Many people think that
quality of any graphic design is determined by how aesthetically pleasing it is: Although making card look good is important, this couldn't be further from truth. The only true measure of any design, at least commercially, is "How well does it pull?". By pull we mean what type of response does it elicit? Does it pull in calls, or pull people into store? In essence, does design accomplish what it set out to do?From this fact it is not a reach to come to conclusion that merit of a graphic designer is based on performance of his or her designs. You may be able to put together most beautiful ad that world has ever seen, but if it doesn't make phone ring it isn't worth paper that it is printed on.
By giving clients designs that are not only attractive but, more importantly, that get them response they need to turn a profit, you are making it much more likely that they will be willing and able to come back to you for future services. In short, if ad doesn't make your client any money, you don't make any money in future.
The following text is a breakdown of different actions to take and ways to make sure that your beautiful design is also a big time moneymaker for both you and your client.
Chapter 1: “BE” Target Market
There is a monkey loose in your office and you can't seem to get any work done. The only solution is to catch little distraction and FedEx him back to jungle that he came from. Question: How do you catch a monkey? You have to get into his head, think like him. You have to “BE” monkey to find out what is going to bring him close enough for you to catch him.
What does an annoying monkey have to do with Marketing Design? Keep reading.
Every potential customer is like monkey. They are going to do whatever they want unless you can persuade them to listen to you. You have to get into their head, think like them, “BE” them. A monkey is a simple animal so you can probably get his attention with stereotypical banana.
Human beings on other hand are extremely complex. Then you add in fact that mailing list is targeted and it can get quite challenging. Following are a few examples:
1) Product = Wrinkle Reducing Eye Cream.
Who do you need to “BE”? Probably a woman over age of 40. Try it. Pretend you are a woman over 40 with crows feet (wrinkles around eyes, for all you guys) and they are getting worse and worse each day. Did you do it? Are you her? Good.
Now, how bombarded with advertising is this woman over 40 that you’re being? Just think about it. PLENTY! So how are you going to communicate to her in an ad to get her to respond?
You may have a headline that pushes button of how upset she is about those crows feet like, “Crow’s Feet Getting Worse as You Age?” You may want to show a before and after shot.
2) Product = New Golf Ball that goes farther and straighter than competition.
Your target market is Senior Citizen golf enthusiasts in state of Florida. So what is number one benefit of this particular product for that target market? To answer that question you should use three things:
•Reasoning •Experience
•Research
In this golf case, in particular, I can tell you from others’ stories that older guy, straighter ball goes. Practice makes perfect and older people have generally had much more practice. Also, as people get older they start to lose strength over all. This means that they will start to lose distance on their shot. It is relatively easy to tell that distance factor is going to be biggest benefit and therefore should be focus of ad.
Sometimes it's really easy, most times it's not.
3) Product (Service) = Refinancing.
This example has you trying to determine biggest benefit of refinancing a mortgage for families with a household income of $75k, revolving debt of $15k and 2+ children. Sound complicated? It can be. Maybe benefit is getting cash to pay off their debt, maybe it's paying for college, or even lowering their monthly payments. There is no real way to tell just by looking at situation. Now you are going to have to do some research.
