How to Make a Brochure (Brochure Design Guide & Tips)

Summary: In this blog, we mainly focus on how to make a brochure. 6 steps are included. Besides, there are 8 tips for brochure best practices. With this guide, creating a unique brochure is just a breeze!

With various handy tools available, creating a brochure in today's world is no longer a daunting task. However, the real challenge is how to craft a professional brochure that grabs attention and convinces potential customers to delve deeper into a product or service.

Whether you're a small business owner, a marketer, or just someone eager to produce striking brochures for a personal endeavor, this 2023 guide on designing brochures is tailored for you.

You’ll learn 6 easy steps on how to make a brochure, together with 8 tips for successfully creating an eye-catching brochure. Now let’s dive in!

What Is a Brochure?

A brochure serves as a promotional tool designed to introduce a company, organization, products, or services while conveying the associated benefits to potential customers or the general public.

Although, initially, a brochure is a paper document that can be folded into a template, pamphlet, or leaflet, it can also be unfolded papers arranged in a pocket folder or packet, or it may exist in a digital format.

Digital Brochure v.s. Brochure Printing

Printable brochures still have their importance. They’re great for distribution at events or within physical stores. Moreover, for luxurious brands, the utilization of exquisite paper for printing product information and images is a highly impactful sales and marketing strategy.

Digital brochures bring numerous advantages to B2B brands. They can be effortlessly crafted, modified, and disseminated, boasting high shareability. You can enhance customer involvement by incorporating interactive features such as quizzes, checklists, graphs, and animations.

6 Steps on How to Make a Brochure

1. Define the Purpose and Target Audience

The first step is crucial to creating a brochure that will capture the audience’s attention and effectively convey the message you want.

You should consider the following 2 factors:

Know your target audience

Before you start your brochure design, you need to know who you're designing it for.

You can ask yourself the following questions:

● Who is your target audience?

● What are their needs and preferences?

● What information do they need to make a purchasing decision?

● Which type of brochure they prefer? A digital or printable?

By defining your target audience, you can make your message and design aligned with their specific needs and preferences. Thus, the content in your brochure can be more persuadable, making it easy to attract more potential customers.

Define the purpose

Defining the purpose can help you put emphasis on the important parts you want to highlight in your brochure. You can use these questions as guidelines:

● What goal do you want to achieve via your brochure? Is it to promote the brand awareness, persuade more customers to buy your products or services, or just introduce the new feature of your latest product?

● Do you want to provide information about your business or organization? Or do you want to invite people to an event?

2. Outline Your Content

Creating a brochure that effectively demonstrates its marketing goals requires engaging content that captures your target audience and inspires them to respond. If you're unsure about the content to incorporate into your brochure, consider the following examples, such as:

● A cover headline: The key element of any brochure, the headline should be succinct and attention-grabbing, and also relevant to the promoted product or service.

● Intro: This serves as the opening statement of your brochure, providing readers with an overview of your company’s mission and values.

● Comprehensive details about the product or service: This encompasses features, benefits, pricing, and other competitive information to persuade and differentiate your offering from competitors.

● Company website: Direct readers to your website for additional information about your products and services.

● Testimonials from satisfied customers: Integrating testimonials enhances trust and credibility among your target audience.

● Industry research and statistics: Reinforce your claims, bolster credibility, and provide context to users by incorporating relevant industry research and statistics.

3. Figure out the Key Visual Elements

Our brains tend to be more sensitive to visuals. Thus you can incorporate images and illustrations into your brochure to make it more engaging and captivating. There are some visual elements you can consider:

● Logo: It can help build brand recognition with your customers. Keep it unique and visually stunning.

● Images: Use high-quality images that are relevant to your message and appeal to your audience.

● Illustrations: These can effectively convey complex ideas or messages, and they can help your brochure stand out from competitors.

● Color: Choose colors that enhance your brand identity and make your message noticeable. Explore color palette ideas that align with your company's logo or website for a cohesive visual representation.

● Layout: Choose a layout that best fits your content and purpose.

4. Determine the Brochure Fold Format

Choosing an appropriate brochure fold can help your brochure work best. There are 3 common types of brochure fold formats.

● Bi-fold brochure format

A bi-fold brochure works well for conveying simple and concise messages or for presenting limited content. Additionally, it’s a good choice for a more formal or professional outlook.

● Tri-fold brochure format

This is widely favored, as its three columns provide an optimal structure for presenting detailed information in a concise format. This can be used for menus, events, and informational materials.

● Z-fold brochure format

Similar in size to a tri-fold brochure, a Z-fold brochure employs a distinct folding method. This design facilitates a seamless flow of information, guiding the reader from one panel to the next. It’s best for real estate brochures, travel guides, or product catalogs.

5. Create Your Brochure with a Brochure Maker

Now it’s time to start your brochure design. With Fotor's online brochure maker, creating a brochure has never been easier.

Instead of starting from scratch, you can choose from a wide selection of pre-made brochure templates. The templates are fully customizable and cover a range of themes, so you easily find the perfect design for your brochure. Additionally, you can easily add some elements like graphics, icons, illustrations, etc to personalize your brochure.

Below are some examples of Fotor’s brochure templates:

Here’s how to create a brochure using Fotor’s brochure maker:

1. Open Fotor, click the “Create a Design” button and select a “Brochure” template layout to start designing.
2. Browse Fotor’s brochure template library. Choose one you like and apply it.
3. Now, you can further customize the brochure template. Drag your photos and logo into the template, and replace the present text with your own messaging.
4. Change colors, backgrounds, fonts, and more to create the perfect look.
5. Once done, save and export your brochure design.

6. Export and Print the Brochure

Now that you have finished your brochure design, it comes to the final step. If you need a digital brochure, just export your brochure and save it in a high-quality format.

If you need to print your brochure design, you should choose the right paper based on your budget, deadline, and desired outcomes. The type of paper you choose will affect your brochure’s overall look and feel, as well as its durability and cost. So please be careful!

Brochure Ideas and Tips for Creating a Professional Brochure Design

Since you have known how to make a brochure, let us introduce some practical tips and ideas to help you make striking and competitive brochures. You can incorporate these ideas and tips into your brochure design based on your actual condition and needs.

• Put Readers First

Your brochure is designed for the target audience. So remember to put your readers in the first place. Use the tone and wording that your readers are favored of. If you have different audiences, create different versions of your brochure to appeal to their interests and preferences.

• Clear Call-to-Action

Whether is to promote brand awareness or persuade readers to purchase your products and services, your brochure is created for a certain purpose. So you must incorporate a clear call-to-action into the brochure. This can give readers an explicit guideline on what they should do after reading the brochure.

• Limit Your Fonts

The font selection is key to the readability of your brochure. Choose a simple-designed font and keep the consistency of different fonts. It’s recommended to use 2-3 types of fonts in a brochure. For some important parts like a headline or a section topic, you can use bold fonts to make them stand out.

• Enhance Credibility With Data Statistics

For those intricate but important information, transforming them into data visuals is an efficient way to convey the message, reinforce your claims, and increase credibility and authority. Must, remember to display the data statistics in a simple manner. A table or graphic is friendly for your audience to read.

• Keep Your Brochure Organized With Clear Sections

To keep your brochure neatly organized and highly logical, you can divide different parts into individual sections or paragraphs. Each section should include a general title.

• Simple Statements

Your target readers may not be experts in your business, and they may not have the patience to read every word in your brochure. Therefore, try to use short and concise expressions.

• Be Unique, Be Creative

To make your brochure stand out from your competitors, you should explore different layouts and styles of brochure templates, and merge your creative ideas into the template. A unique and creative brochure can be more attention-grabbing.

• Insert Appropriate Images and Illustrations

Inserting photos and illustrations in the right place can relieve the monotonicity of the text in your brochure. They are strong visuals that can add an interesting touch to your brochure design. Select the images and illustrations that are highly relevant to the theme and text in your brochure.

• Use Color Contrast to Highlight Content

The use of color contrast is of vital importance to highlight specific information. By using different colors, you can create a logical hierarchy that leads your audience to the content they need most. In particular, color contrast creates a visual impact and leaves a striking impression on readers.

Final Words

A well-designed brochure not only captivates the audience with visually appealing elements but also strategically organizes information for brand promotion and product marketing. Balancing aesthetics, concise content, and a clear call to action is essential for a successful brochure.

In this blog, we have provided you with steps and useful tips on how to make a brochure to engage your audience. Hope you find them helpful! Look no further, follow our guide, and effortlessly create an impactful brochure design to wow your readers.