Building a strong customer base begins with a locally focused marketing strategy.

Going big and stretching your brand across miles can be beneficial, however, this isn’t always a possibility if you own a smaller sized business. Plus, local marketing is important for all kinds of industries. If you forget to market to your community, your community can’t help you spread the word.

Half-Fold Brochure Local Marketing Ideas

While online marketing is becoming increasingly popular, the best way to reach your local audience is with tangible marketing materials, like an interactive, detailed, and professional half-fold brochure. But before you even begin creating your brochure you will need to choose an effective local marketing strategy.

Reach Every ZIP Code

Reaching every ZIP code close to your business’s location is an affordable way to saturate your local market with your company name. Every Door Direct Mail or EDDM—also known as Geo Farming by some industries—is an affordable way to achieve this. It allows you to reach a large audience, easily and cost effectively, which makes it the perfect strategy if your company is just starting out.

All you need to do is choose the size and prepare your design for your half-fold brochure mailers in accordance with USPS guidelines (this includes 8.5” x 14” half-fold brochures and 11” x 17” half-fold brochures) and then choose your mail routes or ZIP codes. You can also target certain demographics within your chosen carrier routes.

Target The Right People

As technology advances every day, so do the options to target certain audiences. One of the tried-and-true ways to market locally is by creating a mailing list consisting of people who matter most to your business, and who also live within a certain radius around your business.

For example, say you are looking to promote your pet store’s grand opening. You could send out a half-fold brochure, that highlights key details of what your pet store has to offer, to every pet owner that is within a 5-mile radius of your store.

Don’t Forget Face-to-Face Interactions

The stronger your company’s presence is locally, the better chance your brand will become recognizable on a regional level. Of course, building a presence and a memorable brand can successfully be accomplished using direct mail marketing, especially if you channel multi-media or multi-drop campaigns. Yet, what about local events or the customers, neighboring businesses, and even strangers that pass by?

You interact with people and businesses every day, so why not let them get to know, not only your business but also you.

Hand your audience a half-fold brochure and introduce yourself and your brand, chances are they will remember their experience and your company, and the likelihood of them becoming loyal customers increases drastically.

Leave Them Behind

Creating long-lasting relationships with your neighboring businesses is key. Get to know the businesses in your area. When you make a connection with them see if they would be interested in leaving business cards or brochures on your front desk or entrance area, and you leave a half-fold brochure at their location for each of your customers to take one. Be sure to find a complimenting or even opposite type of business. For example, if you own a pet store, you could reach out to your local veterinary clinic or if you own a pizza restaurant, reach out to your local ice cream shop.

Making connections like these with a local business is a great way to boost your brand’s exposer and credibility.

Reach Out to Your Customers Neighbors

We mentioned reaching out to a targeted audience who surrounds your business, but for some businesses, reaching individuals who surround their ideal customers is even more beneficial.

These types of businesses typically have visible products or services, like landscapers, roofers, pool stores, car dealerships, and more. And with Proximity Mailing, you can send your half-fold brochure to people who surround your customers as well.

All you need to do is choose a customer’s address (or multiple), choose a certain radius in miles that surround that address, and which demographics you’d like to reach. People who surround your customers most likely have the same needs, income, interests, age of home, and more. So, send them a half-fold brochure marketing that you just installed a new roof or pool in their neighborhood and have a special offer for them!

Have them Visiting Within Minutes

Did you know the average consumer won’t travel more than 20 minutes to eat out, shop, or visit a place? In fact, the closer they are to a place, the more likely they are to visit it. So, let's say you could market to an audience who, one, is likely interested in what you have to offer, but two, only lives 5-10 minutes away? With Drive Time Mailing that’s exactly what you can do.

Drive Time Mailing is the perfect way to use half-fold brochures for your local marketing efforts. This is because it allows you to target an audience who is likely interested in your business based on buying activity, certain demographics, attitudes, and more. On top of that, you can filter this audience to target only the interested individuals who live a few minutes away from your location, including 5, 10 or 15-miutes.

Designing Your Half-Fold Brochure for Local Marketing

Choose the Right Size

When choosing the right size for your half-fold or bi-fold brochure, you need to take into consideration what your local marketing plan is. For example, if you are looking to take advantage of a direct mail strategy, you need to follow the USPS requirements if you want to qualify for letter postage rates. This means your half-fold brochure needs to be at least 3.5” x 5” when folded and no larger than 6” x 10” when folded. You can of course send larger brochures; however, the price of postage will increase slightly which in most cases is worth the extra cents.

Another thing to consider when choosing the size of your half-fold brochure is if you are going to utilize EDDM. For EDDM, half-fold brochures are considered “Folded EDDM Mailers” they need to be either 8.5” x 14” (7”x 8.5” when folded) or 11” x 17” (8.5” x 11” when folded) in size based on USPS guidelines.

Lastly, you need to choose the right size for your half-fold brochure design, and local marketing message. If you are planning on including a good amount of detail, a smaller brochure size, like a 5.5” x 8.5” or 8.5” x 11” half-fold brochure, may not have enough room for your information and you risk making your brochure come across as overwhelming and cluttered. However, if you are promoting a big sale, or new product, an 8.5” x 11” half-fold brochure could be perfect!

A good rule of thumb is if you are introducing your brand or highlighting several elements, an 8.5” x 14”, 11” x 17” or even a 11” x 25.5” half-fold brochure is a good choice.

Don't Go Too Thick or Too Thin

The paper you choose for your half-fold brochure needs to be thin enough to easily fold, but also thick enough to feel substantial. The most recommended paper for half-fold brochures is a 100# Text Paper or an 80# Cover Paper. Because half-fold brochures are only folded once, compared to other types of brochures, you can get away with a slightly thicker paperweight like a 100# Cover or a 14pt C25 Cover paper. However, depending on your local marketing plan, especially if you choose to utilize direct mail marketing, choosing a paper any thinner than a 100# Text, isn’t ideal as the durability of your half-fold brochure decreases and you risk the chances of it ripping during the mailing process.

If you are concerned about how your brochure will feel, ask your printer about a free paper sample booklet which includes a variety of their most popular papers and coding configurations so you can see and feel the paper before your commit.

Use Eye-Catching Images and Colors

For your local marketing strategy, you will want to design a half-fold brochure that stands out. To accomplish this, you will need to include a color pallet that directs the eye to your brochure while also successfully reflecting your brand. Don’t forget to include light text on a dark background or dark text on a light background.

You also want to make sure your images reflect your brand, your target audience, and they are of high resolution (at least 300dpi).

For example, if you are marketing your pet store, include crisp images of happy pets with their owner.

Lay it Out Carefully

Laying out the design for your half-fold brochure needs to be thought out carefully. It’s a good idea to utilize a half-fold brochure template to ensure that your brochures are printed perfectly. You can find free brochure templates offered in the most popular sizes here. Just download the PDF, place it in a separate layer in your design platform so you can easily follow the bleed, fold, and margin guidelines, and then turn off or delete the layer when you have completed your design.

Also, don’t be afraid to get creative with your layout. Place text over imagery or spread an image across 2 panels. As long as your design is legible, the more creative your half-fold brochure is, the more effective it will be.

Give Them an Offer

An irresistible call to action is key for every type of marketing material. It gives your audience something to act on and is what you include to drive responses.

To gain even better results, you want to include an offer. For example, you don’t want to include a simple “visit us today” in your half-fold brochure. Instead, you want to give your audience even more of a reason to visit you, like a “don’t miss out on our grand opening sale” and then include a coupon they can cut out and receive 20% off their purchase when they visit you. This is also a great way to measure your results because everyone who brings in a coupon responded to your half-fold brochure message.

At Conquest Graphics, we offer low prices on high-quality half-fold brochure printing, and we offer marketing solutions to fit any of your local marketing goals! Click below to get started on your half-fold brochure campaign today! Have questions about one of the local marketing strategies listed above? Contact us today at (804) 591-3352, by sending an email to customerservice@conquestgraphics.com, or simply reaching out in our LiveChat pop-up!