Despite past rumors on digital advertising taking over, print advertising is not dead and is still as effective as ever. If anything it has become even more of an important strategy to build trust in our brands, as well as being a strong tool to instigate action with our customer incentives.

Why is it important? Because people still trust print as a medium of truth. Instead of forcing itself on the audience as with digital, multi-media and radio – it invites the reader into an intimate relationship where they are in control. Something that is printed is permanent and holds authority, especially when it comes to the boomer and senior generations.

Many businesses are still claiming that print isn’t working for them – but in actuality, it is not ‘print’ that is failing them, it is the self-imposed pitfalls that are commonly practiced in the medium.   

Here are the top 8 ways to sabotage yourself with print and how to prevent them.

1. Focusing on the FEATURES rather than the BENEFIT
   Your potential customers will respond more openly to the benefits of the product or service over the features. If you are focusing your strategy on listing the features of a product, you are only going to be attracting people that are already looking around for that specific product. Customers are less responsive to features you put into your products such as size, weight, experience, friendliness… etc. These are things that they will take the effort to find out themselves as they shop around. By focusing on the BENEFIT of a product, you are addressing your demographics’ wants, insecurities and desires. How will the product or service impact their lives in a positive way? This is what will open up the conversation to potential leads.

2. “Bedazzling” your ad to death
   Everyone wants their advertisement to stand out and unfortunately this means that many advertisers will try to cram an over abundance of graphics, effects and font styles into their ad space. This will not work – it will come across as screaming to your audience and/or trying way too hard, causing readers to move on. By creating a clean ad, you are making it easy to absorb the message while projecting a professional image. Have fun and be creative with your ads but make sure that you are enhancing the message in a productive way while you do it.
   Key Tips:
   • White space is your friend. Correct use of white space will work ten-fold over a Photoshop effect any day to bring the needed attention to important details.  
   • Stay true to your brand. If you are true to your brand, you will start building a relationship with your audience that will allow them to recognize your ad amidst the other elements and ads on the page before even reading it.
   • Be clean, concise and straight to the point. Make it easy for your audience to understand your message.
   • Understand the publication(s) that you are going to be advertising in and work on a design plan to stand out based on that.
3. Too many messages
   If you are focusing on too many benefits, your print ad will be confusing and undirected. You should focus primarily on only ONE benefit for each print advertisement that you run. This benefit should be the single most compelling reason customers should stop and invest time in reading your ad. All other benefits should be secondary or discussed when the client contacts you. This ensures that the strategy is supporting the most important benefit that your product has to offer and presenting it in the most efficient and straightforward way.

4. Too much copy
    As with the overkill that happens with graphics, too much copy can kill your ad before the customer even begins to read it. Think of those old “Where’s Waldo” books in terms of your print ad. If it is crammed with too much information, it will take too much work for your audience to absorb the key points that are of value to them. It will also look incredibly overwhelming and will deter people from reading it. Your audience is not going to take the time to understand what you are trying to say if it is not clear. Less is more. Quality over Quantity.
5. “Make my logo bigger”
   This request to a graphic designer is all too common and it sounds like nails being scratched onto a blackboard. Why? Your logo is a very important part of your ad but it is not the star. Don’t get me wrong: branding is key to establishing relationships, marketing consistency and public perception. You have to remember though that your print ad is not about you – it is about the value and benefit you have to offer your clients by them coming to you. You can established a strong branded print ad without having to make the logo a prominent feature through the use of layout, colours, tones, imagery, etc. Hierarchy is key to successful ads. Think logically about how you want people to read your ads.
   
   • Step One: They need to understand the benefit and why they want your product
   • Step Two: They need to connect with the incentive you have given them so they will contact you
   • Step Three: They need your contact and business information. They do not need your three phone numbers, your fax number, your two websites, etc. Give them limited options so you make it simple for them to contact you. This will also allow you to track the responses you get more efficiently.
6. There’s no reason for them to call
   Incentive - this is the most important factor in getting your customers to contact you. What's the point of advertising if you are not pushing the customer to do something? You might have a clear message, a nicely designed ad and great branding but that’s only going to go so far. You need to direct the client to the next step, whether that is to log onto your website, call a number, show up at an event, bring a coupon to a store or enter a draw. A successful salesperson knows how to persuade a client to buy. Advertising is no different from this. Discounts, coupons and contests are all great examples on how to get people interacting with your business, on their own terms without the normal hesitations that people have when being pressured into buying.

7. Selling wellness products but your ad is depressing
   The tone of your ad needs to work with the overall strategy of the benefit. You need to understand what will emotionally resonate with your target audience. Think of your product or service as a person. What’s the personality trait? Intelligent, quiet, fast, strong, sexy, sympathic? The words and images you use in your ad concept should match the personality of your product and brand.

8. Running one ad every few month will not work wonders
   Print advertising does not work if you use it as a one night stand. The strength in print advertising lies in its ability to grow a relationship with your audience – key word: relationship. Long term, well thought out print campaigns have been proven time and time again to be essential to a business’s success in marketing their products.

Print advertising can seem overwhelming but as long as you pay attention to your strategy, understand your target audience and keep the message clean, clear and precise, the connection and relationship that is possible to build with your demographic is priceless.

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