Have you ever thought about how much of each day you spend writing? Not just writing copy for marketing materials, a newsletter or other business-related activities, but changing text on web sites, sending e-mail, blogging, texting and perhaps even handwriting an old-fashioned thank you note. As much of what used to be oral phone conversation is now written and marketing is done online, the need for more writing is evident.
Read more: Did I Really Write That? A Guide to Effective Writing
Imagine a page of text describing a product offered for sale. Now imagine that same page with images of the product added. Even in your imagination there’s a difference – the image adds interest to the page and improves its appearance.
That’s the power of images, whether they are photographs, clip art, illustrations, charts, graphs or symbols. To attract attention and improve reader comprehension, nothing beats an image.
Color influences us in many ways. It affects our thought process, guides our emotional response, and can even provoke a physical reaction. We use color-based phrases to describe emotion (seeing red, feeling blue or being green with envy) or attribute characteristics (cowardly yellow, black hearted, red blooded). Lack of color is associated with deprivation, while vibrant color connotes richness and vitality.
It has been more than 20 years since Paul Brainerd, the founder of Aldus Corporation, coined the term desktop publishing to distinguish his software program PageMaker from professional typesetting. Over that time period, typesetting has migrated from the world of commercial printing and publishing to homes and offices. The quality of type produced by today’s inexpensive and readily-available software programs is very different from the primitive appearance of type generated by early desktop publishing programs.
Commit the seven “deadly sins” of direct marketing at your peril!
Good copy and presentation is easy to recognize after the fact – it got results. What comes a little harder is recognizing what will work – and what is doomed to fail – before your direct mail package drops in the mail. These fundamental flaws can undermine any direct marketing campaign.
Read more: 7 mistakes that can sink your campaigns, and how to fix them
Whether you use them for product identification or shipping, for security or promotion, or for any other use, labels are a part of every business’s inventory of printed items. The earliest use of labels was for product identification; uses now include a wide range of applications across many industries.
Label, sticker or decal?
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