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tag:business.tutsplus.com,2005:/posts Envato Tuts+ Business 2016-05-26T12:55:11Z tag:business.tutsplus.com,2005:PostPresenter/cms-26474 10 Business Letterhead Design Tips (With Killer Brand Identity Examples)
Emails may be the standard means of written communication these days, but there are still occasions when only a printed letter will do. They feel particularly relevant now—in our digital-saturated age a delivered letter speaks volumes about the extra effort you're willing to put in to impress new clients.

Colorful Letterhead Template

Letterheads come in a range of styles and layouts, and are the cornerstone of a branded stationery set. Whether you're looking to design something more formal, edgy or unusual, you'll find these ten tips for designing letterheads essential reading before you begin.

When you're ready to design your own business letterhead, this tutorial shows you how you can create a complete branded stationery kit in Adobe InDesign.

We feature a number of great brand identity examples with creative stationary throughout this tutorial. So, you can grab the right one for your business needs. You can also browse a huge range of professional stationery templates on Envato Market to find something you can customize in a flash!

 1. Where to Start? Go for Simple Shapes...

If you find yourself looking at a blank piece of paper and willing it to transform into a showstopping letterhead design, you might want to consider going back to basics first.

A letterhead isn't a show-stealer—whereas you might design your website or business card to give it the real wow factor, a letterhead can be trickier to design as it's not intended to be as showy. After all, the focus of the letter should be the text content, whether that's a cover letter to a new employer or an introduction letter to a new client. The letterhead's design serves to frame the text content in a professional way, without being too distracting.

However, that's not to say that you can't be creative with your business letterhead designs. Rather, try to aim for a minimal design that's stylish yet subtle.

Simple, geometric shapes are great for adding a splash of color and style to your letterhead. If you already have a logo, why not try lifting a shape from the logo design to repeat in a pattern across a corner? Or why not take a simple shape like a triangle or diamond and repeat across the bottom of your letterhead, varying the size and applying your brand colors, like in this geometric letterhead template?

Geometric Letterhead Template

If you're short on time, or need to produce something that's a little more on the corporate side, geometric shapes are instant crowd-pleasers.

This tutorial will take you through step-by-step on how to create a geometric letterhead in Adobe InDesign:

Print Design

Create a Branded Resumé, Letterhead and Business Card in Adobe InDesign

Grace Fussell

 2. No Color Printer? No Problem!

OK, let's think practically for a moment. It's all very well designing a letterhead in an array of brilliant colors and finishes, but if you're designing these for a working office you might find that in-office printers are going to diminish the quality of your designs.

So, what's the solution if the company you're designing for only have practical access to non-color printing?

There's no need to shudder—you can easily create a letterhead design that will work equally well for color and non-color printing. Bright colors can appear dull and greyed out when printed on non-color printers, so aim for a strong monochrome design instead.

Don't be tempted to apply huge chunks of black across your business letterhead—if the printer's a bit dodgy these can appear lined or pixelated. Go for bold linear pattern instead. This stylish monochrome template shows how you can achieve a high-end, Art Deco-inspired style by using repetitive black lines. It's deceptively simple, but looks fantastic, and would work particularly well for retail brands or hotel businesses.

Monochrome Patterned Letterhead

 3. Looking for Something More 'Start-up'?

This might not be the best fit for a legal firm or an accountancy practice, but ultra-colorful designs can look amazing when matched with the right sort of company.

Technology and computing firms, start-ups and creative agencies can appear more forward-thinking and futuristic with a bold color choice. Even utilities companies can appear more optimistic and customer-friendly with a rainbow of brights at the top of bills and invoices.

Organic, curvy graphics are a perfect match for bright color. Also, a 3D style, with highlights, shadows and gradients, can look really impressive and help you stand out in a sea of flat design styles.

If you want to use a rainbow spectrum of color, avoid looking like you've gone crazy with paint by limiting it to just three or four related colors. This brand identity example with a colorful letterhead template shows how to achieve the vibrant look without compromising on style—a blend of curvy shapes is restricted to a palette of yellow, orange, pink and blue to keep it from looking too busy.

Colorful Abstract Letterhead Template

 4. Apply a Strong Brand Design

Before you really get started with designing your letterhead, you need to have some basic but essential elements in place. If you have a strong brand design already to hand, you've got very little work to do—a visually striking logo and bold brand colors will be more than enough to start working with.

If you don't have a logo and color palette, consider creating these for your letterhead. If you're a freelancer and getting started with creating your own stationery, a logo, however simple, with your name and/or business name, is worth spending a little time on creating.

A quick and simple way to create your own personal logo is to write your own name, or set it in a handwritten font. This gives an instant personal edge to your stationery. This tutorial shows you how to use this technique to create a personal brand that you can use on resumes, letterheads and business cards:

Resumes

How to Design a Creative Resume

Grace Fussell

Once you have your logo you can add personality and professionalism by teaming it with a great color combination. Seek out pairs of colors that complement each other and also give off the right signals about your industry and position in the market. For example, yellow and black/slate grey is an ultra-stylish combination with a masculine edge. This branded letterhead template would look great for a creative agency or web design company.

Branded Business Letterhead Template

Other tried-and-tested color combinations to use are blue with white (perfect for tech firms), red with black (a strong, go-getting combination for grabbing attention), and neon or pastel with black (a hip combination that is jarring in just the right way). See our take on a retro-feeling red/white combination in action with our step-by-step guide to creating a brand identity from scratch:

Logo Design

Team Awesome: From Hand-Lettered Logotype to Vector in Adobe Illustrator

Roberlan Borges

 5. Go Retro with the Right Typography

What could be more old-school (in a good way) than receiving a typewritten letter in the post? Play up the vintage appeal of opening a printed letter by using typefaces, layout styles and colors that reference times gone by.

I'm not suggesting you go all-out antique (although if you're running a vintage store or a hipster coffee shop, then why not?), but a subtle reference to the golden age of secretarial letters, the 1950s and 1960s, will add a retro, stylish edge to your letterheads.

Typography is key to achieving this look. Typewriter fonts come in many forms, some more novel than stylish, so look for typefaces that have a geometric style, without aged effects to keep it looking slick. Manson is great for giving headers and logos a look that would be worthy of the International Style, while Source Code Pro is a legible, simple take on the typewriter style.

Don't let the retro style drift into novelty territory by keeping your business letterhead design minimal. Take inspiration from this subtly retro letterhead design—include plenty of white space and stick to a simple two-tone color palette.

Retro-Style Letterhead Template

This rusty peach looks great contrasted with a strong black. Positioning color imperfectly behind the header also adds to the 60s letterpress-style look.

 6. Use a Watermark

With border or corner designs on your letterhead, it sometimes feels like there still isn't enough room for the text. If you have a tendancy to write long letters, or would rather just not reduce further the amount of space available on the page, a watermark is a fantastic solution for adding color and graphics without sacrificing space.

It's also a great solution for the dodgy office printing situation (see item 2, above) where you might not even be able to print to the trim edge of the page. Position a watermark in the dead center of the page and there's no chance of elements of your design being chopped off by the printer.

Watermarks may be one of the oldest stationery tricks in the book but there's an art to getting them right. Too dark and they can obscure text, too pale and they can lack impact.

What I recommend is that you set the transparency or tint of your watermark to much paler than you would first expect. A 5-10% color tint will look just right, even if it appears very pale on screen.

Adding a paper texture background behind the watermark and setting the transparency mode of the graphic to multiply will also pull through some nice texture and add interest and a tactile quality to your letterhead, whatever paper you print on.

Lifting graphic elements from a logo is the perfect starting point for a watermark design. This branded letterhead template lifts the chain-link shape of the company's logo, and pales the color to a pleasing soft pink.

Branded Letterhead with Watermark

 7. Know When to Keep it Simple

Not every company will suit a look-at-me letterhead; sometimes the simplest designs will be a more suitable choice for corporate businesses.

Don't get carried away if you're tasked with creating a letterhead for a business. You may well be able to create stunning graphics and artful typography, but will that sort of look actually suit the business you are designing for?

If the company is likely to share written correspondence with legal or financial firms, it may not be appropriate to use a letterhead adorned with metallics, bright colors or quirky illustrations. It takes a brave designer to do something really creative, but an even braver one to create something elegant and minimal instead.

Minimal Letterhead Template

But don't assume that simple has to mean boring—minimal styles require extra precision and time to perfect, and the result can be beautiful. This ultra-simple letterhead template shows how restraint can be a strong and appropriate look for a more formal letterhead.

Minimal Letterhead Template

In your own designs, limit yourself to just a few key elements for your clean design—one color, one logo, and a simple border or trim. Position the text content of the letter off-center to increase the amount of white space on the page, and visually declutter the layout.

 8. Fun Company? Make a Fun Letterhead!

If you're lucky enough to be given a letterhead design brief by somebody really fun (whether that's a creative agency, or yourself!), you need to ignore all the advice I just shared in item 7, above.

If you're designing for a creative, young company, like an agency or retailer, they might use written correspondence to share information about promotions and events with customers. For this, they're going to want to have a letterhead that really catches the eye.

This is the perfect opportunity for you to flex your creative muscles and design a letterhead that balances the optimism of the brand with an on-trend design.

Flat graphics are a great way of bringing color into a design while keeping the layout looking fresh and contemporary. This playful brand identity example with a fun letterhead template uses repetitive, curvy elements with a retro-inspired color palette and a flat design style.

Colorful Circle Stationery Template

Just allowing the graphics to peek out from the corners of the letterhead keeps the layout fun but conservative on space. This sort of design would suit a children's retail company or a youthful food brand down to the ground. It's also super-simple to achieve, involving repeated shapes. It's the flat style and trendy color palette that keeps the design looking young and exciting.

Looking for something even more fun? This tutorial shows you how to create a complete stationery set for Professor X's School for Gifted Youngsters:

Fan Art

How to Create a Stationery Set for Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters

Grace Fussell

 9. Use Borders with (Extreme!) Caution

It all starts out innocently enough—wouldn't a nice border frame my letterhead just so? True, borders can add a beautiful finishing touch to a layout, but their impact can be severely diminished by the restraints of in-house printing.

Unless you're planning on professionally printing your letterheads and having them carefully trimmed, avoid a trim-edge border at all costs. In-house printing can result in a wobbly, off-centered border or, even worse, a partial or lopped-off border that makes the letter look sloppy.

If you'd still like to take advantage of the framing qualities of a border, place your border on the margin (not the trim) edge, allowing it to frame just the text sitting within. Keep the border thin and minimal to avoid restricting your letter and making text appear constrained.

Bordered Letterhead Template

This bordered letterhead is a nice compromise—a trim-edge border looks fantastic if you have the budget and patience for professional printing and trimming. If the outside border gets lopped off by the office printer, there'll be no need for tears; the inside border will remain and it looks particularly elegant teamed with footnote icons and a ribbon logo draped over the top edge.

Bordered Letterhead Template

 10. Repeat Elements Across a Stationery Set

If you're making the effort to create a branded letterhead for your own personal business or that of a client (and believe me, it's worth the effort!), you really should consider extending your design across a complete stationery set.

This may sound like a lot of work, but it's actually relatively simple to do once you've pinned down a brand 'look' for your letterhead. As we looked at earlier, geometric shapes are really easy to design, look incredibly effective and are versatile enough to repeat across other items, like envelopes and business cards.

Once you have the basic stylistic elements of your letterhead in place, such as graphics, pattern, color and a logo, repeat these elements across other stationery designs. Switching up the color is a great way to add interest while maintaining a consistent look; or why not take inspiration from this branded stationery set, and subtly tweak the scale and position of shapes to create a unified design?

Modern Blue Squares Stationery Set

Promoting consistency across all of your stationery items really is an extra-special touch that will make your 'brand' appear incredibly professional and pulled together.

Go Forth and Create an Amazing Letterhead

While letterheads might not be as high on your business to-do list as designing a logo or website, it will become one of the hardest-working items in your branded arsenal. Written letters tend to mark some of the most defining moments in your business, whether that's introducing yourself to that much sought-after client or establishing contact with a partner business or networking contact.

Geometric Letterhead Template

When these seminal moments come along, you'll be glad that you spent the time creating and refining a beautiful, professional letterhead that you can use time and again.

However, if you don't have the time to create a letterhead from scratch, that's no problem! You can customize a ready-made template from the great selection of stationery templates over on Envato Market. Simple tweaks like adjusting color or typeface can personalize a template and make it unique to your brand.

Do you have any tips for creating branded stationery or brand identities you'd like to share? We'd love to hear them! Share your accounts of successes (and mistakes!) in the comments below.

 2016-05-26T12:55:11.000Z 2016-05-26T12:55:11.000Z Grace Fussell tag:business.tutsplus.com,2005:PostPresenter/cms-26584 Is It Time to Start Your Own Business? 25 Revealing Questions
To start your own business, you need more than a dream. Sure, a dream is where it all begins, but having a clear understanding of what it really takes will help ensure your success as a new business owner.

Statistically, many new businesses have a hard time getting off the ground. According to the Small Business Administration (SBA), which pulls it's data from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, about one-third of businesses will fail during their first two years. And that number continues to climb during the first ten years of a new business, as the SBA states:

About half of all new establishments survive five years or more and about one-third survive 10 years or more.

Okay, so the stats can be downright bleak, with the initial years of any new business being a struggle for survival, but that shouldn't deter you.

Just the opposite: These stats should motivate you to ask yourself the tough questions. So you can make an intelligent decision about whether the time is right for you to start a business? Or, if your venture has what it needs to make it? When you know what you're up against as a new business owner, your chances of succeeding drastically increase.

Business ownership brings many benefits like:

independence

being your own boss

setting your own hours and schedule

being in control of your company growth and how much you make

That's why it pays to start your own business.

But are you ready? Do you have the mindset, resources, and skills it takes to start a business? The benefits of building a successful business are clear, but with so many business failing to gain traction in the marketplace, what will make your's succeed?

Here are the 25 questions to ask yourself beforehand, so you can make sure you're prepared to start a business, and take the necessary actions that will help ensure your success.

Is it time to start your own business?

 1. Can You Afford to Take the Risk?

Let's get one thing straight immediately: Starting your own business is a risk. It's risky to quit your day job, and give up your regular paycheck, to try your hand at something with no guarantee of success.

If you have some savings in the bank, no dependents and are single, then this calculated risk could well prove to be an adventure worth chasing. If you have a family depending on you, then it's still viable to start a successful business, but your risk factors are different. In either case, you want to make sure you weigh the risks first before getting started.

Our guide to determining if risk is worth it can help you make a better decision.

Management

Is Your Project Worth the Risk?

Lisa Jo Rudy

 2. Are You Independent Enough?

Starting a business means that you'll be your own boss. It's liberation, of course, but it's also being self-sufficient. So ask yourself the sobering question of whether or not you're capable of making decisions confidently on your own, without always having someone sign off on them.

If you feel like you can trust your instincts and aren't afraid of being wrong or getting rejected sometimes, then starting a business could be for you.

 3. Are You Passionate About a Product or Service?

Do you truly believe that you have a product or service that has huge demand in the marketplace, but no one's yet thought to bring it to market? Having a brilliant, creative vision for something the market craves is the hallmark of entrepreneurship.

If you know that your idea for a product or service is going to be an in-demand item, then it may be time to open your own business.

 4. Do You Hate Your Job or Feel Stuck at Your Current Job?

Perhaps no other barometer is as accurate for determining opening your own business than how you feel about your current employment situation. Going to work each day and slogging through a job where you can't stand your boss, co-workers or duties is no way to live.

If you hate working where you work now, then starting your own business can be the long sought-after solution.

 5. Are You Able to Organize Yourself Well?

Running your own business is no walk in the park: It'll be an operation that requires structure and efficiency, even as you start out as a small business with only you as the sole owner/employee.

If you know you're well-organized, know how to prioritize tasks, and manage your time excellently, then entrepreneurship could be for you.

Our productivity guide can get you started in the right direction:

Productivity

What Is Productivity?

Annie Mueller

 6. Is Your Industry Stagnating?

In the wake of the huge economic depression which we're still feeling the effects of, has your industry recovered?

If your job is in an industry that's just treading water, and you can't find a job (or have to take one with less pay because you're overqualified for it), then you may want to take a hard at starting your own business.

 7. Are You a Planner and Thinker?

Entrepreneurs, solopreneurs and anyone starting their own business love to think. It's just a fact of life, as starting a business requires lots of strategizing, creativity, and planning.

If you want to finally act on your ambitious thoughts and plans, then it may be time to quit the daily rat race and open your own business.

 8. Can You Free up Enough Time?

Starting your own business is a huge commitment—if you truly want to succeed! Think of it like a marriage, only with even more devotion. To succeed in your first few years, you'll have to work 12-hour (or more) days for many days of the week, and this isn't ideal if you have a family or commitments.

If you feel, nonetheless, that you could shift around your schedule to free up enough time for your new venture, then running a business may be a good fit.

 9. Do You Want to Help People?

Part of starting your own business is a sincere desire to help people. The product or service you're going to bring to market will solve someone's problem, so there's definitely an altruistic side to running a business.

If such a selfless desire can keep you going through the highs and lows of being a new business owner, then you may be ready.

 10. Can You Negotiate Well?

Being a great negotiator is essential to being a business owner. As the owner of a startup in particular, you'll need to negotiate everything from your rates and contract to your lease, should you occupy an actual physical location.

If bartering and meeting people in the middle sounds like what you already do well, then it may be time to start your own business, too.

 11. Are You Persuasive?

Mastering the art of persuasion is key to running a business since you need to convince leads, customers, partners and those in your industry that your product or service solves an essential problem. This entails in-person networking, meetings and perhaps even the odd public-speaking engagement at an event or showcase.

If you know you can persuade people to see things your way, then consider opening your own business.

 12. Do You Have the Creativity?

Starting a business takes creativity. If your business is an agency or other creative enterprise, then that goes double. Too many people know what it's like to be in an office environment where their creative ideas are underappreciated or just dismissed.

If you know you have the creativity it takes to start a business, then read our guide to the Creative Economy for excellent inspiration:

Creativity

7 Business Ideas to Make Money in The Creative Economy

Celine Roque

 13. What Is the Nature of Your Business?

Business is so much about branding. Without a crystal clear indication of who you are and what product or service you provide, it'll be hard to stand out in the market. By understanding what type of business you are (agency, creative, startup, etc.), you're that much closer to successful branding.

To help narrow down what business you want to run, read our tutorial on simplifying your business ideas:

Ideation

How to Simplify Your Business Ideas

Celine Roque

 14. Who Is Your Target Market?

Determining to whom you're going to sell your product or service is fundamental to business success. Your product or service will solve a problem for one, particular demographic, and knowing this will help you advertise to them more effectively.

See our tutorial on selling to your target market to help you excel in this ambition:

Freelance

How to Find Out Exactly What Your Target Clients Want—Then Sell It to Them

Celine Roque

 15. What Exactly Is Your Product or Service?

When you know what type of business you want to start and what problem you want to help people solve, then you'll have a better idea of what your product or service is going to be. Do you want to provide creative services for people? Will you be an agency doing design or development work for your customers?

When you know the exact nature of your product or service, you can start your own business with more confidence.

 16. What Is Your Unique Selling Proposition?

Every business requires a unique selling proposition, which is the great differentiator between you and your competitors, explaining what your brand, product or service can offer your customers that no one else in the entire marketplace can.

If you can articulate what sets apart your business from all the others in your industry, then you have a leg up when starting your own business.

 17. From Where Will You Run Your Business?

These days, small businesses can be run out of the home quite easily if they provide creative services like web design. Decide if you can get away with running your business from a dedicated home office, or if you need a physical space to get clear on your business structure.

If you're leaning toward working from home, then our guide to starting a freelance web-design business will prove helpful:

Freelance

9 Steps to Starting Your Freelance Web Design Business

David Horn

 18. Will You Need Some Employees to Help You?

When you're starting out as a small business, it's necessary to save money and try to do everything yourself. However, when you become profitable and realize that delegating can free you up to running your business more efficiently, it may be wise to consider hiring some employees, if you can afford them.

If you have a good idea about how much work you can handle yourself, then you may be ready to run your own business.

 19. What Are Your Startup Costs?

Understanding how much money you have to invest in your startup goes a long way to helping you plan for sustainability. If you have an online business or work from home, you won't have traditional overhead costs, but you'll still have to pay for an Internet connection and any tools (computer, printer, etc.) to run your business.

If you have a good breakdown of your operating costs, then you can be more confident in starting your own business.

 20. Do You Have a Business Plan?

Think of your business plan as the blueprint of your business vision. This is the document that basically sets down the roadmap for how you see your business growing, expanding and thriving in the years to come.

For some ideas on how to compose a business plan, check out our tutorial on writing a business plan:

Business Plans

How to Write a Business Plan

Andrew Blackman

 21. What Is the Legal Structure of Your Business?

If you're a solopreneur, things are pretty straightforward, as you'll be a sole proprietorship, but what if you have a couple of employees? It pays to understand the difference between different business entities, so you know how you can operate and how you can't.

If you know what legal structure your business will take, you're a step closer to running your business. Learn more in our guide to the subject:

Planning

Which Legal Structure Is Right for Your Business?

Andrew Blackman

 22. Do I Need Business Insurance?

Different business types need different insurance. For instance, if you're going to perform a service at someone's home (electrician, handyman, etc.), then you need insurance. If you're a creative agency, then not so much.

To understand the difference between the kinds of insurance and to determine if you need it, read our how-to on protecting your business with insurance:

Insurance

How to Protect Your Business With the Right Insurance

Andrew Blackman

 23. Who Are Your Competitors?

Understanding who your competitors in the same industry are is crucial to formulating the right business strategy. Knowing this can help you plan your marketing campaigns and decide where to direct your advertising dollars. Plus, you might even pick up a thing or two from your competition.

If you can identify your competitors, you're in a better position to start a business.

 24. How Will You Market Your Business?

Marketing your business is essential to its success. You need to get the word out there about your business, and you need a good advertising strategy. You have to understand principles like persuasion and scarcity and urgency to make an impact with your ads.

For ideas on cost-effective ways to market your business, see our tutorial on content marketing:

Content Marketing

8 Content Marketing Ideas to Increase Your Website Traffic

Marc Schenker

 25. How Will You Manage Your Business?

Running a business is hard work, so it's necessary to devise a plan to manage its operations effectively. Do you have any prior experience in running an enterprise or organization? If not, then it's going to be an uphill climb learning on the fly. Relax, though, as you can learn as you go.

If you understand the basics like setting a budget, providing great customer service, and keeping track of expenses, you may be ready to start your own business.

What to Do After Answering These Questions

Asking yourself these sobering, hard questions is a prerequisite for starting your own business. These questions will keep you honest and ensure that you have a handle on what's expected of you as you take on the responsibility of starting a business.

Jump into our comprehensive guide to starting a business for next steps:

Business

How to Start a Business

Andrew Blackman

If you feel that you can answer most or all of these questions with confidence and competence, then it's time to make that fateful decision: Join the ranks of those who have already started a business, and see if you have what it takes to make yours a success.

 2016-05-25T12:55:15.000Z 2016-05-25T12:55:15.000Z Marc Schenker tag:business.tutsplus.com,2005:PostPresenter/cms-24860 10 Presentation Design Tips (For the Best Pitch Deck)
Designing a compelling and beautiful presentation can be daunting if you're not a designer. It's even more difficult to design a presentation for your startup, knowing you'll be going into an investor pitch, or standing in front of a room presenting for an important business meeting.

When there's a potential deal on the line, the pressure is on! In this tutorial, we cover ten impactful presentation design tips. Discover how to create a better pitch deck design.

The strategies outlined below are all helpful for crafting your pitch deck and relevant to preparing your deck for any important business presentation. Pitching in itself is challenging and the most powerful pitches are supported by well-designed decks. The purpose of a good investor pitch deck is to:

Bring across your message clearly, including only your critical points.

Provide necessary context so people have what they need to make a decision.

Conclude what next action steps are, including your ask, after delivering your presentation.

All of the above points need to be supported by a concise narrative that tells your business story backed by well-crafted slides.

Before we jump into these slide design tips, make note that you can get a quick professional start to designing your pitch deck by using a professional PowerPoint template from Envato Market. We have a number of high quality, presentations designs, with a ton of creative slide options—ready for you to download and customize.

Without further ado, let's dive into these presentation design tips.

 1. One (Powerful) Photo is a Thousand Words

First and foremost, never underestimate the power of strong photography in your presentation designs.

Using emotional photography can make your presentation visually more interesting. Unsplash is an excellent source to find free-to-use photos.

Photography is a powerful tool to convey your message visually. Whether it's emotional photos to deliver a more impactful message, beautiful product photography to convince the value of your product, or striking visuals to enhance otherwise dull slides, photography is useful in many situations.

Presentation Tip: Remember to consider your slides as supporting material while you're presenting. You want the crowd to pay attention to you and your narrative and secondarily your presentation slides. Not the other way around.

Aim to keep to a single photo for each point you make. It's often enough supporting material for you to tell your story and get your message across.

It's wise to keep text to the very minimum in your presentation. This assures people are paying attention to you instead of getting distracted by overdoing it with your slide designs.

A simple creative slide example from the Eureka presentation template.

Photography can be used in creative ways. For example, the Eureka presentation template uses brushes as a mask for photography to give photography in their slide designs a creative vibe. Keep your message clear and enhance it with just a dash of minimal creativity.

 2. Use the Right Colors, Contrast, and Whitespace

Color

When you start learning how to design, colors and the effective use of whitespace is one of the first few subjects which are covered. Because design comes down to effective communication, you can understand the importance of colors and whitespace in your presentation design.

Learning how to use colors effectively is challenging if you're starting out. This is why it's important to find color schemes that do the work for you. Or work from an existing presentation template design, which already has a color scheme in place

Adobe's Color can help you pick a beautiful color scheme.

If your company has a style guide, you can use that as a foundation to pick the right colors from. If not, you can use a website such as Adobe's Color which have a nice selection of ready-made color themes.

Contrast

Contrast is something to keep in mind as well when designing presentations. You want to make sure that your text is legible. You can assure this by having enough contrast between your slide background color (typically white or light-grey) and having an opposite text color (such as black for example).

In case you're adding text on your photography, legibility becomes even more important. You can assure this by adding a black overlay with 60% transparency for example. This makes the image darker and makes text much easier to read.

You can also use contrast to grab people's attention. For example, using a black background color and yellow text creates a strong contrast. Effective use of contrast, especially using it strategically across your presentation, helps people pay attention on moments that you want them to really dial in.

The combination of black and yellow is a prime example of excellent contrast.

Investor Pro presentation template is a good example of using contrasts correctly. By limiting the use of colors and only applying colors in strategic areas during the presentation, your contrasts are more meaningful.

Whitespace

Finally, you have whitespace. The easiest way to deal with whitespace effectively is to give your slides enough breathing room.

Simply put, don't put too many elements on a single slide. Give every element on a slide enough space, this makes your slide easier to digest. Otherwise, your slides will come across as unprofessional, disorganized, and just end up confusing your audience.

 3. Say No to Animations (Mostly)

One of the more tricky aspects of slide design to master is the use of animations. In general, the use of animations is not recommended because:

They tend to slow your presentation, especially if you're adding a transition animation between each slide.

They tend to distract the audience while you're constructing an argument or story.

Finally, they might feel cheesy while you're pitching in a professional context (such as when asking for funding from potential investors).

There are scenarios in which the use of animations make sense. For example, if you're highlighting certain functionality of a product, or building a story with illustrations or even subtly animating graphs or statistics.

In those scenarios, the animation helps you with your objective. However, if you're using animations just for the sake of using animations it means your presentation is probably better off without any in it at all.

 4. Prepare Effective Content and Typography

In any presentation, your content matters more than your design. This is why, even in a list of presentation design tips, I still would like to emphasize you should feel rock solid about the content that you will present.

To be capable of designing a slide more effectively, it helps to prepare your content separately first. Learn more about how to write your PowerPoint presentation before you design your deck. Work on an overview of the message(s) and story you're bringing. Then, you can use that as a foundation to start designing from.

Simultaneously, it's also a matter of using the right typography to present your content. In general, the use of sans-serif font is highly recommended as they tend to be better readable on digital screens. Here is a balanced slide design from the Investor Pro Pitch Deck - PowerPoint Template:

A simple slide design with careful typography and image balance.

The correct font sizing is also important. Make sure the font size is large enough so that in the context you're presenting everyone can read the text on your slides. If you're pitching in a large conference room, the person at the end of the table should still be capable of following along with your presentation just fine.

 5. Be Clever (or Even Funny)

Now this has less to do with visual design, but it's still an important tip to keep in mind.

The most effective presentations are the ones which are remarkable and rememberable. Especially for pitches where you are competing against other startups, this is important. Your objective is your audience remembers you and your message after the presentations.

This is why emotional design often helps you craft an excellent presentation. By connecting with people emotionally, they tend to remember your presentation much better than the average person who pitches.

You can hit an emotional nerve typically in two ways:

 By being funny: by making people laugh, they will automatically feel more positive about the story you're telling. This is a powerful cognitive dissonance. The risk is to not appear as a comedian: you're stilling pitching in a professional context, but a laugh every now and then is a welcome relief.

 By being clever: if you surprise people by providing new insights they'll remember your presentation better, as you provided value on a personal level for the audience.

IN other words, focus on interesting angles for your content. If you can provide meaningful insights or present serious topics from a unique angle it helps you to stand out in the crowd of typically boring business presentations.

 6. You Have 20 Minutes

Whenever you're spending concentrated time on a single task we consider this to be your attention span.

On average, we have an attention span of 20 minutes on a task we're not intrinsically motivated to complete.

Keep this in mind for your presentation. Most pitch presentations are limited in time by default, but should you have the option to present for an hour, ideally try and stick to only 20 minutes.

It forces you to make you message more concise, as well as keep people engaged for only as long as their mind is fresh. Once you're past the 20 minute point, it becomes more difficult to convince people of the value of your innovative product or service.

 7. Apply the Rule of Three

Another psychological trick is that people tend to remember everything better in pairs of three. You can read more about this on Wikipedia.

An example of applying the rule of three can be describing product benefits: a product which is beautiful, sustainable and high-quality. The slide design from the Eureka PowerPoint Template below is setup with the rule of three:

A slide example setup with the rule of three - from Eureka PPT Template.

This can be helpful while designing slides. If you're adding keywords or benefits or any other type of list on a slide, it works much better to summarize this in three elements (or add an extra one if you only have two).

As a rule of thumb, try to avoid bullet points. For example, if you're highlighting product features it's much more worthwhile to add three beautiful product screenshots, or illustrations, to your slide design versus writing product features in text.

 8. Convey a Single (Focused) Message

When you're designing a presentation, it's best to stick to a single message.

By forcing yourselves to focus on one message, it helps you to put all your energy in getting your point across clearly.

Practically, this translates into the following:

What is the single message of my presentation as a whole?

What is the single message of my next slide?

Especially the last question—the message of your slide—helps you identify what the best possible design for your slide would be. The ideal slide design might be a few words, a strong photo or perhaps even a single number.

The easiest advice to apply is to simply use as little text as possible.

An example slide of Simplicity. The key message of this example slide is that you can be trusted as a partner to work with.

A great presentation template which has some excellent slides you can use as a foundation for your presentation is the Simplicity premium PowerPoint template.

 9. Tell Engaging Stories

In presentation deck design, one aspect I always try to keep in mind is the notion of flow. The idea of flow is that your slides transition smoothly into each other. This has to do with bringing a great story, but assuring that your slide design supports the story is important as well.

The most interesting presentations deliver a story. Rather than just listing facts and features, including a story tends to engage people better. It's often that the best people in business are great storytellers.

For investor pitch decks, you typically have a presentation flow that looks a little like the following:

You start with outlining the problem the product is trying to solve. This is often accomplished by telling a personal story.

The presentation often includes photography to make it easier for people to visualize the story.

This is followed by presenting the product and how exactly the product solves the problem.

Then you include data that backs up the points that you make.

Finally, there's a plan on how the product will ultimately become a profitable business.

As you can see, any well-thought out presentation has a number of stories which you're telling the audience. Consider this to be your table of contents for your presentation. In the above example this is:

Problem

Solution

Practical Plan

Now, each story you're telling often requires different slide designs in order to support the story better. For the above example, this might be the following:

 Problem: Mainly photography and data slides to provide visual support and evidence.

 Solution: Mainly textual and illustrative slides using the rule of three to provide content.

 Practical Plan: Typically slides constructed with a single message, whether it's a number, a strategy or a chart to convince stakeholders.

When you think of your presentation as a collection of stories, it will help you figure out what type of slide design packs the most punch, and tells the most clear component of your story.

If you're looking for a variation of different slide designs to support your narrative, the following Pitch Deck template is a great source of inspiration:

Pitch Deck Start Up - PowerPoint Presentation

 10. End Remarkably

If you're able to do all of the above, you've already done an amazing job. If you're looking for the little extra to make the difference, ending your presentation in an unforgettable way is how to do it.

The most famous example would be Apple's "one more thing" as Steve Jobs concluded his presentation by making another, often even more exciting announcement during his product Keynotes.

By giving the notion you're wrapping up your presentation, only to conclude with something more amazing (amount of active users or a unique new feature you're about to release for example) your message will stick better.

Surprise is a powerful tool. By showing impressive facts at the moment the audience expects it the least, you've just delivered a remarkable pitch.

Learn more about how to create engaging presentations that grab an audience's attention and persuade effectively:

Presentations

How to Make a Persuasive PowerPoint Presentation

Celine Roque

Apply These Design Tips to Craft Your Pitch Deck for Investors

Well-prepared content in combination with beautifully crafted slide designs is the recipe for engaging presentations.

By making it even more remarkable by applying the presentation tips above, you assure that you can stand out in the crowd and get the attention of investors with your pitch deck design.

Finally, are you looking for a few helpful PowerPoint templates to kickstart your new presentation using the above techniques? We have a number of great pitch deck templates featured in this article:

Microsoft PowerPoint

15 Best Pitch Deck Templates: For Business Plan PowerPoint Presentations

Sean Hodge

Or take a look at our most popular PowerPoint templates on Envato Market. Our PPT template selection offers plenty of design flexibility, without the headache of having to start from zero.

Thank you for your time. Should you have any questions or remarks, feel free to drop a line on Twitter. Best of luck with your pitch!

 2016-05-25T12:55:05.000Z 2016-05-25T12:55:05.000Z Sven Lenaerts tag:business.tutsplus.com,2005:PostPresenter/cms-26373 10 Ways To Share Your Business Video
You've created a compelling video about your business. You've invested time and money in the content and messaging, and are confident it sells. How do you get people to watch it when there's so much competition for eyeballs online?

Untitled by geralt/Pixabay

Uploading your video to YouTube is a no-brainer. But don't stop there! You need to share that video far and wide to maximize reach and engagement.

Here are ten ways to share your business video, with tips and best practices for each.

YouTube

YouTube is the second largest search engine online after Google, so uploading your video here is essential. YouTube is especially well suited for educational content such as "how to" videos and product demonstrations. The downside? There are hundreds of millions of hours of videos on YouTube, and getting found can be difficult. Bringing traffic back to your website is even harder still.

Tips: Fill out the title and description of each video with relevant keywords and tags for search engine optimization (SEO). Organize your videos into clearly defined playlists so they're easy to find on your channel. Use YouTube cards to direct people to your website or related content when they're finished watching.

Video

How to Increase Engagement on YouTube Videos With Cards

Cindy Burgess

Vimeo

If you're more interested in a quality viewing experience than being found, upload your video to Vimeo. This platform doesn't have nearly as big an audience as YouTube, but there are no banner or pre-roll ads or distracting cat videos. The other plus? Your video will plays in high definition without the viewer having to adjust settings.

Tip: Create a custom thumbnail image for your video after you've uploaded it. You can almost always do better than the one selected automatically!

Your Website

Once you've uploaded your video to YouTube or Vimeo, grab the embed code and post it on your company's website. Make your video a prominent size and place it "above the fold" – in other words, high on a page instead of buried at the bottom.

You can host your own video, but specialized video hosting services, like Wistia (the service we use to host our course videos), VHX, and Uscreen offer solid advantages for certain kinds of business video. These "white label" hosts let you display video on your site without any unwanted branding (or with your own), provide robust metrics and engagment tools, and won't try and drive your traffic back to their platform.

A website with the video placed "above the fold" by Cindy Burgess

Don't forget to write a blog post about your video too!

Tip: Avoid auto play. Most viewers like to have control over when or whether a video plays.

Social Media Sites

Social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, Instagram, and Pinterest are made for sharing. Post your video to all of your company's social media accounts – repeatedly. Keep in mind that not everyone is going to see your video the first time you post it.

Whenever possible, upload your video directly to the platform in question, rather than posting a link to YouTube. Sites like Facebook give a higher priority to videos that are uploaded natively. Also, consider making different versions of your video for different social media sites. For example, you might want to create a 15-second teaser video for Instagram to drive traffic to the full-length video on your website.

Tip: Use online tools like Hootsuite to schedule your posts at different hours and on different days to maximize viewing.

Newsletters

Add your video to the next email blast or newsletter you send out to clients. They're already interested in the content you provide, so chances are you'll have a high click rate.

A newsletter with embedded video by Cindy Burgess

Tip: Encourage clients to share your video with others. Ask them what kind of video content they'd like to see in the future.

Case Study

How We Did It: Designing the New Tuts+ Emails

Ian Yates

Email Signature

Promote your video in your email signature. Just write a line of text to tease the video, then add a hyperlink. Here's a fictional example to illustrate what I'm talking about:

John Doe | Widgets Inc. | (555) 123-4567
Have you seen our newest product line? Watch the video!

Tip: Change the signature every time you release a new video.

Press Releases

Most press releases are sent online these days, so it's easy to link to a video. The next time your business introduces a new product or service or wins an award, make sure the press release includes a link to your video.

Tip: Include an eye-catching thumbnail image to entice people to click on the video.

Partner Blogs

Contact your industry partners and ask if they'll feature your video content on their blog or social media sites. For example, one of my clients is a golf pro who created a series of short tip videos. She has sponsors for clubs, tees, and clothing that might be interested in sharing her videos because they serve the same audience.

Tip: Offer to promote some of their content in exchange.

Community Web Sites

Many communities have blogs or websites that profile local businesses and people, and they're usually hungry for free content. It's worth searching online to see what's out there. Ask if they'd be interested in linking to your video or writing a blog post about it.

Tip: Offer to write a short introduction to the video to help make their job easier.

Stores, Trade Shows, Conferences

If you have a bricks-and-mortar storefront, set up a flat screen monitor to play your video. Same goes for trade shows and conferences where your business might have a booth.

Tip: Make a version of your video with subtitles so you can play it without audio.

Conclusion

As you can see, there are lots of ways to share your business video beyond YouTube. Which methods you choose will depend on your business and the type of video you've created. So start experimenting!

 2016-05-25T07:03:00.000Z 2016-05-25T07:03:00.000Z Cindy Burgess tag:business.tutsplus.com,2005:PostPresenter/cms-26581 WordPress vs Joomla vs Drupal: CMS Comparison Guide
If you are on the verge of creating a website for your small business, knowing where to start might seem overwhelming. Most small business owners usually want a website where they can update the content without having to call a web developer every time, so a Content Management System (CMS) is a logical choice.

When it comes to CMS's, there are three major players: WordPress, Joomla, and Drupal. In this CMS comparison guide, we take a look at each of the three platforms, discuss the advantages and disadvantages of each, along with some tips on how to choose the right CMS for your small business website.

CMS Comparison - Which one is best for your business?

Brief Overview of the Top 3 CMS's

WordPress, Drupal, and Joomla have a lot in common in terms of technology, community, and philosophy. All three of them are open source software which means they are free to use. They all have some great features, are built on PHP and use MySQL as their database management system. Finally, all of them use themes/templates for visual appearance of sites and have plenty of plugins/modules that can add extra functionality to your website.

While these popular CMS's are similar in many aspects, they also have some major differences about what is included in the core software. They differ on how each system handles plugins and themes, how they deal with security, and other differences which have a large impact on users, and how you'll build your website.

This CMS comparison chart points out the key differences:

WordPress

Joomla

Drupal

Homepage

www.wordpress.org

www.joomla.org

www.drupal.org

Ease of use

Doesn't require technical experience. The interface is intuitive. A simple website can be set up in a matter of minutes.

Slightly more complex to use. Interface can seem a little intimidating for a novice user. Needs a little time investment to get familiar with the platform and the terminology.

Requires the most technical expertise out of the three. While the interface is easy when it comes to adding content, it's not so straightforward when it comes to changing appearance.

Features

Powerful enough for developers and designers to create custom sites, while at the same time being easy to take over and use for the end-user.

More geared as a community platform with strong social networking features.

Powerful taxonomy features, has the ability to categorize and organize complex content.

One-Click Install

Yes

Yes

Yes

Available Themes

2000+

1000+

1800+

Available Plugins

45000+ plugins

32000+ modules

7000+ extensions

eCommerce

Yes with WooCommerce

Yes, extensions for managing products and content

Yes, and No - Drupal 8, the latest version, does not support a stable e-commerce module yet.

SEO Friendly

Excellent SEO

Basic SEO, requires additional tweaks

Good SEO

Mobile Friendly

Yes

Yes

Yes

Speed

Can handle traffic well but requires better hosting plans as the traffic grows.

If not tweaked properly it can consume resources rather quickly.

Typically loads more quickly, and has faster response times than websites made with WordPress or Joomla.

Now let's examine each of the three platform in more depth.

 1. WordPress

WordPress is the most popular CMS. Over 30% of all sites that use a CMS are running on WordPress. It started out as a simple blogging platform but has grown quickly into a CMS capable of handling complex websites such as TechCrunch and Time Inc.

WordPress has many advantages for small business owners looking to build their own website. Some of those advantages include:

 Easy to Use - Most hosting companies offer one-click installation of WordPress and even a novice user can install it, choose a theme, and have a website running within five minutes. The dashboard is easy and intuitive and requires no technical knowledge.

 Free - WordPress software is open source and completely free to use.

 Customizable - With thousands of themes and plugins available, you can create any type of website you need, and because WordPress is so popular you can find plenty of designers and developers who can create a custom website for you.

 Community Support - Once again, due to its popularity the number of websites who have WordPress-specific tips is large, and their own support forum is filled with WordPress experts who can answer your questions in a matter of minutes.

WordPress is not perfect. There are some disadvantages that come with it such as:

Larger, more complex sites can quickly become resource hogs and require a hosting plan upgrade.

It's API is not very user-friendly which means the core of WordPress is difficult to change so those looking to make back-end changes to their websites will probably run into some issues.

When it comes to learning WordPress, there are hundreds of websites that provide tutorials on all things WordPress. From basic how-tos to explaining WordPress themes to WordPress security tips - you can find a tutorial on almost anything.

Apart from that, you can also ask questions on WordPress StackExchange and get an answer to your problem fairly quickly.

As far as the design goes, there are free themes and plugins available in the official theme and plugin repository. While free themes may seem great at first, you will soon realize they are all rather limited in design and functionality.

Marketplaces like ThemeForest offer plenty of premium, high quality WordPress themes that are packed with multipurpose features and creative designs that will make your website stand out.

Avada is one of many popular premium WordPress themes on ThemeForest:

Avada WordPress Theme on ThemeForest (Envato Market)

Here are more top WordPress themes:

WordPress

15 Best WordPress Business Themes

Brenda Barron

WordPress is a great choice for starting your business website, especially if you're including a blog or additional functionality.

 2. Joomla

Some consider Joomla as the middle ground between WordPress and Drupal. It's a powerful CMS which can handle complex websites rather well and yet it doesn't require as much technical knowledge as Drupal. Joomla powers websites like Harvard University and Linux. It still offers plenty of features such as:

 Social Networking - Joomla makes it very easy to create social networks which can be a powerful asset for many sites.

 Commerce Sites - Setting up an eCommerce website is a lot faster and easier with Joomla than it is with Drupal and WordPress since Joomla has more native support for it.

 Not too Technical - While Joomla requires a bit more technical knowledge than WordPress, it's still approachable for people with beginner level web development experience.

 Help Portal - Joomla offers a great help portal for asking questions and getting technical support. It's slightly less extensive than the community-based support pages of WordPress, but it is quicker (and cheaper) than technical support most people get for Drupal.

 Free - Like WordPress, Joomla is free to use.

When it comes to the disadvantages, Joomla has its own set of downsides, them being:

 Learning Curve - While not too technical, Joomla does require some time investment to get familiar with the platform.

 Limited SEO - While it does have some basic SEO capabilities, Joomla requires extensive work to achieve the same level of search engine friendliness as WordPress.

When it comes to learning Joomla, aside from their own help portal, you can find plenty of tutorials in their documentation. The Envato community also has useful Joomla tutorials such as an overview of Joomla CMS, how to build a social networking site, and how to modify Joomla templates.

On the design side of things, Joomla has less themes and modules than WordPress but that doesn't mean you are out of luck. You can find plenty of premium, high-quality Joomla themes on ThemeForest, such as the best-selling Kallyas Joomla theme shown below:

Kallyas Joomla Theme on ThemeForest (Envato Market)

 3. Drupal

Drupal is the second most popular CMS, powering 8% of the websites who run a CMS. It's extremely powerful and less resource intensive meaning it's the most suitable for large and complex websites. Sites running on Drupal include University of Oxford and The Weather Channel. Some of the advantages of Drupal are:

 Flexibility - With almost 2000 themes and over 7000 extensions, Drupal is easy to customize. And considering you can edit the core files with relative ease, it's the most flexible out of the top three CMS's.

 Improved Performance - Websites built with Drupal load faster than those built with Joomla and WordPress.

 Free - Just like WordPress and Joomla, Drupal is free to use.

 Community Support - Support is available at drupal.org, as well as Stack Exchange and many other sites.

Unfortunately, as powerful as Drupal is, it does come with its own set of disadvantages, the biggest one being:

Steep Learning Curve - If you need more than a basic blog or small business website, you will most likely need technical support which means you will need someone to create the website, the modules, and provide support along the way.

If you are looking for a few tutorials to get you started with Drupal then our tutorial on Drupal is a step in the right direction. Once you know what Drupal is, you might want to check out how to implement a business theme using Drupal.

And if you are looking for a quality Drupal theme, look no further than ThemeForest. With 394 premium themes to choose from, you are guaranteed to find the perfect theme for your Drupal website no matter which niche you are in. The InnoCompany Drupal theme is one of the best-selling on our marketplace:

InnoCompany Drupal Theme on ThemeForest (Envato Market)

How to Choose the Right CMS

There is no doubt that all three of the content management systems offer great advantages. And if you take to the internet in the hopes of finding a definitive answer, you will run into fans of all three content management systems claiming their preferred CMS is the best one.

This, of course, won't make your decision any easier so how do you tell which CMS should you choose? Do you pick WordPress, Joomla or Drupal for your small business website?

Unfortunately, there is no universal answer. The fact of the matter is, each business and website are unique and each situation will require a different solution.

Joomla is better suited for mid-sized websites or those who want social networking and community-oriented websites.

Drupal, on the other hand, is the most logical solutions for large, complex websites which require extensive features and scalability.

For those looking to set up a simple website for their small business, WordPress is likely the way to go.

Another thing you have to consider is your technical abilities. If you aren't tech-savvy, then WordPress is definitely the best choice as it's the easiest to setup and use. If on the other hand you have some technical abilities or you are willing and prepared to pay for someone to handle the tech side of things for you, then Joomla or Drupal might be more up your alley.

What if you make the wrong choice?

It is possible that you will pick a CMS and later down the road realize you made a mistake. In most cases, migrating from one CMS to another is fairly easy nowadays. Bear in mind, however, that in order to properly migrate your website from one content management system to another you will have to put aside some time and be familiar with the process to make sure the migration goes over smoothly.

WordPress vs Joomla! vs Drupal: Decision Time

When it comes to content management systems, WordPress, Joomla, and Drupal are the most popular solutions. All three of them offer some great advantages such as community support, different themes to provide you with a nice looking website, plugins and extensions that allow you to add extra functionality to your website and all three of them are free to use on your own hosting plan. However, they each come with their own set of disadvantages.

If you are just starting out, WordPress is probably your best option. It's easy to use and there are plenty of WordPress themes to help you get started. All that considered, however, Joomla! and Drupal are good options as well, and provide a bit more flexibility if you like to get your hands dirty in code. And of course, we have lots Drupal templates and Joomla! templates available here too, that you can use to start your site with.

Making a choice is definitely not easy so you have to bear in mind what is the main purpose of your website, what your overall budget is, as well as your own level of technical expertise, or your if you plan to work with a professional web developer.

This CMS comparison guide gives you a few critical points to consider, links to important CMS resources, and where to dig in deeper to make your decision.

 2016-05-24T12:55:35.000Z 2016-05-24T12:55:35.000Z Brenda Barron tag:business.tutsplus.com,2005:PostPresenter/cms-26522 20 Best InDesign Brochure Templates - For Creative Business Marketing
You might think that brochures are an afterthought these days due to the penetration of digital marketing, but that couldn't be further from the truth.

Brochures help you get more customers by boosting your credibility. They are still one of the most effective ways to market your business.

Local clients that you meet with in person will expect you to hand them printed ad material like brochures, because that's what a legitimate business does.

They want something visually engaging to take home with them, that they can easily refer to, which highlights your best messaging and key offers. Without brochures as part of your marketing arsenal, your trustworthiness and effectiveness simply drops.

Smart small business owners use brochures in conjunction with a well-planned digital-marketing campaign for the greatest effectiveness. You can also attach brochures as PDFs to your emails or distribute them from your website.

Entrepreneurs, designers, marketers and creative agencies can all benefit from using brochures as part of their advertising, too. Why not use one marketing tactic to complement another?

With a quality brochure, you can expect to increase your marketing results. Envato Market has hundreds of creative InDesign brochure templates with professional designs—ready to work with.

Best Selling Brochure Templates - available for sale on Envato Market (GraphicRiver)

With one of these creative brochure templates in hand, you can get them prepped, and out to new potential customers fast.

Just add your company's brand information and graphics in InDesign, insert the text of your sales offer readily, as these templates are setup for quick customization.

Drive more potential clients to your website, and through your sales pipeline, with a professional brochure.

Creative InDesign Brochure Templates

Here is a detailed rundown of our best-selling, most creative InDesign brochure templates from the last year:

1. The Company Profile - InDesign Template

Impress your leads and clients with this powerful and effective marketing brochure. With a minimalist design and a contrasting color scheme, its bold look will capture the attention of your readers in no time flat.

Easily communicate what your small business is all about and what your product or service can do for your target market. It comes in two sizes, A4 and Letter, and is compatible with Adobe InDesign CS4, CS5, CS5.5 and CS6.

2. The Brochure - INDD Print Template

Creative and clean in its presentation style, this professional brochure is a highly effective way of conveying your marketing message. Featuring generous white space and padding, the layout makes it easy for your readers to absorb and retain information.

Its creative layout is ideal for any type of small business, agency, designer or marketer to use to land more clients. It's print-ready design is setup in both A4 and US letter sizes. It's compatible with Adobe Indesign CS4, CS5, CS5.5 & CS6. It also has vector graphics, free fonts, and more packaged inside the template files for easy customization.

3. Creative Multipurpose Brochure/Report

With a vibrant color scheme and a modern design, this multipurpose brochure template is ideal for any kind of small business, agency, marketer or designer's next advertising campaign.

It intelligently uses splashes of color to highlight important information while neatly chunked paragraphs make reading the information a breeze. This InDesign template is fully editable so you're in total control of your marketing voice. It comes in two sizes: Letter and A4.

4. Company Profile Square INDD Brochure

If you're looking for a unique take on the marketing brochure, try this square template in all its aesthetic effectiveness. Its grid-column layout increases the readability of your marketing message, making it likelier that your audience remembers key points of information.

Its bright and eye-catching design is suitable for showcasing the creativity of your small business. With 20 customizable pages, this square brochure puts you in control of your print marketing.

5. Brochure Template for InDesign - A4 and Letter

As far as InDesign brochure templates go, this one has you covered with 20 pages and three, unique covers. Showcase your latest products or services to your target market, or simply humanize your small business by featuring various employees that work for you.

Whatever you choose to do, this brochure's clean and sophisticated look makes your marketing message more attractive and persuasive. You can even extend its use as a PDF email attachment or distribute it as an online brochure.

6. Company Profile Brochure - INDD Template

This creative company brochure template features 24 pages of fully customizable content, is print-ready, and requires a minimum of Adobe InDesign CS4.

Its easy editing capacity makes it quick to use, as you can tailor your marketing approach to how you see fit in snagging more leads and clients. Its cool, blue, color tones, and triangular design elements make it stand out with a modern creative design. It comes in A4 paper size.

7. Trifold Brochure - InDesign Template

With a classic quality brochure design, this trifold layout has stood the test of time, and is still ideal for your marketing efforts. Put the power of your messaging communication directly into the hands of your clients and customers with this clean and well-thought out design.

Readers will appreciate the beautiful tracking in between letters of the typeface for maximum legibility. Featuring full editing capabilities and two fonts (Roboto and Montserrat), this creative template is ready to go!

8. The Annual Report - Creative Brochure

This layered document is perfect for any small business, agency, marketer or designer to use in promotional campaigns. Its multipurpose use means that you can just as easily record your fiscal year statements if you're running a restaurant or a floral shop.

Its highly detailed and well-structured organization means that readers can easily pick out the most important info immediately. This InDesign template comes with vector infographics, free fonts and two sizes: Letter and A4.

9. 2-in-1/Corporate Brochure + Annual Report

Available in bold, striking cover colors, this InDesign brochure template satisfies both your marketing and report-tracking needs. It comes with 36 pages in total, all of which are subject to full customization, so that you can get your marketing message across just the way you want it!

Some of its attributes are three unique color schemes, four distinct fonts, print-ready status, and various character and paragraph styles from which to choose.

10. Multicorp Brochure Template - INDD

Suitable for all sorts of small businesses, this corporate style template is the difference between delivering your marketing effectively and failing to successfully tell the marketplace about your product or service.

Everything on this template can be efficiently customized to your liking, from the typography to the content's messaging. The designs inclusion of many images adds to the legible quality and creative feel. It's available in Letter and A4 sizes.

11. Brochure Template for InDesign – Cingo

Empowering you to create or delete pages at will, this handy brochure template comes with 20 unique pages overall. This makes it well-suited to handle your marketing message, whether that's explaining your newest product launch or simply telling customers about the culture at your small business! You only need a minimum Adobe InDesign version of CS3 to make this work, and it comes with print-ready colors.

12. The Portfolio - InDesign Creative Brochure

The Portfolio is a clean and easy to customize brochure template that's really suitable for any purpose. You can just as easily list your work history for relevant employers as you can tell your leads and target audience about your latest product line or services.

This not only makes this template very versatile, but also suitable to a number of small business applications. With vector infographics included, it features 24 pages of premium Adobe InDesign documents.

13. The Business Brochure Template File

Using copious color contrast to highlight the most important elements on a page and guide the readers' eyes, the Business Brochure is a great example of both a creative and clean template that's designed for multipurpose use.

It features free fonts, 24 pages in total, a six-column grid layout, full customization of text and colors, and Letter and A4 sizes. Educate your consumers about your products just as easily as you share your company profile and spread your brand!

14. Creative Business Brochure Template

This 16-page document is sure to solve your promotional needs. Presented in a 6/12 grid column and armed with various free fonts, this brochure template has quality appeal to your prospects' aesthetic side.

Since this brochure design is fully editable, you can be sure to communicate your small business brand exactly the way you want to your leads and customers. With generous white space and tracking between letters, your marketing message comes through loud and clear!

15. Creative Portfolio Brochure - INDD

This layered document gives you the opportunity to make your business shine. Its 16 pages are totally customizable, so you are in 100% control of your print advertising campaign.

Show off this brochure to leads, or even use it as part of a strategic, direct-mail campaign to increase your brand awareness for your small business. However you use it, know that it's going to make a great impression for your brand in the marketplace.

16. Be Company Profile - Creative Brochure

An elegant and minimalistic brochure template, this company profile allows you to explain your brand to your customers in the most effective way. Its layered and easy-to-read layout makes it a cinch for your leads and clients to connect with your brand.

Put the power of print advertising in the hands of your target audience, and get amazing results! It comes with 24 pages in total, a 6/12 content column grid, and two sizes: A4 and Letter.

17. The Trifold Modern Brochure Template

Modern, sophisticated and eye-catching, this trifold brochure relies on a classic layout and combines it with today's sleek design to create a great template for your print advertising campaign.

Due to its multipurpose design, this template is a great fit for any small business in any industry. Its fully editable scheme lets you customize it to the marketing message that you want to send out to your developing client base. It comes with free fonts and in size A4.

18. Go Creative InDesign Trifold Brochure

With a classic style of brochure design, this trifold layout is easy to handle and turn over in your readers' hands. This brochure is a convenient way to promote your small business and control your marketing message.

Its stand-out, red color strongly contrasts with the neutral tones of the brochure, ensuring that your message pops and can't be missed by your target audience! It features easy-to-edit pages, organized layers and print-readiness.

19. Multipurpose INDD Corporate Brochure

No matter what industry your small business is in, you can efficiently adapt this brochure template to your marketing message and target customers. InDesign brochure templates like this one are completely customizable, so that you can ensure full control of your promotional advertising.

Tell your customers about new products, services and your small business' philosophy. It comes with four free fonts and is print-ready for immediate use.

20. Creative Agency - InDesign Brochure Template

This agency brochure template is perfect for any agency that's trying to attract new leads and clients. In its pages, you can showcase your portfolio, your products, your services, and your vision.

With 20 pages that are fully customizable in InDesign, it's easy to tailor your marketing message just the way you want. Print-ready, this brochure template is appropriate for any industry.

How to Design a Brochure for Powerful Marketing Results

Our wonderful collection of Envato Market InDesign brochure templates offers small businesses of all industries the marketing tools they need to succeed.

Even in today's digital marketing-obsessed world, print ads like brochures are still consistently effective. By placing something palpable and substantial into your customers' hands, they can easily refer to it and get in touch with your small business at any time.

But even with a high quality template, you still need the design savvy to correctly frame your marketing message within your brochure. Here are a few quick pointers:

 1. Write Stellar Sales Copy

Often an afterthought in brochure design, nailing the copy is essential to your messaging success. What does that mean? Make sure the font is readable, there's adequate spacing between letters, the copy is chunked into smaller paragraphs, and sentences communicate your brand's benefits and value proposition clearly.

2. Design for Your Prospects

Make the brochure about your leads and potential customers instead of all about your brand. By positioning your small business as the solution to your prospects' problem, you stand to persuade them to choose your business with greater success.

3. Present With High Quality Graphics

Wow your readers right off the bat. Use high-quality, professional images in your brochure, and ensure that your brochure's appearance is appropriate for your brand positioning. For instance:

If you're a young tech company, you may want to have a modern, hip layout, such as this vibrant multipurpose InDesign brochure template.

Whereas, if you're an established financial business, you may want a more conservative and reserved layout, such as with this clean, creatively restrained, company profile InDesign brochure template.

Learn more about how to make a creative business brochure in this ultimate guide, whether from a template, or from scratch in InDesign:

Brochure

How to Make a Brochure

Grace Fussell

Grab a Creative Brochure Template Today!

Now's a great time to add a brochure template to your marketing pipeline. Put together a piece of sales literature that your potential clients can take home with them, or that you can email to their inbox.

Promote your best selling offers and drive new leads to your website. Browse through our large selection of creative InDesign brochure templates on Envato Market, and get the perfect one for your business, or for your client, today.

 2016-05-19T12:55:14.000Z 2016-05-19T12:55:14.000Z Marc Schenker tag:business.tutsplus.com,2005:PostPresenter/cms-26523 How to Start a Consulting Business - With High Earnings
Do you want to know how to start a consulting business? For many professionals, consulting sounds like an attractive career choice. There's a lot of flexibility in the work and there can be high pay. In some cases, there's also a lot of travel involved.

But what does it really mean to be a consultant, and how would you know if it's right for you? This guide provides an overview of consulting, its pros and cons, your possible career path options as a consultant, and what it takes to become a high-earning consultant.

Start a Consulting Business (graphic)

What Consultants Do

Generally, consultants are advisers hired by businesses so that they can achieve a specific goal. Since what falls under "consultant" is vague, consultants could help businesses in almost any aspect of their operations, whether it's efficiency, profits, or sales.

They can even help in less business-inclined areas such as design, morale, employee personal development, creativity, and company diversity. The broad possibilities of consulting is probably one of the reasons why it's a career option that attracts many professionals. In the United States, for management consulting alone, there are over 700,000 jobs, a number that's projected to grow at a faster rate than in most occupations.

Launching a consulting business has its fair share of benefits. Consultants often have the autonomy to choose their own projects and clients, allowing them to tackle the problems and challenges that they find most interesting. The profit margins can also be high, since you'll be providing expertise that your clients don't already have in-house, plus operating costs can be low if you don't need too much extra staff or equipment.

But there are some costs that come with these benefits. Because consulting attracts so many people it can be very competitive. It will take a lot of work to stand out from other consultants with similar services. This means it will be difficult to get a consistent stream of clients.

Also, like with any business you start yourself, in the beginning you'll have to do a lot of the legwork apart from the job itself. Be prepared to answer phones, be the only salesperson, provide client support, and become the Head of Marketing as well. Expect to invest long hours, at least during the start of your consulting business.

What It Takes to Become a Consultant

There are some specific requirements to become a consultant, but you'll find that most of them are informal or can be achieved with some training. Here are some of the qualifications and skills you'll need before you get started:

 Valuable expertise. Since you'll hire out your skills, there must be something in your background and experience that proves the value you'll provide. For example, if you're looking to be a company's diversity consultant, do you have a background in sociology or anthropology or, at the very least, do you have experience working on diversity programs? If you plan to work as a sales consultant, have you led a sales team and do you have the numbers to show the difference you made? Did you write a book on the subject that you're helping your clients with? While you don't necessarily need to have a specific degree for most consulting jobs, you need to have at least some proof that you have the expertise to contribute something valuable to your clients.

 Knowledge of business practices. Even if you plan to work on projects that don't directly impact business operations, understanding how a typical business works will allow you to navigate your clients' needs more thoroughly. You'll understand how different departments work with each other, how hierarchies typically interact, and foresee any potential problems that will interfere with your efforts.

 Excellent communication skills. Most of your time will be spent communicating with your clients. You'll be managing their expectations, persuading them to accept your solutions, and interacting with many different individuals and departments. A single misunderstanding can cause a lot of damage, not just to your project, but to your client's business. Because of this, consultants need to have good communication skills, especially the ability to adjust their communication style depending on the context and medium.

 Soft skills. Other soft skills are needed to run a consulting business and work with your clients, including negotiation, collaboration, and organization. You'll be tapping into these skills regularly throughout the course of your career.

 Relevant certifications. Some consultants need formal credentials, whether as a requirement or an optional way to prove their expertise. For example, management consultants can get a Certified Management Consultant qualification, if they meet criteria such as having at least five client recommendations, a college degree, and pass certain written and oral tests. As you plan your consulting business, make a note of the formal credentials you'll be needing when you set up shop.

How to Get Started Consulting

Now that you're more familiar with how a consulting business works, here are the steps you need to get started once you've decided that consulting is the right path for you.

1. Pick a Niche

When you first considered starting a consulting business, you probably already had some niches in mind. Your niche is the industry you'll be working in, which includes the types of services you'll offer and the clients you'll have. Usually, it's best to start with the services that you already have knowledge and experience in, so that you can start working as soon as possible. The more experience you already have in your industry of choice, the faster you can start.

If you need some additional ideas, here are some consulting fields you can get into:

Management consulting

Sales

Information technology, web, and computers

Public relations and marketing

Finance and accounting

Human resources

Business intelligence and data

Business process consultants

As for picking your niche of clients, try to craft a buyer persona that describes the characteristics of the decision-makers you plan to sell your services to. This document will direct your next steps, since it will give you a firm idea about who your target clients might be and what their potential needs are.

2. Plan Your Service Offering and Pricing

Once you've selected your niche, you can narrow down the services you'll be providing, the types of problems you want to solve for clients, and the goals you'll help them achieve. You can then craft a service offering that outlines exactly the types of tasks or projects you can do for your target clients.

As for pricing, more than just figuring out the amount you'll charge, you also need to know the models to use, whether it's by project, by task, hourly, on retainer, or a combination of more than one fee model. To figure out your initial rates and the models you can use, there are many pricing resources here on Envato Tuts+, which provide you with tips on proposing and negotiating your prices.

3. Find Your First Clients

It can be overwhelming at first to think about all the clients you have to acquire throughout the life of your consulting practice. Because of this, during the start of your consulting career, focus only on acquiring your first two or three clients.

By focusing on getting your first few clients, your effort and time will be invested in making sales and building your first crucial relationships. This will prevent you from spreading yourself too thin—a common tendency for entrepreneurs who are trying to get a new venture off the ground.

Here are some resources that can help you acquire your first clients:

Freelance

Getting Your First 3 Paying Clients as a New Freelancer

Richa Jain

Freelance

Freelance Consultant's Guide to Client Interviews (Questions + Process)

Celine Roque

Freelance

How Freelancers Can Close the Deal—Without Seeming Too Pushy

Laura Spencer

Become a High-Earning Consultant

Now that you know how to start a consulting business, it's time to take action on your consulting income goals. To maximize your earning potential as a consultant, here are some strategies you can use:

1. Find Profitable Markets

Some companies are more profitable than others and, as a consultant, you'll need to learn how to gauge a business' profitability from afar before you make your pitch. The more profitable the business or the industry, the more they can pay you for your work.

For example, a medium-sized financial corporation would be more willing and able to afford the premium rates of a PR consultant than a small mom-and-pop shop would. If you want to target profitable clients, this comprehensive guide walks you through the process of identifying them.

2. Find Quality Contacts

More than just meeting potential clients, building your network means reaching out to other people whose work you find interesting. This includes those who could possibly introduce you to potential clients.

For example, if you're looking to be a business intelligence consultant on medium-sized law firms, rather than just seeking out contacts who are partners in law firms, get to know the people who are most likely in touch with them.

This includes people involved in organizations for legal professionals, corporate event planners, or editors of law-related publications. They might not be your potential clients, but they know people who might be your potential clients, and they can also provide you with industry insights you wouldn't normally have access to.

Think about the people or organizations that your target clients often interact with. Then, see if you can find some of these people that may genuinely need your services, and reach out to them.

3. Focus on In-demand, Profitable Services

The more you can improve your client's business—whether through increasing their profits or by solving their most pressing problems—the easier you can justify higher rates. If you offer just services that are "nice to have" rather than "must haves", it will be harder to make a sale or to justify high prices.

Proposals

How to Charge Premium Prices and Write Winning Proposals

Joyce Akiko

Freelance

How to Find Out Exactly What Your Target Clients Want—Then Sell It to Them

Celine Roque

4. Develop Strong Branding and Marketing

If you want to reach top-tier clients and provide highly profitable services, your marketing should reflect that. This includes everything from your business card to your website template. Sloppy or cheap-looking design might indicate that you're not ready to handle high profile or top-tier clients, so be mindful of the impression you're making with your marketing materials.

Consider your target clients' design sensibilities. What do their marketing materials look like? Which types of premium products do they use, and what does the design and packaging of these products look like?

As for your marketing plan itself, you can start with a minimalist plan that requires less effort and fewer resources, so that you can spend time on the things that matter. For example, it's better to have 50 beautifully designed business cards than 400 cheap-looking ones.

It's also better for your branding to have an elegant one-page website, rather than a website with a blog, too many pages, and multi-media features but looks hastily put together. By focusing on the essential marketing tasks and making sure that the output is high quality, you're likely to get more for the time and money you invest into your marketing.

Start a Consulting Business the Smart Way

While consulting can be a challenging, intimidating, and a highly competitive venture, the rewards are attractive to those who are able to do the work. If you find that consulting is a good fit for you and that you'd be able to thrive with full autonomy, then all the effort you put into starting a consulting business will be worth it.

 2016-05-18T00:55:29.000Z 2016-05-18T00:55:29.000Z Celine Roque tag:business.tutsplus.com,2005:PostPresenter/cms-26496 What Is a Franchise Business?
If you want to start a business, maybe you've heard of the term "franchising" bandied around, but aren't really sure what it means or how it works.

Don't worry. In this tutorial, I'll define a franchise business for you, explaining how franchises work and giving examples of famous franchises that you're probably already familiar with.

Then I'll take you through the process of starting and running a franchise. If you want more detail at any stage, you can refer to my comprehensive series on Buying and Running a Successful Franchise. But if you just want a quick introduction so that you can get clear on what a franchise is and how it works, this tutorial is for you.

 1. What Is a Franchise Business?

Let's start with a basic definition of a franchise. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, a franchise is:

An authorization granted to an individual or group to trade in a particular area for a stated period, usually in return for royalties, a share of the profits, etc.

Let's explore what that means through an example. In fact, we're going to look at two famous fast-food businesses that operate in very different ways: McDonald's and Chipotle Mexican Grill.

Why those two? Because McDonald's is a franchise business, and Chipotle isn't. The difference in how they operate will help you to understand what a franchise business is.

Chipotle

We'll start with the non-franchise example. Chipotle operates more than 2,000 restaurants worldwide, and it owns those restaurants itself. The company bears all the cost of opening and running each store, and keeps all the profits for itself. The people who run the stores and those who make the burritos are all Chipotle employees.

McDonald's

McDonald's, on the other hand, only directly owns a minority of its 36,000 outlets. Most of them are franchises. What that means is that someone else owns and operates each McDonald's restaurant. McDonald's gives those people the right to use its famous brand, logo, menu, etc., so they can probably attract far more customers than they would if they opened up a new hamburger restaurant in their own name. They also get to use a proven business model rather than trying to invent their own.

In return for all that, the people who run each restaurant pay fees to McDonald's, usually calculated as a percentage of sales.

That's the basic tradeoff in a franchising relationship. The franchisor (in this case McDonald's) lets other people (the franchisees) take advantage of its brand, its business model, and its marketing clout, and it takes a percentage of sales in return.

We'll look at franchise businesses in more detail later on, but I hope that for now you understand the fundamental difference between the franchise and non-franchise business model.

 2. Examples of Franchises

Even if you weren't familiar with the franchise business model before reading this, you've almost certainly had dealings with some franchises already in your day-to-day life.

Take a look at Franchise Direct's ranking of the Top 100 Global Franchises, and you'll see plenty of household names. McDonald's is on there, as we've seen, but so are Subway, KFC, Burger King, Pizza Hut, Dunkin' Donuts, and many more. Every time you go to one of those restaurants, you're actually visiting an individual franchise under the larger brand umbrella.

But although many of the largest and best-known franchises are in the fast food industry, you'll also find franchises in many different fields.

There's Hilton Hotels, for example, or the Carrefour supermarket chain, or Century 21 real-estate agents, or the car rental agency Hertz. And the list goes on: courier companies, gyms, office-supply firms, tax accountants, auto-repair firms, and much more.

In the U.S., franchise businesses employ more than 9 million people and have a gross domestic product (GDP) of $552 billion, 3% of the U.S. economy as a whole, according to the International Franchise Association.

So now that you know what franchises are and have seen some examples of well-known franchises, let's take a more detailed look at how they work.

 3. How Does a Franchise Work?

Let's say that you want to run a franchise. How does the process work from your point of view as a franchisee?

The first thing you'll need to do is find an opportunity. You can start with some useful web resources like Entrepreneur's Franchise 500 list or Franchise Direct's searchable directory of franchises.

Keep in mind that there are many different types of franchises out there, and the type you choose depends on what you're looking for. The initial investment required from you could be anywhere from tens of thousands to millions of dollars. Some franchises may offer different levels of risk (and different levels of potential reward as well).

Some franchisors may offer lots of support to franchisees, while others offer less. Some are very structured, with lots of rules to follow, while others may allow more independence. Some may require you to work longer hours than others. Some may offer locations in your area, while others will require you to move.

All of these things will affect which franchise opportunity is right for you, so it's important to set your criteria up front and be clear about what you're looking for.

Then, when you've identified some possibilities, you'll need to evaluate each one. Make sure you understand the business model, and ask questions to find out how much you can expect to earn, how much training and marketing support is provided, and so on. Also make sure you read the detailed prospectus, known in the U.S. as a Franchise Disclosure Document.

I go into much more detail on the process of identifying and evaluating franchise opportunities in the following tutorials:

Franchise

How to Find Good Franchise Opportunities

Andrew Blackman

Franchise

How to Evaluate a Franchise Opportunity

Andrew Blackman

Franchise

How to Decode a Franchise Disclosure Document and Franchise Agreement

Andrew Blackman

When you've decided on a franchise opportunity and signed a deal, you'll typically get a license to run that business for a fixed term, say ten years, in exchange for an upfront fee and a commitment to pay royalties of perhaps 5% of revenue every year.

Beyond the fees, you'll have to budget for the usual setup costs of a business, like rent, equipment and inventory, so make sure you know exactly what you're getting into and have the funds to make it work.

When you've started, you'll run the business yourself, but within the guidelines established by the franchisor. If you've ever visited McDonald's, for example, you've probably noticed that each restaurant is pretty much the same. There may be some minor variations in store layout or menu items, but you don't get any big surprises.

That's because McDonald's, like any other franchisor, has a list of rules designed to keep the customer experience consistent in each store. If you run a McDonald's franchise, you'll have some leeway in the day-to-day management, but you won't be able to double the price of a Big Mac or decide to offer mashed potato instead of fries. Some things have to remain consistent with the brand.

In terms of the finances, it's pretty much like running your own independent business. You have to make all the investments and take the risks, but you get to keep any profits you make after paying the royalties and other fees to the franchisor.

 4. How to Run a Successful Franchise Business

As you've seen, running a franchise can be a great way to go into business while taking advantage of an existing firm's brand recognition.

But that doesn't mean that you should run out and invest in the next franchise opportunity you come across. There are good franchises and bad ones, good locations and bad ones. To make it work, you'll need to do a lot of research and follow the right process.

In this section, I'll cover some of the key points of running a successful franchise. I went into this process in depth in my series Buying and Running a Successful Franchise, so feel free to read that if you want more detail on any of the steps.

As I mentioned in section 3, it's important to do the research early on and decide on the right franchise for you. Once you've done that and started running the business, the key thing to remember is that, although a lot of support is provided for you, it's still your business, and you'll need to plan and strategize for success just as you would if you were starting your own business from scratch.

Many of the steps in the How to Start a Business tutorial, for example, also apply to franchises. You won't need to come up with an idea or create a name and a brand, because that's been done for you. But you will need to take other steps, like identifying and understanding your target market, creating a business plan and a financial model, hiring employees, and setting up your accounts.

And although many franchise agreements include some marketing support, that doesn't mean you don't need to do anything by yourself. If you run a McDonald's franchise, for example, you'll benefit from all the ads the company runs on TV and elsewhere, and from the general brand recognition. But those ads aren't telling people about your particular restaurant. So what can you do to get the word out locally? Maybe you could run contests or promotions, or get a spot on local radio.

As you're making your plans, of course, you'll need to consult your franchising agreement at all times to make sure you're not violating any of the terms. But as long as you're staying within the franchisor's guidelines, do everything you can to get the word out and attract a loyal customer base. View the support you get from the franchisor as a bonus, not as the be-all and end-all.

Also remember that, as Theodore Roosevelt once said, "The most important single ingredient in the formula of success is knowing how to get along with people."

Getting along with people doesn't mean going along with things you don't want to. If you have concerns, you should definitely raise them with the franchisor. But maintaining a good relationship is important.

With an independent business, you can stay in business for as long as you want, as long as you're profitable. But a franchise agreement runs for a fixed term, and there's no guarantee of being able to renew it. And if you violate any of the terms, it could even be terminated early. So although doing a good job, following the rules and paying your royalties are most important, maintaining a good relationship can certainly help.

And, on a more positive note, keeping on good terms with the franchisor can lead to more opportunities. For example, your store may be chosen to be featured in a special promotion or an advertising campaign. And if new franchises become available, you may be given the chance to buy one.

It's also important, of course, to build relationships with your customers and your employees. Customers are the lifeblood of your business, and employees are responsible not only for working efficiently but for dealing with customers and being the face of your business.

These two tutorials give a useful framework for identifying your target customers and giving them what they want. They're aimed at freelancers, but many of the lessons also apply to franchises.

Freelance

How to Identify Profitable Clients: A Step-by-Step Guide

Celine Roque

Freelance

How to Find Out Exactly What Your Target Clients Want—Then Sell It to Them

Celine Roque

For more on hiring and managing employees, see the following tutorials:

Management

The Strategic Guide to Managing Difficult Employees

Lisa Jo Rudy

Creativity

How to Bring Out Your Team's Creative Best

David Masters

Management

How to Hire Your First Employees

Andrew Blackman

Branding

How to Encourage Brand Advocacy Through Employee Engagement

Brenda Barron

Conclusion

In this tutorial, you've learned what a franchise business is and how it works. We've looked at some examples of franchises, and we've seen how a franchise business like McDonald's differs from a predominantly non-franchise business like Chipotle.

You also now have an understanding of some of the research you need to do in order to find and evaluate franchise opportunities, and you've got some tips on running a successful franchise.

If that's all you were looking for, then I hope it's met your expectations. If you're still looking for more details, the next step is to work through my comprehensive series on Buying and Running a Successful Franchise.

 2016-05-17T12:55:21.000Z 2016-05-17T12:55:21.000Z Andrew Blackman tag:business.tutsplus.com,2005:PostPresenter/cms-26492 20 Best MailChimp Templates - To Level-Up Your Business Email Newsletter
People love MailChimp because of its ease-of-use and beautiful designs.

Problem is, many times it's cumbersome to try and use your own customized templates if they're not specifically optimized for MailChimp.

Instead, you end up sacrificing either the intuitive interface or the jaw-dropping user experience. Neither of which are acceptable.

Fortunately, we've compiled a list of the top 20 MailChimp email newsletter templates that provide the simple, drag-and-drop functionality without sacrificing style.

Best Selling MailChimp templates - available for sale on Envato Market (ThemeForest)

Best Mailchimp Templates

Here's the full list of MailChimp optimized email templates, with a few helpful quick tips at the end to highlight how to use these new beautiful designs:

1. Multimail - Responsive Email Set + MailBuild Online

Multimail is one of the best selling email template sets over the last year for a reason. It comes standard with over 10 multi-purpose email templates for a variety of uses. It's compatible with MailChimp and a number of additional popular email marketing providers.

But if that's not enough, it also contains over 179 modules to offer literally thousands of different possibilities—sure to help you stand out from the crowd.

Multimail - MailChimp optimized template

2. Omail - Email Templates Set with Online Builder

Omail is another email template with hugely customizable options, offering two hundred different modules, and 20 specific multipurpose templates that range from software to fitness and travel. The best part about full, multi-purpose sets like Omail is the range.

For example, this one set can help you with a standard newsletter, the next event you have coming up, or even general invoices that need to be sent out.

Omail - MailChimp email newsletter design

3. Kent - Responsive Email + StampReady Builder

Kent comes with over 50 drag-and-drop modules, featuring flat, contemporary design perfect for agencies, eCommerce, and other tech aficionados.

If you're looking for a template to customize, Kent would be perfect. It comes with templates built out in standard HTML (without pre-formatting tags for MailChimp), so you can easily make edits before sending.

Kent - MailChimp compatible email template

4. Emailio - Responsive Multipurpose Email Template

Emailio contains over ten templates, made up of more than 60 different modules. Beyond some of the more common email templates you're used to seeing, Emailio contains templates perfect for weddings, restaurants, new product launches and real estate too.

Emailio also works with the latest version of Outlook (2016), which can be notoriously problematic for many pre-built email newsletter templates.

Emailio - responsive MailChimp template

5. Moka - Creative Email and Newsletter Template

Moka is a traditional business-focused email template that contains sections to describe your services at a glance, highlight team members, and even put the spotlight on specific products.

Moka also features unlimited colors and variations to perfectly match your specific company's brand identity.

Moka - creative MailChimp email design

6. Supra - Pack of 20 Templates + Online Template Builder

Supra contains twenty different email templates to choose from and customize, making it one of the best options for people looking for pre-built templates to use.

In addition to the 'standard' business and product-focused templates, Supra also contains ready-made templates for nonprofit organizations, crowdfunding, resumes, and order receipts.

Supra - Email Template MailChimp Ready

7. Course - Responsive Email + MailBuild Online

Course contains 26 modules to create a huge variety of possible layouts. It also provides unlimited color options using their color picker and a simple WYSIWYG text editor for dropping in content.

When ready, you can 'export to desktop' for other services, or send a template directly to your MailChimp account to speed up the process.

Course - responsive MailChimp email newsletter

8. Deso - Email and Newsletter Template

Deso is another business-focused template, brought to you by the same people who created Moka (number 5 above).

The simple-to-use online editor makes it a breeze to drag modules in-and-out depending on your preferred layout. And the ready-made designs mean you can switch out the basics (like color and content) without worrying about messing up the rest of the beautiful email design.

Deso - MailChimp Email and Newsletter Template

9. Magma - Email Template + EmailBuilder

Magma is a modern and clean template set containing 35 modules to drag-and-drop. The flat design makes for a very simple, elegant email with lots of white space (for those who love minimal designs). Some of the newest modules include 'Specs', 'Reviews', 'Blog', and 'Partners'.

Magma - MailChimp Email Template Design

10. Atellar - Email Newsletter + StampReady Builder

Atellar is a contemporary business template compatible with the StampReady Builder for painless editing.

Perfect for agencies and other technology companies, Atellar features unique module designs including a chart bar and product pricing tables.

Atellar - MailChimp Email Newsletter Builder

11. Ferio - MailChimp Compatible Email Template

Ferio features 22 different pre-built modules to assemble a 'custom' email business layout in minutes (as opposed to hours or days).

Beautiful, full-width video modules make it perfect for highly visual brands. While a dedicated Call-To-Action modules make it easy to get your point across and do more than just show off.

Ferio - MailChimp email template design

12. Fountain - Modern Email Template + Online Editor

Fountain is a simple, elegant template that keeps the focus on showcasing your brand, products, and services.

It packs over 40+ draggable modules, but keeps a consistent aesthetic so that your customizations of color and content won't 'break' the overall theme (which can sometimes happen when you start editing too much without a trained eye for design).

Fountain - Modern MailChimp Email Template

13. Breathe - Responsive Email + Online Builder

Breathe provides businesses a minimal yet modern email design that can work in a variety of traditional industries.

The modules feature portfolio spaces to show off your latest work, a 'skills' section to highlight service options and a client section with offset background color to make your impressive credentials stand out.

Breathe - MailChimp email newsletter

14. Agency - MailChimp Ready Email Template

Agency delivers exactly as promised. It's an agency-focused template that combines highly contrasting color sections, a flat aesthetic, and full-width background image sections to give your firm a start-up look and feel. Another interesting perk? Free lifetime updates and support.

Agency - MailChimp newsletter template

15. Activo - Email Templates Set with Online Builder

Activo is a monster template pack, stuffed full with 15 email templates and 200 modules for limitless creativity.

It features a few different notification templates, as well as an order confirmation, several travel options and one of the best restaurant focused designs around.

Activo - Best MailChimp Templates Set

16. Atom - Responsive Email + MailChimp Compatible

Atom takes the counterintuitive approach of keeping customizations rather limited because the basic design is already great.

That means you can drag-and-drop different modules for unlimited layouts, and customize the content, images or colors. But otherwise there's nothing else you need to worry about, which makes your life simple if you're looking for a 'done-for-you' solution.

Atom - email newsletter MailChimp compatible

17. Rockmail - Multipurpose Email + Builder Access

Rockmail's minimal design is highlighted by the fact that you can simply add or remove modules directly in the MailChimp editor. You can also specify theme colors and edit images or content directly in MailChimp.

That makes editing and publishing new campaigns on-the-fly a breeze, limiting the need to dive into a third-party editor each time you want to send a new newsletter or make simply copy edits.

Rockmail - MailChimp Email Ready + Multipurpose

18. Professional - Email Newsletter Pack + MailChimp

Professional is a robust solution. It features a fully drag and drop interface to quickly assemble the 13 modules, or edit the 7 email templates included.

Publishing new email newsletters with Professional is a breeze because you only need to worry about matching your basic branding colors, selecting new images and then dropping in some copy. It takes care of everything else!

Professional - MailChimp designed email newsletter

19. Notify2 - Notification Email + Themebuilder Access

Most notification emails sent from applications or other products are ugly and text-heavy.

Fortunately, Notify2 can help you liven up these critical emails so that people actually look forward to opening and reading them.

You can send out coupons, deliver important news, and use re-engagement notifications to get people back onto your site similar to how other popular platforms do (like Pinterest).

Notify2 - notification email + MailChimp compatible

20. Monitor - Email Template Set + Builder 2.0

Monitor contains 15 email templates for businesses, real estate, fitness, applications, and more. They also contain over 200 individual modules for infinite customizations.

Each module features contemporary designs that expertly balance branding and conversions. So you'll be able to sell, without taking away from the overall look and feel you've worked so hard to cultivate.

Monitor - MailChimp email template set

3 Emails You Should be Sending (In Addition to Your Regular Newsletter)

Emails are five times more likely to be seen than a message on Facebook or Twitter. And they're still, after all this time, produce a better ROI than social media (and almost any other channel).

Chances are, you're already familiar with sending out a standard email newsletter. A semi-frequent round-up sent weekly (or monthly) to a general audience.

These help, but only to a point.

If you're only sending a single weekly or month newsletter, chances are, you're leaving money on the table.

Event-triggered messages can boost results 600% according to one study from market research firm Gartner.

Adding these into your regular email marketing workflow can give you tremendous leverage with a tiny amount of effort. Because the best news is that you can automate these messages. Just create and set them up once, and then set them on autopilot.

Here are three quick examples that most companies can (and should) begin sending this week.

1. Welcome Emails

These are simple introductory emails to welcome new people and begin building trust. Typically new contacts need 7 'touches' before they start to recognize who you are. So start building familiarity as soon as possible with a 'welcome' email sent immediately to new subscribers or contacts.

2. Post-Purchase Emails

Sending emails to new customers and clients is a smart move to confirm their order and expand on what comes next.

But they're also a powerful way to continue earning trust, moving quickly to squash any potential buyers remorse before it strikes.

Following up after purchases also presents a new opportunity to capitalize on their interest to upsell, cross-sell, or encourage referrals to friends, family, and colleagues.

3. Past Customer Emails

We're all going to lose customers or clients at a certain point in time. Unfortunately, that's a given.

The good news is that you don't have to completely abandon the relationship. Instead, you can send out emails to 'win back' or recover lost customers and clients by highlighting new or different offerings.

Grab a MailChimp Email Template Now!

MailChimp is one of the simplest email marketing services to use.

But when you try to upload a pre-built template that's not built specifically for them, problems occur.

Difficulty going back to edit images and copy are routine. Compatibility with other email service providers like Gmail or Outlook can be a nightmare. And don't even bring up responsive for mobile.

Fortunately, the 20 best selling MailChimp email templates listed here are all perfectly compatible with MailChimp, simplifying your life with easy-to-use, drag-and-drop modules. Browse them today to find one that's perfect for your business.

And they do it without sacrificing beauty or aesthetic, so your email newsletter will look as good when published as it does when you originally edited it.

Start browsing them today to find one that's perfect for your business.

 2016-05-17T12:55:02.000Z 2016-05-17T12:55:02.000Z Brad Smith tag:business.tutsplus.com,2005:PostPresenter/cms-26446 Excel What-If Analysis: How to Use the Scenario Manager
The Scenario Manager is a great, but often overlooked What-If Analysis feature of Excel that will let you swap multiple sets of data in a worksheet and even compare them side-by-side. This technique can help you decide between multiple courses of action or what the implications are among several possibilities.

For example, let's say we are concert promoters and want to produce a show. We need to decide what venue to use because that will determine costs, revenues, profit or loss, and what talent to contract for.

In this exercise, we'll use the Scenario Manager to compare four sets of numbers: small, medium, large and very large locations and their associated costs and revenues, assuming each show sells out.

Screencast

Watch the complete tutorial screencast above, or work through the step-by-step written version below, but first download the practice worksheet so you can work through the excercises.

Download the Practice Worksheet

You can re-create the sheet below or download practice-files.zip, which contains the scenarios.xlsx worksheet below and a worksheet of the completed Excel Scenario Manager exercise.

Excel What-If Analysis Scenerio Manager - Practice Worksheet

This sheet currently displays the smallest of the venues, which has 300 seats. The numbers in orange boxes are calculated, so we won't adjust them in the scenarios. Here are the formulas the calculated numbers use:

B13: Total costs adds the costs from the cells above.

B19: Ticket sales multiplies the number of seats x ticket price (B4*B17).

B20: Merchandising (t-shirts, souvenirs) assumes patrons purchase an average of $5/seat (5*B4).

B21: Food & beverage assumes patrons purchase an average of $15/seat (15*B4).

B22: Total revenue adds the revenues from the cells above.

B24: Profit or loss subtracts total cost from total revenue (B22-B13).

Tip: press Ctrl + `</b> (accent mark) to display all the formulas on the sheet at once. Press <b>Ctrl</b> + <b>` again to return the sheet to normal. This shortcut is identical in both Windows and Mac.

Display formulas using Excel keyboard shortcut

1. Make Your First Scenario

Step 1: Set up the First Scenario

Now we'll dig into What-If Analysis in Excel. We'll open up the Scenario Manager and begin:

First, select all the cells that will change. To do that, click B4, hold the Ctrl key (Command key on the Mac) while dragging from B6 down to B12, then Ctrl + click (Command + click on the Mac) B17.

On the ribbon, select the Data tab > What-If Analysis > Scenario Manager.

Excel What-If Analysis: Scenario Manager

This displays the Scenario Manager dialog box. Since we haven't created any scenarios yet, it says there are none defined.

Scenario Manager dialog box

Each scenario will be a set of the cells you just selected, containing unique values. The first set will be the current values.

Step 2: Now Create the First Scenerio

In the dialog box, click Add.

Enter the name Original values.

The changing cells are what you selected. If you selected different cells by mistake, you can enter the correct ones here (see image below).

Enter a comment if you want. This is optional.

The checkboxes for Protection are only if you want to protect the sheet from changes. We won't do that in this exercise, so ignore these choices.

Scenario Protections options

Click OK. The Scenario Values dialog box shows you a list of all the cells in the scenario and what their current values are. Note that you can't resize this box, so use its scrollbar to see all of them.

Scenario Values dialog box

For now, there's nothing to change, but note the Add button. A quick way of creating several scenarios one after another is to click this Add button after entering values. That will immediately display the Add Scenario screen.

For now, click OK. That brings back the main Scenario Manager dialog, showing the first one listed.

Back to the main Scenario Manager dialog box

The Manager has buttons for adding a new scenario, deleting one, editing one, merging in a scenario from another open workbook, and creating a summary. The summary is the coolest part, and we'll do that below.

2. Create Additional Scenarios

Step 1: Add More Scenarios

Click Add. This is the same thing as clicking the Add button in the previous step.

Create 3 more scenarios using the data from the table below. The general concept is that larger venues will have higher costs – not always in proportion – along with the ability to charge higher ticket prices resulting in greater revenues. For the sake of simplicity, assume that if a concert has more than one act, they're combined in the Artist category.

The fastest way of entering the numbers is not to use the mouse. Just type a number, press the Tab key, type another number, press the Tab key, and so on.

Description

Value

Scenario name

Medium venue

B4 (# of seats)

800

B6 (artist)

7500

B7 (venue rental)

1000

B8 (amplification)

600

B9 (lighting)

350

B10 (ticketing)

250

B11 (security)

300

B12 (insurance)

250

B17 (ticket price)

35

Scenario name

Large venue

B4 (# of seats)

1500

B6 (artist)

12000

B7 (venue rental)

3500

B8 (amplification)

1000

B9 (lighting)

700

B10 (ticketing)

350

B11 (security)

1000

B12 (insurance)

500

B17 (ticket price)

50

Scenario name

Very large venue

B4 (# of seats)

5000

B6 (artist)

25000

B7 (venue rental)

10000

B8 (amplification)

2500

B9 (lighting)

2000

B10 (ticketing)

500

B11 (security)

2500

B12 (insurance)

2500

B17 (ticket price)

50

After entering the last scenario, click OK to return to the main Scenario Manager screen. It should look like this:

Scenario Manager screen

Step 2: Switch Between

The sheet still shows the original values, so here's the first cool feature: Double-click one of the scenario names in the list. The sheet updates with those values.

Updated values

Step 3: View All the Scenarios at Once

Click the Summary button.

That confirms you want to create a summary, not a PivotTable, so leave the default radio button selected.

It also confirms the main result cell is the Profit or Loss in B24.

Profit or Loss cell Result

 Click OK. That creates a new sheet in the workbook, called Scenario Summary.

Scenario Summary worksheet

Step 4: Engaging With the Scenario Summary

This shows the values that the sheet currently displays (you could have changed these manually) as well as the sets of numbers from all four scenarios.

Notice the small plus and minus symbols in the margins. These are part of Excel's Group and Outline feature, which you can use separately from Scenario Manager. The Outline button is also on the ribbon's Data tab, all the way on the end.

Click any of the minus signs to collapse the sheet so it shows only summary data, or click the plus signs to expand and show detail.

Outline features

Step 5: Two Things to Be Aware Of

None of the values are dynamic. If you change the underlying data on the original sheet, the values on this sheet will not change. You will need to create a new summary.

Down column C, you see Excel lists the cell references, not their labels (Artist, Venue rental, etc.). If you want to see the labels, stretch out column C and type them manually.

Scenario Summary issues

Conclusion

The next time you want to compare several sets of data, maybe to decide among multiple courses of action, give the Excel What-If Analysis - Scenario Manager a try. It might show exactly what you need to make a decision.

 2016-05-16T12:55:55.000Z 2016-05-16T12:55:55.000Z Bob Flisser tag:business.tutsplus.com,2005:PostPresenter/cms-26506 20 Best WordPress Magazine Themes: For Blog & News Sites
When it comes to magazine and news websites, WordPress is popular choice.

Many well-known news sites like The New York Times, The Crunch, CNN, and others use WordPress as their platform of choice, since it allows them to showcase their content with a beautiful design and professional SEO. It also built to regularly update your website content with ease and plug-in functionality as you need it.

Choosing the perfect WordPress theme for your magazine website or news blog can be harder than it seems. You need to make sure your site can showcase a larger amount of content on a single screen, and at the same time, you need your content to look attractive to your readers to generate user engagement.

So to help you out, in this article we've prepared a list of the top WordPress magazine themes on Envato Market (ThemeForest).

Best Selling WordPress Magazine Themes - available for sale on Envato Market (ThemeForest)

These are the best-selling WP magazine themes from Envato Market that have proven their popularity over the last year with their stellar design, plenty of features, and customization options that are sure to take your magazine or news site to the next level.

Best WordPress Magazine Themes

Why spend hours sifting through countless themes when we can point you to the best magazine themes right now? Here's our current top twenty:

1. Redwood - Responsive WordPress Blog Theme

Redwood is a responsive WordPress theme that features a beautiful slider with three promo boxes at the top, perfect for showcasing different categories of your magazine. It also comes with five different blog layouts, including full width version of each layout and five different post formats suitable for video posts, gallery posts, music posts and standard posts.

It also comes with custom widgets for Facebook and Instagram. Plus, profile and social widgets. Easy customization options are included as well, which allow you to change your site's colors (and branding) with a click of a button.

2. The Voux - Comprehensive Magazine Theme

The Voux touts itself as a stylish, professional magazine WordPress theme that's simultaneously comprehensive and lightweight. The theme is responsive and retina ready, meaning it will look beautiful no matter what devices your visitors use to view your content.

Some of this theme's features include striking highlighted images which help draw your readers in, infinite scroll, the ability to share your posts on social media built into the theme, and so much more. To top it all off, The Voux comes with Visual Composer which allows you to completely customize the look and feel of your pages.

3. Newstube - Magazine Blog & Video Theme

NewsTube is a clean and well-organized theme perfect for video oriented sites. It is fully responsive, retina ready, includes flexible theme layouts, extensive theme options, and supports videos from many popular sites including Youtube, Vimeo and Daily Motion.

With this video theme, you can submit a video from the front end, create great video channels and playlists, or import YouTube Videos and Channels to your website.

4. Flex Mag - Responsive WordPress News Theme

Flex Mag features a mobile first design which gives your readers the option to browse through the articles sorted by featured or latest posts via secondary navigation. The theme is packed with features which include a custom Fly-Out Navigation, custom scoreboard, auto-load posts, four different preset skins, nine different Featured Posts options, eight different article templates, 700+ Google Fonts, integration with WooCommerce and bbPress, and so much more.

This theme is the perfect combination of power and simplicity in a WordPress news and magazine theme, giving you plenty of options and flexibility to customize your site without being totally overwhelming.

5. Bimber - Viral & Buzz WP Theme

Bimber is the perfect theme if you want to create a site similar to BuzzFeed. Bimber is responsive, SEO optimized, compatible with SEO plugins, optimized for Google PageSpeed and comes with support for microdata and rich snippets as well as several ad widgets.

What's more, the theme can be easily modified via WordPress customizer and comes with a child theme which allows you to safely modify the theme without worrying about losing your changes with the next theme update. On top of that, it comes with one-click installable demos to get your site up and running as quickly as possible.

6. Herald - News Portal & Magazine WordPress Theme

Herald is a professional WordPress theme crafted especially for news and magazine sites. It offers a high level of customization with more than 500 variations for your article listing layouts, as well as many options to suit your needs with no coding knowledge required.

Herald integrates with WooCommerce and bbPress and it even allows your readers to leave a rating on your services or products. It's optimized for speed and ensures your website will load fast. And it supports a wide variety of image sizes to make sure your images always look great.

7. Goodlife - Premium WP Magazine Theme

Goodlife comes with seven different layouts to choose from depending on what kind of site you want to create. All of the homepage layouts are responsive and include three different header styles and smart ad areas.

The theme is bundled with several different plugins such as Visual Composer, Viral Quiz Builder, Maintenance Pro, Essential Grid and Rankie, which give additional interactive features and the ability to create unique layouts. On top of that, Goodlife is SEO and speed optimized with you plenty of customization options.

8. Chirps - Flexible WordPress Magazine Theme

With 13 different article layouts, 14 unique page designs, and the option to create colorful rows and columns, Chirps truly helps you stand out from the crowd. Every element can be individually customized via a page builder.

This theme includes multiple header layouts, Google Fonts, title area overlays, the ability to feature review articles, and much more. Chirps is fully SEO optimized and built with speed in mind.

9. Falive - Beautiful Creative & Fashion Blog Theme

Lifestyle, fashion, and creative bloggers will appreciate Falive's clean and streamlined layout. Falive allows you to customize colors, fonts, padding, header layouts, and more with WordPress customizer.

Choose between a full-width or a boxed layout. Or optionally, add a sidebar, add related posts inside individual posts, and set up a recommended post to display as a user scrolls down. Falive's setup simplicity allows you to spend more time on creating engaging content.

10. Jay - Elegant WordPress Blog Theme

Jay is a responsive magazine theme with a clean and modern look, featuring eight different layouts, including a parallax option. The homepage features a large image which is perfect for welcoming your site's visitors with a custom message.

Take advantage of multiple layouts and advanced design options to create a visually impressive magazine website. Other features include shortcodes, a post author section, related posts section, infinite scrolling, custom Facebook, Instagram, Flickr, and Dribble widgets, and much more.

11. Bitz - News & Publishing WP Theme

If your website relies on publishing the most up-to-date news, look no further than Bitz. With built-in functionality for custom timing, your readers will know your website is the go-to place for the most recent news.

Pair that with a review functionality with rich snippets with a powerful front-end and back-end editor which lets you customize any aspect of your website (and see the changes as you make them) and you have a truly powerful theme on your hands.

Bits also supports attractive article labels, SEO, and has WooCommerce integration.

12. Examiner - Robust WP Magazine Theme

Examiner was designed to be flexible, user-friendly, with plenty of customization options while still being easy to setup and use. The theme features multiple layout options, a review system, and 24 custom widget areas which allow you to create a truly unique and interesting layout.

The Examiner WordPress magazine theme is the perfect theme for publishers and bloggers who want to share their passion with the world, but don't have the time or resources to build something from scratch.

13. Master - Premium Blog & Magazine WordPress Theme

Master is a responsive magazine theme that is not only modern and elegant but also features one-click install and setup. With 10 ready-to-use demos, the theme is designed to get your website up and running as quickly as possible.

Master offers five different blog layouts, three slider designs, give different ways to present your categories, a drag and drop page builder, multi-lingual support and much more. To top it all off, Master comes with complete online documentation full of screenshots and video tutorials to help you setup your site.

14. Voyager - Creative Blog WordPress Theme

Voyager offers a clean and minimal design, suitable for a lifestyle, fashion, or travel blog and/or a portfolio site. With five different homepage designs, the theme can easily adapt to various niches by putting the focus on your content.

Voyager offers fully responsive design, integration with WooCommerce, as well as a built in pop up form so you can easily convert your visitors into subscribers. Voyager theme is the perfect choice for anyone whose primary goal is to grow their email list.

15. Metz - A Fashion Editorial Magazine Theme

Metz is a fashion-oriented editorial magazine theme that features an elegant and clean design with carefully selected typography that is sure to appeal to a female audience.

The theme's top features include a mobile friendly, responsive design, a sleek slider that can be used in three different positions, support for WooCommerce, five different layout options, four different header views, as well as 13 custom widgets.

16. Magzilla - For News Sites, Magazines and Blogs

Magzilla is a feature-rich theme suitable for news sites, magazines, and blogs alike. It's a fully responsive, flexible, and modern WordPress theme designed to showcase your content in a clean, minimal, and fashionable way.

This theme lets you choose from unlimited colors, unlimited page templates, as well as from a slew of other options. On top of that, the theme comes with multi-lingual and SEO support, Visual Composer, and thorough documentation to guide you through the setup process.

17. Matador - Responsive News, Blog, & Magazine Theme

Matador is a clean and stylish magazine theme that offers several different layouts ranging from traditional to masonry to slider-focused. It supports responsive design, includes preset color schemes and shortcodes, with plenty of other features to get you started quickly.

And if you want to customize your site and make it your own, then the extensive customization options and 20 different widget areas, will allow you to create a truly unique design.

18. Read & Digest Theme - for Magazines, Newspapers & Blogs

With 14 different homepage layouts, four slider types, a fully responsive design, and bold typography, Read & Digest is everything you need in a theme to create a visually appealing magazine or news website.

The included comprehensive options panel lets you easily tweak any option in an intuitive manner and allows you to give your website your own personal touch. Other notable features include integration with WooCommerce, Contact Form 7, and a child theme so you can safely change theme files at any time.

19. Soledad - Multi-Concept Blog/Magazine WP Theme

Soledad is a multi-concept blog and magazine theme with over 200 slider and blog layout combinations, three sidebar layout styles, five article layout styles, and six different layouts, giving you a wide range of possibilities to create a unique and stunning design.

This theme also comes with the ability to have video backgrounds as well as WooCommerce support and plenty of customization options, which are sure to please even the most demanding website owner.

20. Paperback - Magazine WordPress Theme

Paperback is a magazine-style theme that allows you to quickly and easily create beautiful, immersive content with images, galleries, video, audio, and more. Paperback is fully responsive and customizable. It's compatible with many popular plugins including Jetpack and Shortcodes Ultimate.

The theme offers multiple homepage templates, content discovery features, premium Typekit typography, and several built-in color schemes, which you can use as-is or as a starting point for your own splash of color.

Get your magazine website, news driven site, or professional blog setup quickly with this robust WordPress theme. And get to publishing beautiful, engaging content.

Magazine & News Sites Best Practices

Creating a visually appealing magazine or news site is no easy task. Aside from making sure the theme follows the latest best practices, there are three main things you need to keep in mind when choosing a theme for your magazine website:

Your content needs to be front and center and easy to read on all devices.

Content demands to be presented in a visually appealing way with striking imagery that will draw your visitors in.

The design should be well organized and structured, rather than feel busy and overwhelming.

Once you've chosen a theme that fits the above requirements and gives you the features you need, your next step is properly installing and setting up your new magazine WordPress theme. And from there, the sky's the limit.

Choose the Best WordPress Magazine Theme

With so many WordPress themes available, and the complexity of magazine and news sites, deciding on the best theme for your website may take some consideration.

Choose a theme that fits your branding needs, showcases your content in a style that matches your design goals, and that displays perfectly on all devices.

With Envato Market's huge WordPress theme selection your website can be up and running professionally in no time.

 2016-05-12T12:57:55.826Z 2016-05-12T12:57:55.826Z Brenda Barron tag:business.tutsplus.com,2005:PostPresenter/cms-26463 The Definitive Guide to Buyer Personas for Beginners
In the game I Spy, the spy says "I spy with my little eye something with the color blue." Then the players must guess what object the spy saw based on that color (or whichever color the spy chooses).

The game can be difficult, depending on how many objects are in the vicinity with the specified color. Difficult games of I Spy can be frustrating for spies, who can get bored waiting for the player to pick the correct object.

Content marketing is a lot like the game, "I Spy." Your ideal prospects know your solution is out there, but they're getting bored waiting for you to identify and target them with the message they expect. Or even worse, it's likely they're being bombarded with content from your competitors since 91 percent of marketers are creating custom content today.

If you don't want to spy with your little eye a bunch of prospects you're missing out on, then it's time you to create buyer personas.

Buyer personas are generalized representations of your ideal customers. The process of researching and creating buyer personas makes you understand your customers and prospects. Personas allow you to personalize your marketing campaigns, website messaging and content specifically for your perfect customers, which increases your conversions.

When personas are well researched, the exercise clarifies who your buyers are, the situations they're in and most importantly, the goals they're trying to accomplish.

Top performing companies have mapped 90 percent or more of their customer database by buyer persona, and 71 percent of companies that exceed revenue and lead generation goals have documented buyer personas.

The takeaway here is: first comes the buyer personas then comes the content marketing.

In this tutorial, learn how to conduct the proper research to fill your buyer personas with meaningful insights. Also, use our free buyer persona slide template as a guide to put together your first buyer persona.

Buyer Persona Template - Slides (free download)

How Many Buyer Personas Should You Create?

"It's incredibly difficult to monetize an 'audience of everybody.'" - Joe Pulizzi

Each buyer persona represents a key segment of your audience; and so the number of personas you need to create depends on the number of segments you plan on targeting.

Most marketers will recommend building between three to five personas, but keep in mind, the more personas you make, the more content you're going to need to create. So in the beginning, focus on nailing the one key audience segment you need the most help engaging.

How Do You Get Insights into Your Buyer Persona?

Before you build out your first buyer persona, there's some much needed research to perform. Whether you have customer data in hand already or not, there's a variety of ways to research your personas online and gather more meaningful information. Here's your options for getting the insights you need to craft a detailed buyer persona from the web.

1. Set up a Feedback Poll on Your Site

Nothing beats actually talking to people. Who do you want to talk to? Your current customers, former customers, your competitors' customers and website visitors.

Hotjar is a phenomenal tool for interviewing and polling website visitors as well as recruiting beta testers to provide feedback on your offering(s). Using Hotjar's feedback polls (or any website feedback poll tool), discover the drivers on high traffic landing pages so you can understand why your site visitors are there in the first place.

For instance, if you have an online course site, you'll want to ask why they want to take the course. Is it for fun, to get a promotion, or something else? Having the answer to this question allows you to make your site's design and copy more relevant and convincing to visitors.

Set up a open text (not a multiple choice dropdown) feedback poll that triggers after five seconds. Here's three questions you can ask. Choose one:

Why are you looking for [insert offering] today?

What's missing on this page?

Where did you first hear about us?

2. Survey Existing Customers

Again, you can use a survey to ask questions to your customers. Here's the open-ended questions you should ask your existing customers, recommended by Hotjar:

What led you to look for [insert offering]? Explain in as much detail as possible how it will make your life easier / better.

What nearly stopped you from using us? List as many items as you can think of.

What persuaded you to [insert call-to-action (CTA)]. List as many items you can think of.

What could we have done to make your decision easier?

How would you describe yourself? e.g. I am a 30 year old male designer that loves cars and poker.

How would you describe us to a friend? (This is a great way to get testimonials for your site as well!)

Hotjar suggests keeping surveys short and to the point—asking no more than seven or eight questions. Answers to these questions give you the information you need to construct detailed buyer personas that are driven by real customer feedback.

3. Look for Public Reviews

While I don't recommend skipping the above two tactics, you really could create a fairly well defined persona simply from Googling what your customers and your competitors' customers are saying about your offerings.

Where do people review businesses like yours? These places are customer feedback gold mines. Here's a few places to starting browsing reviews:

For local businesses, visit sites like Yelp, Angie's List, Google Local, Better Business Bureau, The Chamber of Commerce or any of these other local business review sites.

For niche businesses, such as wedding planning offerings, check out places like theKnot and WeddingWire.

For app developers, visit iTunes and Google Play.

For startups, visit places like Product Hunt, GetApp, AlternativeTo and Software Advice.

For all small businesses, check social media, especially Twitter and Facebook, and Google your business name and/or unique offering + reviews.

When you find these reviews, look for key identifying phrases that show what your customers want and expect from you. Phrases may include:

"I wish…,"

"When will you add…,"

"Competitor X lets me…"

4. Utilize Forums and Communities

Sites like Quora and Reddit can also provide useful information when creating your buyer personas. You can ask the community questions or you can browse already answered questions that are helpful to your business offering.

5. Listen Online

Listen for key insights from your personas, even after you're done creating your buyer persona. Use a free tool like Mention, Google Alerts or Talkwalker Alerts to get notified of specific phrases that'll help you personalize your content even more.

I find Twitter Advanced Search especially useful when looking for customer or prospect feedback. Or track hashtags that are important to your industry using tools like Hootsuite or Tweetdeck.

Twitter advanced search

My last helpful listening hack is to browse the comments on popular industry blog posts. Use AllTop if you don't already have a list of blogs in your industry.

How Do You Craft Your Buyer Persona?

All this research is what feeds into creating detailed buyer personas.

When you research personas well, it helps you target your buyers better, understand what's important to them, the goals they are trying to accomplish, and how your product can better meet their needs.

Download our Buyer Persona Template for free, and let's get to work with taking the customer research you've conducted and transforming that into your first buyer persona.

Buyer Persona Slide Template

In this section, we use the example of a freelance internship marketplace to craft relevant questions and demonstrate the process. Our template focuses on these eight sections:

Demographics

Pain Points

Priorities

Values

Research Habits

Identifying Factors

Psychographics

And it's segmented into these key slides:

Persona Example

Personal Background

What?

Why?

How?

While this template is based on the example of research done for a freelance internship marketplace, it's compatible with multiple business types. It includes an easy to customize section in addition to the sample in the download, so you can tailor your buyer personas to your business—adding or removing sections that fit your company best.

Now to dive into each section and review the types of questions that will help you craft your first buyer persona.

Persona Slide

But first, let's review the persona slide, before we dig into deeper details. After you've collected information about your customers, then it's time to craft a representative buyer persona, which is slide 3 in the template. In the example below, we target an upbeat young professional that is reflective of our research:

Buyer Persona Slide: Example

Here you can customize the template and replace the character avatar placeholder with an image reflective of your target buyer persona.

Step 1: Personal Background

Demographics

Demographics let us know who our personas are. It tells us things like their age, gender, salary, location, education and family.

Ask these types of questions:

What's their name?

How old are they?

Are they male or female?

Do they have children? If so, how many?

Where are they located?

Are they married or single?

What level of education have they completed? (Use Alexa to find out)

Which school(s) did they attend and what was their major? Be specific.

Fill in the Personal Background and What? slides to narrow in on your persona's background details, goals, and demographic information. Then use that to clarify how your product or service will solve your customers needs.

Buyer Persona Slide: Personal Background

Keep in mind, that the details you pull from questioning your customers and your research will take a fuzzy view of who you're targeting and bring it into focus.

Buyer Persona Slide: What?

Career

In this example, we want to know about their current position, career aspirations, and goals. You may have another focal point here for your business.

Example questions:

How did they end up where they are today?

What industry do they work in? What type of company is it?

What is your current job title?

What's your career aspiration(s)?

How long have you been in your current position?

Who do you report to? Who reports to you?

How are you measured at work?

What skills are required to do your job?

What knowledge and software or tools do you use in your job?

Step 2: Pain Points

We want to know the buyer personas' pain points because this will help us craft messaging that makes them feel their pain, causing them to move quickly through your purchasing cycle.

Questions:

What frustrates you daily or often?

Please describe in detail the the worst customer service experience you've ever had.

What stresses you out?

What makes you angry?

What is the least favorite part of your job?

What does the worst job you can imagine look like?

Tell me about a purchase you made recently that you regret.

What keeps you up at night?

What accomplishment(s) are you most proud of? Why?

What are the top three things on your bucket list?

Step 3: Priorities

What are your personas' priorities? Is a tight budget their priority? Or are they motivated by what others think of them? Ordering your personas priorities allows you to craft messages that get to the point and convert quickly. For instance, if budget isn't an issue, focus on the value of your offering.

Questions:

What does a typical day look like for you?

How much time do you spend at work and at home?

Step 4: Values

Consider: What do your prospects value? Do they care about the environment? Are they hungry to grow their company quickly? Clearly defined values will define how you paint the bigger picture for your audience.

Questions:

What type of vehicles do you own and why?

Who are the people in your life that are most important?

Pull real quotes from your customer's answers and use them to add dimension to buyer persona in the Why? slide. And clarify what are top objections to the product or service you offer.

Buyer Persona Slide: Why?

Step 5: Research Habits

Are your personas early adopters, or are they late to the Facebook and Twitter party? The best way to find out how your buyer personas find and consume information is through quantitative website metrics. Consider factors like: What are the top three sources of referral traffic to your site? What keywords have the highest search volume and drive the most traffic to your site?

Questions:

Where do you go to learn about offerings?

What offline resources do you use?

What online resources do you use?

How do you prefer to shop?

Do you look at online reviews? Or do you ask for reviews in person?

How important is it to get a deal?

Which type of phone do you have?

What do you treat yourself to often or recently?

Which publications or blogs do you read?

How do you learn about new information for your job?

Which associations and social networks do you participate in?

Step 6: Identifying Factors

Why do some personas with the same demographics buy while others pull the trigger? It's tough to say. The easiest way to answer this question may be to go straight to the sales department. What factors distinguish hot leads from okay leads? Identifying factors may be anything from questions asked during the research phase to a company's organizational chart.

Questions:

What do they Google when they look for your offering?

How do they talk about your offering? What keywords do they use?

What words or phrases make their ears perk up or get them excited?

What words or phrases make them not excited or even upset?

Step 7: Psychographics

While demographics tell you who your persona is, psychographics tell you why they are who they are. Psychographics, or "attitudes, opinions and personality traits," which tell you what your persona cares about. They provide a huge opportunity to craft increasingly personalized, and therefore motivating, marketing content.

Questions:

What are their interests?

What do you do for fun?

What do you watch on TV?

Would they consider themselves an introvert or extrovert?

Would they say they're spontaneous?

What are their attitudes about [insert topic]?

What are their hobbies or activities?

Are they a risk taker or risk adverse?

Do they tend to break or follow rules?

Are they mostly optimistic, pessimistic or realistic?

Are they more creative or more logical?

How easily do they adapt to change?

Are they more independent or more dependent?

Do they get jealous easily?

Do they care about what others think of them?

How would their friends describe them?

How would they describe themselves?

Use this information to craft your marketing message and targeted elevator pitch in the How? slide, shown below:

Buyer Persona Slide: How?

It's Time to Complete Your Template

By now, you've conducted your research, asked your customers the right questions, and downloaded your buyer persona template, which means it's time to fill it in and craft your first buyer persona. If you don't have the time to complete this now, Pocket this article for later. Good luck!

 2016-05-11T12:55:42.000Z 2016-05-11T12:55:42.000Z Lauren Holliday