When putting together your campaign brochures, you definitely want to put your best foot forward. In some cases, your brochure may be the first, last and only time you will reach a voter.
Here are some tips to creating a great election brochure!
Write out the content first, keeping in mind the amount of space you have to work with. The tendency is to try to pack too much text into the campaign brochure. Keep in mind the overall design. For example, if this is tri-fold brochure mailer, two-thirds of one side will be for address information and the ‘cover’ on the other side.
When writing, try to:
- Have one idea per paragraph.
- Use short sentences.
- Use bullet points.
- Divide the text into sections (About the Candidate, Issues, Voting Information/Election Date…)
From personal experience we’ve found that it’s better to have only a few people involved in writing the brochure. Campaign material created by committee tends to be unfocused, trying to cover too many points in a single piece.
When designing the campaign brochure, keep the layout simple. Be sure the primary colors of the brochure match the rest of your campaign materials, yard signs, and website. Script fonts should be avoided. Keep in mind that using more colors adds to the cost of printing.
Photographs are very powerful visual element. There should be at least one photo of the candidate included in the brochure. Typically a professionally-shot candidate photo appears on the cover, along with an ‘action shot’ inside. All the photos should make the candidate look good with proper dress and backgrounds. The last thing you want potential voters to do is to scrutinize the candidate’s fashion sense or the corporate logo of some item in the shot’s background.
As picture can tell a thousand words, charts and graphs can do the same. They should be simple and clear in design and clearly illustrate a point. A simple explanation under the chart should be all you need.
As the brochure design is finalized, it’s likely that you (or the designer) will need to adjust the different elements to make everything fit and flow properly. If there is too much text, the font size may need to be adjusted or the graphics or photos resized. A cramped brochure is looks bad and is less likely to be read.
Throughout the process, have others proofread the piece for misspellings or grammatical errors.
If you are having an outside company print your brochures, check their printing requirements and be sure to provide everything they need. If the brochures are to be mailed, check with the post office for such things as size and bulk mail requirements
Speak with an employee in the post office about requirements that must be met for mailing the brochure. For i.e. there are size requirements and bulk mail requirements. Speaking with a post office employee may also save you a great deal of money.
Finally, have a digital version of the campaign brochure(s) available on your website for others to download, share and print.
Looking for campaign brochure templates? Free up your valuable time! Download our Political Brochure Templates to add a professional edge to your campaign brochures and handouts.
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Tags: brochures, campaign advertising, campaign tips
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