Adam McIntyre
In this article we’re going to focus our attention on tri-fold brochures; but the advice is applicable to almost any paper format.
Clients can be difficult creatures at the best of times. Endless questions about the work at hand and project misunderstandings are a constant nag for graphic designers.
What to you and I may be a simple concept is to clients a whole world of ideas they've never considered.
So as a designer, your job is two-fold. As well as providing a design service, you also need to help clients shape their marketing in a cost-effective and affordable manner. It is therefore essential you understand and can explain the benefits of different paper products and printed marketing materials.
Why is this important?
This last week I picked up a new client who needed help promoting her local cleaning business. She originally requested I design her a single sided flyer, something I knew was a bad idea.
With 20 different product options offered by her business, I explained that a trifold brochure would be a much more suitable option. She hesitated at first. The higher design fee and increased printing cost put her off. But after a few emails back and forth, she relented; realising how much more powerful (and convenient) a folded leaflet would be for her business.
And that is what lead me to writing this post…
For many new businesses (and low-budget clients alike), trifold brochures can seem like an extravagant marketing expense. Tri-folds are often more expensive than simple one-sided flyers or posters, and this can put clients off if they don’t understand the merits that come with this higher price tag. (Even in our store trifolds are more expensive than other single items)
Why Tri-Fold Brochures are a Great Choice
So, in this article we’re going to look at the key benefits of using trifold brochures and why they’re a popular and cost-effective marketing choice.
Why? For when price-conscious clients place budget at the forefront of their project. With the tips in this article, you'll be armed with the info you need to sit clients down and persuade them otherwise.
As a designer with years of experience helping clients shape their marketing, you know what works best and it’s your job to help clients make the right decision, even on small likes choosing trifolds over flyers.
This advice has been hard learned. These 6 tips will give you the bulletproof reasons you need to persuade clients when and why tri-folds are a great choice for their business…
1. Pack lots of information into small size
The most obvious benefit of trifold brochures is their ability to include larger amounts of information into a small and compact document. Trifold brochures provide four times more space than a standard single sided flyer.
Trifold brochures utilise both sides of an A4 sized paper. This provides huge amounts of space for text, images and charts; but once folded the brochure becomes just a third of the size.
For the same effort of handing out flyers or rack cards, a trifold brochure can provide far more information. This is more convenient for receiving customers and gives your client much more bang for their buck.
2. Folds up into pocket-sized, easy to take-away leaflets
Trifold brochures get their name because they fold up neatly into 3 panel leaflets which are 1 third the size of an A4 sheet. Unlike a poster, for example, this makes it very easy for customers to slide into their back pocket – which is a key goal for your client.
With the pocket-sized nature of trifold brochures and their ability to include huge amounts of text, it’s easy to see why they're a popular choice amongst takeaway restaurants.
3. Easily break up information into sections
Trifold brochures are an ideal choice for businesses with a wide range of products and services (think takeaways with menu items, or hair salons with different treatment options).
A single trifold brochure provides 6 individual panels split between the front and back of the leaflet. These panels can be used to divide up information, products and services into different categories, price points and so on.
With a flyer or a poster you’d need to manually design segments of the page to divide up products. With a trifold brochure, the 3-folding form of the leaflet naturally provides panels to break up products and information.
4. Cheaper than full scale brochures
Trifold brochures may be more expensive than single-sided flyers, but they're relatively inexpensive when compared to the cost of full scale brochures and catalogs.
For some high-ticket products (like cars, houses, kitchens, holidays, etc) giving clients full-scale brochures can be affordable. But for cheaper products with lower profits (like a nail salon or coffee shop), tri-fold brochures are a much more viable option.
As I mention at the beginning of this article, clients with cheap budgets can be difficult, but that’s not to say as a designer you should always push for the most expensive design job.
It is part of your job to be wary of your client’s budget and provide a valuable, cost-effective service.
5. Fits in DL sized rack card slots
DL cards, or rack cards, are one third the size of an A4 sheet – just liked a folded trifold brochure template.
Many businesses already have countertop rack card holders and rack card displays to show off the products and services they sell.
(when you’re in a hotel and they have a display of flyers and leaflets by reception showing available tours – that’s a rack card display).
For these business which already have rack card displays, there’s no additional expense to using a trifold brochure. They can simply pop the new trifold leaflets in their existing displays.
This may seem like a trivial benefit, but for penny-pinching clients, you'd be surprised at the minuscule details which can win them over.
6. Gives a professional impression of your business
The slightly higher design and printing costs of trifold brochures can be a hurdle for low-budget clients. Likewise, as trifold brochures are more difficult to design, inexperienced designers can be less likely to offer them as a service.
These combined factors often see trifold brochures being utilised by larger companies over small local businesses. And it’s because of this that trifold brochures seem so professional, especially when done right.
Trifold are more difficult to design and are slightly more expensive. But rather than handing customers cheaply designed flyers, a local business that hands out well-designed trifold brochures will instantly create an image of quality & professionalism – and reap the benefits too.
And as the designer of these well-designed trifolds? Well, you'll be an image of quality and professionalism too.
Upgrade your trifold brochure designs
If you’re anything like the designers here at BrandPacks, you’re probably the sort of designer that always wants to impress your clients and keep them happy.
As already discussed, trifolds can be more expensive to produce, take more time to design and be difficult to get just right. That’s why we’ve created a library of hundreds of readymade trifold brochure templates for Photoshop & Illustrator.
With our professionally designed trifold brochures, you can create high quality designs for your clients with just a few minutes editing. This will help you make more money whilst delivering high-end design work that blows your clients’ expectations.
What tips can you share?
In your years of design experience, what have you learned about managing client's expectations and helping them choose the right paper product for their project?
Whether it's related to trifold brochures or another paper format, I'd love to hear your advice in the comments below – and you never know who you might help.
