Tips for making attention-grabbing marketing materials for small businesses and brands

Whenever we’re making marketing materials, we have to think of the best ways to make them grab people’s attention.

It has to be eye-catching enough for them to stop scrolling for a bit and check out what we’re saying online.

Or if it’s print material like posters and banners, it has to be good enough for your audience to hold their steps and check out what we’re talking about.

After all, that’s the entire point of marketing materials for your business, right?

Effective marketing lets you get people’s attention to your brand, product, or service.

You can’t just put all the details on a brochure or folder and hope for people to stop and read it. This is the past.

Now that we’re all competing for people’s attention, both in the digital world and in real life, it can be quite tough.

When they see a bunch of ads, it can simply look like clutter.

Who would bother reading that?

Let me make it simple for you. I’ll share some marketing strategies to design stuff that stands out from the clutter.

This guide is your ultimate guide to creating marketing materials that captivate your audience and leave a lasting impression.

We’ll also explore the strategies and techniques to make your brand shine, whether you’re crafting online ads, designing print materials, or exploring collaborative opportunities.

Effective brand marketing through attention marketing

Do you remember the last pop-up ad that interrupted you while you were scrolling online or playing games?

You probably clicked the exit button immediately without bothering to know what the ad was about.

This is because your focus was somewhere else, and the abrupt ad got in the way of this focus. We don’t want our marketing materials to get in the way of an experience.

We want them to be the experience that people want to take part in.

This is where attention marketing comes in.

Attention marketing is all about grabbing people’s attention without annoying them.

Instead of interrupting people, we want to make things they like seeing, especially on social media.

Good design helps make things interesting and fun to look at.

You don’t have to wrestle their attention out of your competitor’s hands. Your target market would want to pay attention to your content.

Here are some basic tips when it comes to attention marketing:

Online ads? Print marketing? Know where you’re going to promote your business

Before you even start designing your marketing materials, you have to know which platforms you are going to be putting them on.

All the social media platforms have their own ideal image and video sizes.

Using a horizontal format, for example, is better on YouTube, while a vertical format is better on Instagram reels, stories, and TikTok.

Other than just formatting, you also have to think of the experience of the people who use social media.

People on LinkedIn, for example, are more likely to engage with educational content and can handle wordy articles as they are there to network, learn new things about their field, etc.

The Tiktok audience, on the other hand, is just scrolling passively.

You will have to catch their attention within the first few seconds with a combination of great visuals and messaging.

Don’t be afraid to try something new and adapt popular trends to your brand. These experience-focused principles also apply to printed marketing materials.

If you’re having a billboard, is it on a street where commuters are stuck in traffic?

If you’re making flyers and business cards, are they spread in a commercial area with heavy foot traffic of people wanting to shop or get food?

You can use these experiences in your design to target your audience.

This will make them feel like the marketing material is speaking to them directly.

Custom marketing materials to target the emotions of your potential customers

We are more drawn to things that have a story or can make us feel something.

You’re more likely to click on a post if it has a funny photo, a massive promo that is on a limited-time offer, or an inspirational story.

These things trigger your emotions and make you want to learn more.

Instead of just adding your logo, promo details, or a product’s specifications, you want to customize your design to target the emotions of the people who would most likely check out these promotions or buy these products.

For example, if you’re targeting mothers who want to save money on a grocery promo, you can include a mom shopping with kids in your material.

Combine this with a large discount, like “50% off,” or a call for urgency, such as a “limited time offer,” and you have a more attention-grabbing design.

Make the message of your promotional materials and banners stand out

Is the message or purpose of your design clear enough?

This can be difficult, especially if you have so much text and information to put into one design.

You should pay attention to the visual hierarchy of your design. This means that the most important stuff should stand out first.

Here are some tips to make sure your marketing material has a clear message:

The important details in your marketing collateral should be highlighted first

The biggest item in your design will affect the first impression of potential clients.

You’ll want the most important message or call to action in your marketing collateral to be big and bold.

It’s like having signage at your storefront to tell people what your store offers and draw them inside.

For example, if you are having a big sale, you want the percentage of the sale to stand out in your design. You can indicate which products are on sale and other smaller details after that.

Draw them in with a special offer or some promotional items first, and then you can give them other details like your contact information and the products or services you offer.

Use variations to highlight your promotional products and details

If you have a lot of information about your business you need to highlight, such as in a catalog or brochure, it can be a challenge to make it stand out without cluttering up the design.

You can separate them from the rest of your text with variations like different colors, fonts, and sizes.

This just screams “Hey, look at me!” without taking away from your main message and call to action.

If there isn’t enough space in the material, like business cards, postcards, or door hangers, you can simply add a QR code so interested people can see more of your brand’s information instead of trying to cram everything in.

Effective marketing materials are usually neat and easy to navigate

Even if you have a lot of information in your materials, you can still keep them organized and easy to read.

You can organize your design by putting similar stuff together, making use of proper alignment, and making sure your readers know where to start to read and what to look at next.

People usually read the biggest text on the topmost part of a design first and the smallest text at the bottom last.

Consider other types of marketing, like collaborations with small businesses

Have you done collaborations before?

Co-marketing is when you make brand partnerships and collaborations to help grow your reach and expand your audience.

You can combine expertise, as in a video or podcast collaboration, or create a new and unique product if you’re a brand partnering with a specific artist or a brand with a distinct style.

This is a great way to show something new and interesting to your existing customers while still staying on brand.

Think of it as adding some spice to your usual products or content.

You also get to build brand recognition and reach out to potential new customers you previously had no access to.

Other than brands, you can also reach out to influencers.

51% of marketers believe that they can acquire better customers with influencer marketing.

This is because you can target an audience that is already willing to listen to this specific influencer.

Influencers are experts in content marketing who usually build their audience over time, developing trust and interest in their brand.

Depending on the influencer, you are likely to get a return on investment from your collab as they have active listeners ready to make purchases from their endorsements.

You will have to make sure the influencer or brand you are partnering with makes sense for your brand.

Think of what interests their audience and if it matches your brand identity.

You don’t even need to spend a lot of money to get the biggest brands and influencers out there.

You can be cost-effective by choosing the right ones to promote your brand.

Creating effective print and digital marketing materials

There are different types of marketing materials you can use to build your online presence or grow your business.

When you are creating essential marketing materials, whether they are online ads or printed business cards and catalogs, you want them to be attractive enough that people want to look at them.

With simple tweaks to your design’s visual hierarchy and using images that trigger emotions, you can design marketing materials that stand out.

Whether your marketing campaign is meant to promote a sale, inform your audience of a new product, or build brand awareness, these simple tips will help you make designs that your target audience will love to see.

So, get creative, have fun, and make something awesome!

Key Takeaways

• Great marketing materials make people want to pay attention voluntarily. If you’re spamming them with ineffective print advertising and email campaigns, they will just ignore you and click away.
• As there are many ways to promote your brand, keep it platform-specific.
• Think of what offers and images will create an emotional response from your potential customers.
• Make sure the main promotion of your campaign stands out.
• Collaborations are a great way to expand your audience and offer something new to your existing customers.