However, in order for your brochures to be effective in this manner, they must be adequately designed. There are some things that you must know before you even begin to plan your brochure design. Here are five of them.

Your Audience

You have to design your brochures from the point of view of your customers, not your own. In order to do that, you must know who your customers are, what they like, how they live, how old they are, whether they are male or female. In short, you have to know everything you possibly can about your target customers. And then, when you design your brochures, you have to plan them in a way that will appeal to those customers.

Your Purpose

Once you know who your customers are, you then have to decide how you are going to try to get their business. What words are you going to use? What images are you going to include? What approach are you going to take? The way you approach your customers is what makes up the purpose of your brochure.

Paper

Now we are getting into the actual design elements of your brochures. What type of paper do you want to use? Most brochures are printed on 80 pound stock or 100 pound stock, but there are many, many more options available. In general, you want to use a thicker paper in order to appear more professional. However, if a thinner stock of paper feels right to you for your particular project, go ahead and use it.

Besides paper type, you also have to determine your paper size. The standard is 8 ? inch by 11 inch paper, but 11 inch by 17 inch sizes are also quite common.

Color

The color of your brochures is also important. You want to use enough color ? and the right color ? to grab attention and make your brochures stand out from the millions of others out there. But you also have to make sure that your colors work well with your material. Use colors that relate to the type of business that you have.

Headlines

Now you have all of the basics decided, so it is time to get into the details. You have to know what type of content you are going to include in your brochure, and each section of content should be set apart using an enticing headline. Figure out ahead of time what your headlines will be, so you can tinker with them to get the very best, most attractive headlines possible.