As you can probably tell I am all over my Chinese proverbs today, to be brutally honest the one in the blog title I just made up but it sounds damn good.
In the most long winded way ever, I am trying to make the connection with my lovely new proverb and helping people to get their print standing out from the rest. Or as I now like to call it, ‘being the ripest apple’.
In this blog post I am going to be using all of my worldly wisdom to help you publishers of Magazines/Brochures to make sure your publication is the one that takes pride of place on the coffee table or is the one that is picked up in the Doctors waiting room.
There are numerous ways that you can make sure your publication stands out from the crowd and not all of them have to cost the earth. It is far too easy to slip in to the trap of just getting a standard A4 glossy publication throw together, just think though, you will now be looking exactly the same as all the other A4 glossy publications on there.
There are some simple questions that you can ask yourself when you are thinking about going to print on your publication.
What is it you are selling? For example if your magazine is advertising the newest sports cars you are going to want to really make the images pop, so a gloss finish would be best with maybe a UV varnish over some of the feature images.
UV Varnish 101: UV varnish is a liquid layer which is added to the paper stock after the printing process. You can have either Flood UV that covers the whole surface of the page of Spot UV which is used to make a curtain logo, image or a piece of text look more rich & vibrant in colour.
Example of Spot UV
Yet again if your magazine is based around gardening then you may want to look into more natural looking uncoated paper stocks. Recycled paper being used in your publication may also appeal to the readers.
Who is the average reader of your publication? Depending on what you are selling and who your average reader is colour and font selections can be extremely important. For example, if your publications are advertising activities for the over 50’s then you are going to want to select softer colours and slightly larger font sizes to make sure those people who’s sight isn’t what it used to be can still see everything clearly.
Where are your publications going to be kept or most frequently viewed? The size of your publication can be extremely important as it won’t only set it apart as looking slightly different but for the practicality of where is it going to be kept. Going back to the example of the activities for over 50’s magazine, chances are they are going to want to take it out with them in the car or on walks. This means there is not point if it’s too big or bulky, it would need to be something fairly slim line and maybe around the A6/A5 kind of size. If your publication is for property, fashion or motoring then is it more like to take pride of place on the coffee table. Because of this you are going to want your publication to have a refined, established look to it. This can be created by using a high quality gloss/silk stock, quality binding (perfect bound) and by being a bit more robust size like A4 or maybe 210x210mm to be a bit different.
Perfect binding 101: As a process perfecting binding involves the inner pages of the publication being trimmed down to size as double sided sheets and then collated into page order. Depending on if the publication is landscape or portrait glue is applied to the left hand edge and a four page cover including a capacity spin is attached creating the finished publication.
Example of perfect binding
If you are lucky enough to be able to splash the cash a little for the production of your publication then there are numerous finishing options that you can look into which can massively enhance the look and appeal of your publication. I shall talk about these finishing options in more detail in another post but some examples are; Flood UV, Spot UV, Foil Blocking, Gloss/Matt laminating, Thermography and many others.
If you would like to learn more about how to make your publication to stand out from the crowd then please do not hesitate to contact us at CBF on 01242 237 652 or email info@cbfnet.co.uk.