Whether you’re designing a banner to promote your business, celebrate a special occasion or another purpose, there are a lot of things you need to consider before placing your order. Even if you have experience designing brochures, leaflets and other forms of signage and print marketing collateral, there are plenty of crucial aspects of effective banner design that many people tend to neglect.
What makes banners different from other printed materials is that in order to be effective, banners need to convey their messages quickly and from a distance. For this reason, there are certain design elements that need to be emphasized, such as the graphics and text you use. So, what types of graphics and text should you place on your banner?
In most cases, the goal for a banner is to attract attention from a distance, therefore it’s important that you do everything you can to design your banner in such a way that it quickly catches the eyes of street or foot traffic. If you want your banner to be effective, then you should always use high-quality graphics and photos. Images are often used as a focal point, enticing passersby to glance in the direction of your banner and read your message. Make sure to always use high-resolution images so your graphics don’t blur or pixelate. Check to see if your images adhere to the correct art specs. If you think your image is poor quality, let us know and one of our design consultants will be happy to assist you.
Again, the aim of most banners is to attract attention from a distance. Because of this, you’ll need to make sure that any text on your banner is written in a large, readable font. If your text is too small, it’s unlikely that anyone will be able to read your message unless they’re standing right next to your banner or have a pair of binoculars handy.
However, it’s not just the size of your text that’s important. You also need to consider the type of font you’re using, along with the weight. There are literally hundreds of thousands of different fonts and it can be tempting to choose a font that’s artistic and fancy, but when it comes to banners, readability is important. In most cases, bold sans-serif fonts will be easier to read and see from afar than serif fonts.
Most importantly, remember to keep your message as short and simple as possible. The reason for this is because your banner needs to be able to communicate your message in as little time as possible as most of the people who will see it will be driving or walking by. These people won’t have time to read paragraphs of text, so you should give your message some thought and remove anything that isn’t necessary.