Next time you design a small business promotional flyer for your company use these guidelines to help in your design and promotional efforts. Restaurants, retailers, dentists and many other small businesses can take advantage of promotional flyers since they’re a great way to get the attention of your target audience. What’s even better is the fact that anyone can design a promotional flyer, with the right tools in hand.

Tips on how to design a small business promotional flyer:

–Promotional flyers are an inexpensive form of advertising: Small businesses don’t have a large advertising budget. Promotional flyers are a great way to get your message out or promote a special deal without breaking the bank.

–Promotional flyers extend your brand: Be careful to avoid looking cheesy in your flyers. Do have them look clean and professional with clear branding of your company. Have a nice logo, colors, the right tagline and fonts that represent your company. Avoid looking like the pressure cleaner that leaves flyers all over your front door. You know who you are.

–Consider guerrilla marketing techniques: Leaving flyers on the windshield of a car is not the ideal way to employ a guerrilla marketing technique. Heading out to a busy plaza dressed as a fluff monkey, giving children an opportunity to run completely wild towards you, is a good example (assuming kids and parents are your target audience, of course). Additionally, guerrilla marketing will become more valuable over time because it’s a great way to capture attention, and as the U.S. Postal Service decides to cut back on the number of days for delivery.

–Use quality digital photography: Put down the Polaroid, and slowly back away. Good photography can make so much of a difference. This is not the area you want to be cheap.

–What kind of stock: If you have the budget try to put your promotional flyer on a stock that’s going to impress. Use glossy for high-end customers and a nice, heavy stock for standard commercial customers.

–Find illustrations that support your message: People look at pictures and illustrations so much more than they read what you say. Find a way to deliver your message through an illustration.

Watch this tutorial on using Photoshop to create your own flyer:

Part 2

–Strongest image in the top half: Again, since images are so powerful you want to use them right away where you know they’ll first glance.

–Better to use one large image than lots of smaller ones: Size matters when it comes to images on a promotional flyer. Try to use a nice sized image to capture your reader’s attention.

–Group several smaller ones together: But if you must use smaller images, group them together so that they appear to make one larger image.

–Use persuasive writing to interest customers: You didn’t think I was going to say words are absolutely meaningless, did you? Really? Pictures are ultra important here but words can close the deal because what do people do after you’ve gotten their attention? You guessed it. They look for the details in print.

–Where have you heard this before – it’s all about the headline: I may say this a million times on this blog. And I may just accomplish this before 2011.

–Who are you writing for? You’ve really got to know your customer here because if you’re off you can end up wasting a lot of money. Segment your list if you must and only deliver to people you know will be moved by your offer. Also, design your promotional flyer with your customer in mind. Use bright, playful colors if you’re targeting families and soft, classic colors if you’re targeting a more upscale audience. Use this marketing color guide to help you choose.

–Write in terms of “you”: Write your message so that you’re speaking directly to the person reading the flyer. Remember Uncle Same – “I Want You!”

–Tell your customers to do something: By all accounts always tell them what to do. Whether it’s go to a Web site, a store or an event, people respond to a good call to action supported by a great incentive.

–Speaking of the incentive: Entice them with something more than just a great price! If it’s a consumer you’re targeting give away something they’ll love. If it’s a business customer consider giving away information or a white paper on industry research, for example.

–Go easy on the fonts and bold the headline: Try to use no more than two different kinds of fonts in your promotional flyer.

–It’s ok to keep fonts in the family: It is acceptable to use a variety of different types of one font (Arial, Times New Roman, etc.).

Here’s a tip: If you don’t have an eye for design think about contacting your local college or university to see if there may be an intern you can hire for the design work. Hiring an intern will cost significantly less money than a seasoned design professional and you’ll be giving them an opportunity to get real-world experience.

Chrisanne Sternal has been developing marketing strategies for companies of all sizes for more than 15 years. She’s designed flyers, postcards and direct mail brochures for a variety of companies that have yielded a high return on investment. Email Chrisanne with your promotional flyer questions at chrisanne (at) sternalconsulting dot com.

Want to add something to this list? Feel free to leave a comment and we’ll make sure everyone shares in your ideas.