Far from being the dinosaur of marketing, the corporate brochure is still a vital part of any company’s marketing strategy.
It’s a document that can be handed out at trade shows, or used as part of a direct mail campaign, but it will only be effective if it’s done right.
Don’t give in to temptation
There is a huge temptation when creating your corporate brochure to talk your company and its achievements.
The typical thinking when it comes to what you’re going to write is along the lines of:
- Talk about you
- You give your opinions on you
- You talk about what you want to achieve
That’s not going to work.
The people reading your brochure (i.e. your customers and potential clients) aren’t interested in what you think about yourself; they are interested in themselves.
Getting it right
The fact that you’re investing in a glossy, expensive corporate brochure tells the market that you’re doing well; you have a motivated and engaged team who are working their butts off to make you look great.
Done well, a good brochure will help you:
- Gain investor confidence
- Attract new clients
- Show existing clients what you can do for them
- Impress the great and the good
To pull off a fantastic result, you’ll need a team of professional designers, photographers, a great brochure copywriter who are all experienced in what they do and can easily collaborate to achieve the ultimate result.
It’s essential your brochure shouldn’t contain any corporate speak – in fact; your copywriter would have gone to great pains to ensure the language is simple, accessible to all, clear and convincing, which is not an easy thing to pull off. And yet by the time the copy has gone round everyone involved in the sign-off process, it’s mutated into an overly intellectual hotchpotch of meaningless drivel.
The design has been mauled mutating the understated, tasteful design into something ostentatious. And the fantastic photography of your staff and company has been replaced by dodgy stock images.
If you call in a group of experts to create your corporate brochure let them get on with it – they know what they are doing.
The perfect formula
Your corporate brochure has to be something people will want to pick up and read. If they don’t, it becomes an extremely expensive coaster.
Use it wisely and make sure yours includes:
- A personal letter written by your Chairman or CEO
- Photos of your staff (be proud of them and show them off)
- Testimonials from customers
- Engaging case studies to show how you have helped clients overcome typical challenges
- A profile of your organisation
- Benefits-driven copy to show how you can help your customers
- High-level product descriptions and images
- Full and correct contact details
Your professional team will need a briefing on their part of the puzzle. Give them all the information they need and access to someone who can quickly provide them additional information as and when required and then sit back and let them get on with it.
The people you have pulled together for your project do this stuff for a living and therefore have an excellent eye for what works and what doesn’t. Listen to their advice and take on board their suggestions and, before you know it, you’ll have a corporate brochure of which you can be proud.
Need help with the content of your corporate brochure? Get in touch with Sally Ormond of Briar Copywriting who has worked with clients around the world, delivering exceptional content to make their brand come to life.