OK, this is going to be a steep learning curve for many. So you need to have a comfy chair, a coffee handy (maybe a cookie too!) and some patience. We're going to take you on a little trip down the road of desktop publishing. It can get a little rough now and then, but you'll make it through with our help.

We get many requests from customers for information and tips on designing Business Cards, Brochures, Flyers and Letterheads! The following four articles will be covering the most common mistakes we see made.

Wrong Page size. Yep, it sounds like it would be a hard mistake to make, but this is one of the most common mistakes we see. In many cases the designer is in a rush to begin the project and starts with the default page size of the program. This is normally A4 or Letter size.

This is a problem when supplying to a printer, since many times they have automatic 'imposition' or layout applications to place your job on a 'press sheet'. If the page size is incorrect it means it won't position your product correctly and can cause your product to be cut at the wrong position. Obviously, you don't want this! What the printer then has to do, is adjust the page size, before they go to the imposition stage. Obviously, the more pages they have to edit, the more time it takes. Even if it is seemingly little time to edit it, the printers will charge for it. (they have massive overheads!) In many cases, printers will simply reject the job and ask you to resupply it.

Easy Solution? Contact the print provider before creating your document. Request the precise size of the final product. Punch those values into your design program. This can be under 'document setup' or 'page settings' in some applications. Now if you're using Adobe Photoshop to create your design, you will need to also make your document larger again to allow for document bleed. That's coming up in the following article

Yes it's not rocket science, but unfortunately it is a very common mistake we see in Business Cards, Brochures and Letterheads! That's why we made it mistake #1.