Good Design, Visual Memory & Marketing
By Michele Alise
 Your product or service is the starring attraction of your business, and after spending countless hours perfecting it, you want potential customers to choose it because of its excellence, value, and/or the exemplary customer service that backs it; and although a quality product stands on its own, unless yours has reached the 'household name' status, you probably need more exposure and a memorability factor to reach the sort of sales you'd like.
This is where the marriage of good design, dynamic, relevant copy, and targeted advertising come in. This article will focus on the Design element, so let's begin by talking about how it functions and what it can do for you.
Some of the intrinsic benefits of good design are that it:
• Grabs Your Readers' Attention
• Enhances the Virtues of Your Product or Service
• Speaks The Language of Your Audience
• Backs Up Your Message
• Directs the Viewer's Eye to Key Points
• Assists in the Assimilation of the Information
Design plays on the sensibilities of visual memory, which is quicker, more receptive and more dominant than word memory. In fact, it's been proven scientifically that visual memory far exceeds the brain's capacity to remember text. (If you're the inquisitive type, here's a fascinating study "Neural Correlates of the Episodic Encoding of Pictures and Words".)
The premise is really very simple and you've heard it a million times...
"A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words"
Have you ever read a restaurant review with no photographs? or worse, with food slopped onto a plate in a displeasing way? How about a mailer so crammed full of 'Deals of the Week', banners and colors that your brain went into immediate overload?
Not me...I left long before I ever started reading. You get the picture... "file this".
In contrast, think about a children's picture book, especially ones with pop-ups or texture. They're short, interactive, and to the point. Before you start rolling your eyes, I'm not suggesting that your customers have the mentality of a 2-year-old, only that humans desire to be visually pleased and that we don't want to have to 'process' inordinate amounts of data on a continual basis.
The right balance of technical information with a good amount of eye candy helps your readers comprehend your message quickly and completely, which is where they need to be in order to decide how to act upon the information. And what your reader doesn't see is often equally important, in other words, the eye needs a rest from all that visually appealing, technically rich content. Text must be easy to read, consistent, and well-balanced with imagery, color, and white space.
I'm likely to retain a nicely designed advertisement even if I'm not in the market for the product for the mere fact that it looks too good to throw away, and the longer it lingers around my house, the more likely I am to remember what was in it. On the flip side, 'bad' design like the one I spoke of earlier (you remember - the one you used as kindling in the fire) puts potential customers off from taking action likely because of too much information, too many choices, or a lack of confidence in the product.
If someone's got to take an ad into the bathroom just to finish reading it...
how likely is it going to get read?
In A Nutshell
Consistent, visually-pleasing design creates a sense of familiarity, trust & confidence and this is, of course, By Design. Combined with dynamic, relevant copy, targeted marketing, and backed by excellent customer service, your product will stay longer in the thoughts and on the lips of your audience, and thus has a better chance of converting to sales now and in the long term. Improve upon the design of your marketing materials and your advertising will end up paying for itself.
About the Author
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| Michele Alise, Flux Appeal Design
Los Angeles, CA 90067
323-412-0664
If you would like to re-print this article, please contact the author.
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