posted
I'm trying to come up with a small promotional postcard. My plan is to use them as a "big business card", as well as follow-up notes to customers and potential customers.
Here's what I've come up with. I'd appreciate any suggestions, critique, additions, etc.
front:
and back:
-------------------- :: Scooter Marriner :: :: Coyote Signs :: :: Oakland, CA :: :: still a beginner :: :: Posts: 1356 | From: Oakland (and San Francisco) | Registered: Mar 2001
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posted
How 'bout a little color? Here's something I threw together. Didn't have much time so the colors may not be anything you like. But check it out.
Later.
-------------------- John Cordova Gitano Design Studio Albuquerque, NM Posts: 268 | From: Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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posted
I like the word Coyote written in script. It looked too squishy the other way.
Posts: 3729 | From: Seattle | Registered: Sep 1999
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Besides, I got a grin out of her use of the word "Squishy".
-------------------- Jon Aston MARKETING PARTNERS "Strategy, Marketing and Business Development" Tel 705-719-9209 Posts: 1724 | From: Barrie, ON, CANADA | Registered: Sep 2000
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-------------------- Jon Aston MARKETING PARTNERS "Strategy, Marketing and Business Development" Tel 705-719-9209 Posts: 1724 | From: Barrie, ON, CANADA | Registered: Sep 2000
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posted
We decided to let ours work as mini portfolios. We will be doing a several similar layouts (one every couple months) with different pictures, geared toward different markets. Real Estate, Contractors, marinas, etc. This is the first time we've done this, so I'm interested in seeing how it does. We are using a mailing list obtained through the local Chamber of Commerce.
You may consider including some pictures of your work that may be familiar to the recipient. We get people who come in and see some of our pictures, and when they see stuff that they are familiar with, they are a little more comfortable with trusting you to do there signs. Just a thought.
This is what we did for the first one, just a generic overview of our services.
I would like to hear how other shop's mailings have worked for them.
-------------------- Joe Endicott NEXCOM (Navy Exchange Service Command) Signing Programs Specialist Virginia Beach, VA jeendicott@msn.com
"I want to be Stereotyped....I want to be Classified." Posts: 681 | From: Virginia Beach, VA USA | Registered: Mar 1999
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I'm still really new at this stuff, but still I know what catches my eye.... You say you didn't have much time on that color creation, John, but for me, when I looked at it, it made me think of "Made Ya Look!" I really like the colors, script and the shading
-------------------- Pat Foley Foley Signs 35812 Wells Road Coarsegold CA 93614 foleys@sierratel.com (559) 642-6264 Posts: 73 | From: Coarsegold, CA | Registered: Jan 2002
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posted
Must add a Kudos for Joe...a really well put together mailer and with a very "signie" kind of feel to it. I'm not surprised it was a success.
To all of you: If you were designing a mailer like this for a customer, how much would you charge them?
[ March 14, 2002, 04:31 PM: Message edited by: Jon Aston ]
-------------------- Jon Aston MARKETING PARTNERS "Strategy, Marketing and Business Development" Tel 705-719-9209 Posts: 1724 | From: Barrie, ON, CANADA | Registered: Sep 2000
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[ March 15, 2002, 04:28 PM: Message edited by: Tony B ]
-------------------- Tony Broussard Graphic Details Digital Media Loreauville, LA Posts: 395 | From: Loreauville, LA | Registered: Jul 1999
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Here is my take on your promotional postcard. Thanks for letting me play!
Have a great one!
-------------------- Bruce Bowers
DrCAS Custom Lettering and Design Saint Cloud, Minnesota
"Things work out best for the people who make the best of the way things work out." - Art Linkletter Posts: 6451 | From: Saint Cloud, Minnesota | Registered: Jun 1999
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I need to come up with an ad design for an important NEW PRODUCT and have nothing remaining in the budget for it.
I was thinking about running a DESIGN CONTEST and furnishing the winner with some of the new product (a calendered vinyl)...$500 or so bucks worth. Do you think this would be a fair enough prize, given the amount of time needed to throw a design together?
Thanks for your opinion!
[ March 15, 2002, 11:19 AM: Message edited by: Jon Aston ]
-------------------- Jon Aston MARKETING PARTNERS "Strategy, Marketing and Business Development" Tel 705-719-9209 Posts: 1724 | From: Barrie, ON, CANADA | Registered: Sep 2000
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-------------------- John Cordova Gitano Design Studio Albuquerque, NM Posts: 268 | From: Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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I don't know if you noticed but you spelled "yacht" wrong on your flyer.
-------------------- John Cordova Gitano Design Studio Albuquerque, NM Posts: 268 | From: Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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Thanks John, I have two types of postcard flyers, the boat one and a truck lettering one. I don't have the boat one posted up anywhere and glad you caught that. I do have the truck ones up. (spelling's cool on those)
-------------------- Tony Broussard Graphic Details Digital Media Loreauville, LA Posts: 395 | From: Loreauville, LA | Registered: Jul 1999
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i'm learning a lot by seeing how my advertising/graphic designer friends treat the design versus how my signmaking peers approach it.
i like how you brought all the text to the front of the card, and i like your use of color.
i think "coyote" (the word) is too large -- i'm still trying to figure that one out though. its the old question of "am i coyote SIGNS or am i COYOTE signs."
among the letterheads, i'm COYOTE signs, because everybody is "___ signs". i think my customers think of me as the SIGNS guy, and if they had to look me up in the phone book they might, or might not, remember the coyote.
that might be a problem in the future when i'm more established, but right now i'm more concerned that when they see me their first thought is "signs".
-------------------- :: Scooter Marriner :: :: Coyote Signs :: :: Oakland, CA :: :: still a beginner :: :: Posts: 1356 | From: Oakland (and San Francisco) | Registered: Mar 2001
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I took notes during another feedback session...Cause them to relate, read and reply!
At the top you could call on Wolf medicine and use a statement like,
"Looking for a Leader in the industry who offers Quality and Integrity?"
Underneath that, I'm thinking a full panel, deep midnight blue sky with a few twinkles in the sky (to create big sky, vastness) This same panel has your bulleted items in the sky, some vertical space and your logo at the bottom of the panel. Have the coyote stand in front of the white moon and show a little grass or stumblage (rocks) at his feet. Carve the word signs into the cliff the wolf is howling from. (I love John's script cuz it isn't squishy, it's alive and catches the eye!) (and it's bevelled too!)
(Example to summarize/have closure from heading above; "Don't be a loner, give us a howl!")
Then of course, your contact information in the same midnight blue ink across the bottom. You can form a time honored "z" formation with your information and really reel them in.
(I would not suggest reversing out any copy that is detrimental, like your contact info).
If you go this route, you're looking at one color ink that could be done in black only, as well, for printed matter like shipping slips, etc.
Something to ponder, yellow and blue make green. Tight registration is not always achieved. One color is not only cost and time efficient, but as Bruce has proven, time and time again, a genious design!
Usually there is no color in the night of a full moon. Just degrees of blue and white. You could trap some gold in the moon, when you've reached a goal and call it a harvest moon, but it is best to start out simple, and leave room for time and experience to help you grow (business capital too).
Reversing out the copy in the big sky, would have to be done in a fairly bold copy and with a competent printer, to avoid bleeding the copy with ink. With this layout, you can merely mask out the copy in the panel and have consistency with your cards, etc.
...or not, hehehe!
I'm very intrigued to see how you put this together!
[ March 16, 2002, 02:06 PM: Message edited by: Linda Silver Eagle ]
posted
Linda, thank you for reminding me of some basics (marketing!) that i was forgetting in my haste to get the design elements worked out. your questions/suggestions are exactly what i would have asked my client, but its the sort of thing that i often forget when i become the client. (i suspect many of us have this blind side).
for myself, the postcard is more of a "leave-behind" and not really a call-to-action mailer. i don't have 500 people to mail these to, and i don't want to mail 500 of them. my marketing plan is to just canvas my neighborhood (there are over 500 businesses in a 4 block radius) and hand thecards to interested people. additionally, i'll use the cards for follow up, thank-you notes, and the like.
the purpose of the list of different types of signs isn't so much to tout my abilities as it is to get customers thinking about signs and what kinds of signs they might need. in other words, to get them past "oh, we already have a sign" to "gee, a sign on our delivery truck is a good idea."
i've pretty much settled my mind on screen printing the cards (at least on the "picture" side). i'm going to use a glow-in-the-dark yellow for the moon and a dark turquoise/silver swirl for the other color, so my cards will have a different look/feel/quality than the standard 4-color postcard.
also, i'm going to screen print onto a variety of materials: paper, coroplast, thin PVC, wood veneer, colored acetate, vinyl sign material, banner cloth. - each card will be a mini sign sample. (to generate the "oh, you make banners too?" comments). so, the design has to be simple enough for me to be able to print it. if nothing else, it might land me some orders for decals.
-------------------- :: Scooter Marriner :: :: Coyote Signs :: :: Oakland, CA :: :: still a beginner :: :: Posts: 1356 | From: Oakland (and San Francisco) | Registered: Mar 2001
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I wish you success! You have a great head on your shoulders.
Simple was what I was trying to convince you to stay with. I really love the suggestions above...but yes, it's kewl if you can reproduce it in a proficient manner...hehehe.
I used to not put a list of any type on my media, then later hear someone say, "I called them because I didn't know you could do that too!"
The reason I'm learning airbrush, do you know how many people asked me if I did it, and I said no to over the past 28 years? It's mind boggling!
posted
Well, just to bring this all to a close, here's the revised design. (the actual colors will shirt, but this is optimized for the web, and is close enough).
thank you to everybody for suggestions and feedback.
-------------------- :: Scooter Marriner :: :: Coyote Signs :: :: Oakland, CA :: :: still a beginner :: :: Posts: 1356 | From: Oakland (and San Francisco) | Registered: Mar 2001
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Later.
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