Yes, of course you need some sort of “company brochure.” It will frequently be requested by outsiders and often be left behind by you or your staff as a calling card. Your own staff, any new recruits as well as potential staff will all expect you to have a brochure of some sort, but I feel it is unlikely to be the means to winning new business. I very much doubt that potential clients will make their selection of who to work with on the basis of the company brochure and I suspect that they will have a low probability of reading it. It is likely that it will be seen as a calling card at best which is filed for reference or as junk and filed in the recycling bin at worst.
The process of putting together a brochure is not an easy one. It can take months or even years and evoke all sorts of passions within a company (it can also bring out company rifts too!). Not forgetting the expense incurred by the company – the hours in discussion re the design, the arguments re the budget, the quality of the print, the presentation format and even the actual quantity required!
At the end of this massive process when the numerous boxes of brochures do finally arrive in their hundreds at your office, one question that can arise is………..”what do we do with them now!?” This is because more often that not no thought has been given to this as the focus was given solely to the look and content forgetting the actual application!
What tends to happen is that someone decides to just send them out and or give them out willy nilly to avoid the boxes cluttering up the office so these expensive documents are mass mailed to all and sundry, and guess what…….nothing happens! Not a thank you. Not a congratulatory note and not a whisper of new business.
Another common problem with the company brochure in my experience is that they tend to be written in house and contain lots of “we do…..” and “the team does…..” showcasing what the organisation does rather than show what help and benefit the organisation brings.
I’m not meaning to come across as some sort of grumpy old man here. I’m just passing on my experience in the hope that this article might help you sit back before rushing in and spending thousands on something that could go to waste!
So what does Bath Marketing Consultancy suggest you do when it comes to the company brochure? Well, to be honest the answer to this is something that might be better discussed over a coffee, but I feel that the planning and production of the company brochure should be seen as a necessary starting point in a process of producing a range of print material for the company. The thinking should be extended maybe to the corporate ID and general design issues like signage and stationery. Once the decision process about the brochure has been got out of the way, the real creative thinking can start which is where you aim at producing genuinely client orientated, helpful marketing material that will be collectable rather than binable!
