Leaflets can be a great way to advertise your business and spread information about the products and services you provide. Leaflets are also a relatively cheap way of marketing your services.

The better designed and distributed your leaflets are, the more effective they will be in terms of boosting your business.

Designing the Leaflet

The design is key to whether someone picks up your leaflet or not. If it doesn’t look attractive and eye-catching, nobody will look at it, so all the information on it will be wasted.

If you can afford it, enlist the services of a professional designer and copywriter to produce your leaflet. You may think this is a wasted expense but it could dramatically increase the effectiveness of your leaflet and be a very worthwhile investment.

Here are some quick tips which cover the basics of marketing leaflets:

• Don’t skimp on colour. Coloured leaflets are far more eye-catching than black and white ones.
• Make sure the headline grabs attention. For example, “Cath’s hair salon provides cuts, colours and perms at fair prices” is much less attention-grabbing than “Say goodbye to bad hair days!”
• Use bullet points and short paragraphs for the text. People will not read reams of text.
• Use relevant images to add interest and reinforce your message.
• Make the leaflet clean and uncluttered. Filling every space will make it look confusing and off-putting.
• Include a call-to-action such as “Book before April and receive a free colour”, or “Introduce a friend and get 20% off your next haircut”.

Leaflet Distribution

Once you’ve designed a good leaflet you need to get it out there to people. There are a few ways to do it:

• Hand leaflets out in the street to passers-by
• Send them as a direct mail shot
• Slip them into magazines and papers (with permission)
• Place them on windscreens
• Leave them in public places such as cafes and cinemas. Again, you need permission and should choose places relevant to your target market.
• Use leaflet dispensers. Outdoor leaflet dispensers and indoor ones are available. Using an outdoor leaflet dispenser means nobody has to be there to distribute the leaflets. Only one is given at a time so there’s no waste or spillage. Outdoor leaflet dispensers cut down on litter and can be a great way to spread the message about your business if they are situated in a public places such as near a theatre, bus station or shopping centre.