The Mousetrap Series - Tips 21 thru 26

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by Matt Michel

PROLOGUE

They were a tribe of warriors. They were masters of the horse and masters of war. Through their tactical brilliance, they overcame the inferiority of their numbers to drive the Apache out of Texas and beat back the Spanish. The Utes called them "one who fights me all the time." The Utes called them Comanches. The Comanche warrior was one who fought all of the time.

The Comanche marketer is one who markets as fiercely, as brilliantly, and as relentlessly as the Comanche fought. The Comanche marketer is "one who markets all of the time."

The Mousetrap Series - Tips 21 thru 26

The Mousetrap Series Continues.

21. Pictures Trump Clip Art

Clip art has it's place, but the proliferation of clip art has done almost as much harm to graphic design as the emergence of 10,000 font CD-ROMs. While clip art has it's place, pictures trump clip art almost every time.

I used to test this by flipping open a yellow pages directory I had to the rental car section. There were two, nearly identical ads, side by side. One featured a line art drawing of a can. The other featured a gray scale image of a car. I asked people to pick the ad that caught their eye. Nine times out of ten, people picked the ad with the picture over the ad with the line art.

What holds for rental cars, holds even more for people. Use photographs and cut the image out of the background if necessary.

22. People Prefer Pictures of People

Contractors love trucks. There's nothing more appealing to a contractor than a great big shiny new service or installation truck. If you want contractors to look at your ad, put a truck in it. If you want people to look at it, put a person in it.

People are warm, friendly, and expressive. Trucks are cold and metallic. The same thing is true about condensing units, water heaters, and so on.

23. Extend Graphics Into The Page

Extending a graphic into the text on a page, which wraps around the graphic, makes the page more interesting. It links the graphic and the

text, adding a sense of harmony.

24. Continue The Lead Story of a Newsletter Inside

If you want people to open your newsletter, continue the lead story inside. It gives people a reason to opne the newsletter. This same tactic is used with every newspaper. Editors could easily cut the story to the first page, but they don't. They want you to open the paper.

25. Break Box Borders to Break Out of the Box

Borders make things nice and neat. They can also be confining and boring. Engineers love borders. Add visual interest by extending graphics or text outside of or past borders. It adds visual interest and can be used to direct people to focal points.

26. Look Into the Page Unless You Want Them to Read the Ad Next Door

If you've got a graphic, it should be pointed into your ad, not outside of it. Images of people should be looking into your ad. If images are directed off the page, you're leading the eye away from your ad, your copy,

your sales.

Since it helps to "see" examples, you might want to download a copy of the "Build a More Profitable Service Business" notes by clicking on the link below.

http://www.serviceroundtable.com/Freebi ... p?PCID=295

Source: Comanche Marketing. Reprinted by permission.

Free subscriptions are available at:

www.serviceroundtable.com -- click on the Comanche Marketing tab

Copyright © 2004 Matt Michel