Printing

Print Still Matters: Why Consistent Branding in Print Materials Is Essential In a world full of digital media, it’s easy to overlook the power of print — but for small and mid-sized businesses, printed materials still play a crucial role in creating strong, lasting impressions. Print offers a sense of credibility and reliability, which helps build trust with your audience. From business cards and brochures to yard signs and invoices, every printed piece your business puts into the world is a direct reflection of your brand. Consistency Builds Credibility and Recognition  That’s why consistent branding across all your print materials is so important. When your business card matches the look and feel of your brochures, signage, and even your invoices, it helps build trust and recognition. Customers are more likely to remember your business — and take it seriously — when everything looks polished and cohesive. Think of your printed materials as the “leave-behind” that sticks with people long after the conversation ends. A well-designed business card can spark a follow-up call. A professionally printed brochure can turn a maybe into a yes. Even your invoice, with a clear logo and consistent font, reinforces your professionalism and brand identity. Make a Big Impact with Small Details Small and mid-sized businesses don’t need massive marketing budgets to make an impact — just attention to detail and a commitment to consistency. Matching colors, fonts, logos, and messaging across all formats creates a seamless experience that makes your business look confident and credible. Print materials are memorable, tangible, and create multiple opportunities for customer engagement and they allow consumers to browse your full range of products in a relaxing, physical format. Print Works Well with Digital At the end of the day, print doesn’t compete with digital — it complements it. Adding QR codes, website URLs, and social handles to your print materials bridges the gap and drives people to your online presence. In short, print is far from dead. It’s a trusted, proven tool that builds connections, credibility, and brand visibility in a hands-on way. When done right, print makes a lasting impression and helps your business stand out in a noisy, fast-scrolling world.

Print is More Memorable & Trustworthy Than Other Forms of Advertising Print Remains a Powerful Medium Despite the rapid growth of digital media, print continues to stand strong as an essential and effective marketing channel. While it may not be the latest trend, print’s enduring benefits make it indispensable. One of the key advantages of print is its tangibility. Unlike digital media, print can be held, passed around, and revisited at any time. With the influx of emails and online advertisements, homeowners’ mailboxes are less cluttered, increasing the likelihood that your print advertisement or publication will be seen and remembered. Print Inspires Trust Trust in advertising is crucial, and print consistently outperforms digital in this area. According to a MarketingSherpa survey, 82% of U.S. internet users trust print ads more than any other form of advertising when making a purchase decision. This level of trust may stem from print’s long-standing reputation for reliability and the permanence of seeing something physically printed. As a result, using print media can lend your brand a sense of credibility and authenticity that is difficult to achieve through digital-only campaigns. Print Reaches Key Audiences Print still holds a special place in the hearts of many, especially among certain demographics. Recent research on directory advertising reveals that 46% of people start their local searches in print rather than online. Additionally, the majority of these print users are in the 55+ age group—a demographic that controls 75% of the nation’s wealth. This makes print a valuable tool for reaching an audience with significant purchasing power, ensuring your message gets in front of the right people. Print Is More Memorable Studies also show that print leaves a more lasting impression than digital media. People are more likely to recall information they’ve read in print than information consumed on a screen. This could be due to the multi-sensory experience print provides—its weight, texture, and permanence make it easier for readers to engage with and retain the content. What’s more, printed materials often have a longer lifespan; magazines and brochures can sit on a coffee table or desk, giving them multiple opportunities to be viewed. Harness the Power of Print Print media offers a versatile array of opportunities for reaching your target audience. From direct mail campaigns to trade shows, directories, conferences, newspapers, and magazines, print can be used in many different settings, amplifying your brand’s message. When combined with digital efforts, print becomes even more impactful. At the end of the day, print’s ability to inspire trust, reach key audiences, and provide a memorable experience ensures that it remains one of the most effective and lasting marketing channels available. By investing in print, you can harness its timeless power to connect with your audience in a meaningful, trustworthy, and enduring way.

High Resolution Images Versus Low Resolution Images When working with photos, it is important to know that there is a difference between how they look online versus how they look when they are in print. That is because digital media works differently than print media. This can be confusing, because the world of digital photography has made it so easy to take photos and post them online. A photo can look great on your computer screen, or on your phone’s Facebook feed, yet when it is printed out, that very same photo might look blurry or choppy. The reason for this difference between online photos and printed photos is in the resolution of the image. Resolution describes the amount of detail an image has. The higher the resolution, the more detail. Photos that are intended for online viewing don’t need nearly as high resolution as photos intended for print. In fact, low resolution images are actually preferred for online, since they take up less file space and load more quickly. But, these low resolution images are very difficult for designers trying to make them look good in print. One quick way to know if a photo is going to look pixelated in print is to zoom in on it. If it starts to look blurry or choppy as you zoom in, that’s a good indication that it is a low resolution image: fine for online, but not so good for print. About Resolution, Pixels, & Dots per Inch Also, some basics about resolution might help you decide if your photo is fit to print. There are a couple of terms people use to describe resolution. One of them is “pixel.” Pixels are used to describe how much detail or information an image has. The more pixels, the more detail. When an image doesn’t have a high amount of pixels, it will appear “pixelated,” where the image looks like a bunch of squares joined together. (Kind of like the earliest video games used to look!) With printed images, a common term people use to describe resolution is DPI, or “dots per inch,” referring to the tiny dots on paper that make up an image. A pixel in a digital image is the equivalent of a dot in a printed one. Many online photos are 72 DPI, and they look really good on a computer monitor or a phone screen. However, 72 DPI is considered low resolution for print media, and would look blurry and pixelated when printed. If you want a photo to look sharp and vivid when printed, a general rule of thumb is that it should be at least 300 DPI. To give you an idea of the size of file a high resolution photo would be, a 3 x 5 inch photo, at 300 DPI, is usually about 1 MB (megabyte), while a full page photo, at 300 DPI, is usually about 3 MB. Sometimes it can be easier to figure out the size of photo you need by measuring your pixels. If you don’t mind a little math, you can convert from pixels to DPI pretty easily, to help you with sizing your photo. For example, if you want a 4 x 6 inch printed photo to have 300 DPI, your photo would need to be 1200 (4 x 300) pixels on its short side, and 1800 pixels (6 x 300) on its long side. So, it needs to be at least 1200 x 1800 pixels in size. When in Doubt, Save In Higher Resolution When in doubt, if you know your photo is going to be used for print, save it in the highest resolution format you can. Your graphic designer can always reduce the size of your photo, but it’s very hard to increase the size and the resolution, while maintaining the quality. And while viewing and sharing photos online is quick, fun, and easy, there is nothing like having that same photo in a more permanent format like print, either for an advertisement or for your own personal memories. At Total Local, because our directories are printed, we will need high resolution images and artwork. So please send us your highest resolution logo and photos. We usually cannot pull images from your website or facebook pages and use them in print, because they normally are lower resolution for online media. If you have any questions about whether or not a photo or artwork is high enough resolution, please open it in a photo viewer to look at the dimensions, pixels or DPI. When in doubt, the higher the file size, the higher the resolution. For photos, anything less than one megabyte is usually too low resolution for print. If you have any questions about your files, one of our sales representatives will be happy to assist you.