Type:
One space between sentences. The use of proportionally spaced fonts
works best when only one space is used between any punctuation such as
periods, colons, exclamation marks, question marks, quotation marks. Extra
spaces will effect the kerning of your material.
Periods and commas are always placed inside the quotation marks.
Colons and semicolons are placed outside the quotation marks. Question marks
and exclamation points may be placed either inside or out, depending upon
whether they belong to the quoted material.
Periods outside the parenthesis. Period should be inside only when
statement stands by itself.
Don't underline. You should use italic type or bold if you wish to
emphasize a word.
Avoid all capital letters. All caps are more
difficult to read.
Never space your text with a spacebar. Use tabs to
align your text.
Serif type is more best for text. Sans serif type is
more legible and best used for headlines.
Indicate a dash with two (--)
hyphens.
Spell out numbers below 10.
Ellipses: Must have
four dots if ending a sentence, three if signifying an omission of text.
If your type will be used in a
page layout program by any professional, the following additional hints
will minimize the time required to prepare your final product:
Don't use hard hyphens. The professional will undoubtedly have a
different text flow than that on your printer.
Do not use tabs to indent
lines. Most professionals will assign a "style" to ensure that
indents are handled properly in keeping with your document.
Most of us
tend to format text so it prints exactly like we want on our own printer. A
professional will need to remove any hard-formatting used on paragraphs.
The use of "styles" in your word-processing program will serve you
best in the long run, although the learning curve may be a little more
steep.
Direct Mail:
Make your message clear and concise.
Always compose copy in the active tense.
Offer
a benefit. Make your benefits credible — don't promise the moon — and include at least one
benefit in
your headline.
Involve the reader
in your offer. Personalize when feasible.
Ask for action. Facilitate
action by including a business reply card, a fax-back form, your e-mail address
link,
or whatever would easily enable direct contact.
Break
large blocks of copy into smaller ones to facilitate reading.
Keep the layout
simple. For economical printing projects, keep the color scheme and
design clear and simple. Too many colors can create distracting and unreadable
design.
Don't forget your envelopes. The
experts report that the standard white envelope with a first class tamp and no
return address results in high response rates. If you use color, the traditional colors are red and blue.
You may also consider using vivid colors such as yellow, orange or pink.
However, the choice of color should be appropriate to the product being
offered. A variety of special effects may be used, such as rubber stamp
effects or post-it notes.
