to include in the brochure.

Structure the information in the brochure based on the audience analysis. Take your audience on a journey, as they read your brochure the information should shift from brief descriptions to more detailed information. When doing this consider how people will read your brochure. Most people briefly skim the front and back, before giving the middle a quick glance. They then assess if it is worth reading further. The main things that get read are the titles. Therefore make your titles brief and benefit oriented. The title should inform the reader what information they will get from reading the section and arouse their curiosity.

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