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Tingalls Blog - Marketing Tips & Tricks

How Sketching with a Pencil Can Improve Graphic Design

Do you sketch with a pencil and pad or on your computer? In our digital world, more and more people are opting for sketching apps, but is something being lost in the process? The answer to this question depends on many factors, including your preferred art tools, as well as if you’re working on your own or with a group of designers. We recently ran across an article on the YouTheDesigner blog that inspired us to share some of our design process on our own blog. At Tingalls, our graphic design team uses both pencil & digital sketching to create our clients’ designs — but we always begin with our […]

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Posted in Logo Design, Print & Package Design, Website Design

Print Design Still Matters More Than You Think

Are printed graphic design pieces and printed advertising still relevant in the digital age? The answer might surprise you. Although the Internet certainly is changing the way we do almost everything, print doesn’t still just matter, it might even be coming back into style. Of course, that implies that it ever went anywhere at all. Just as the US still does most of its business with Canada and Mexico while Chinese factories dominate the headlines, print has been there all along helping smart businesses put together profitable campaigns – even while search engine optimization, social media marketing, and business web design have become hotter and hotter topics. And as we […]

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Posted in Branding, Print & Package Design

How the Wrong Marketing Piece Can Kill Your Tradeshow or Networking Event

The success of a tradeshow or networking can literally make or break your company. In fact, entire businesses and careers have been built from sales made in a few precious moments face-to-face with prospects and important decision-makers. But, too many business leaders ignore the importance of the marketing materials they bring to tradeshows, conventions, and other similar gatherings – particularly their business cards, fliers, and brochures. It’s not an overstatement to say that the wrong piece, even just one poorly designed one, can kill any progress or sales opportunities you might have made otherwise. Here are five of the biggest reasons why: 1. You want to stand out in a […]

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Posted in Advertising, Networking, Print & Package Design

Go Green – Get Printing

Print Marketing with Tingalls Print marketing may be more energy efficient than you realize and the benefits of using print could boost your company’s visibility too. The following statistics related to print marketing, the paper industry and the environment were presented by NewPage Corporation and provide some interesting insight on sustainability and marketing. Did you know that the creation and delivery of direct mail generates less greenhouse gas emissions than an eight minute shower? In the last 25 year annual energy consumption at US data centers increased by 24% but the pulp and paper industry reduced energy by 24%. The footprint of paper for one 3×5 inch direct mail card […]

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Posted in Advertising, Branding, Print & Package Design

Convenience Does Not Need to be Expensive

Eight dollars a gallon seems like a lot to pay for anything.  It seems like a crazy amount for something as simple as sugar water, or more specifically a cold soda.  But on a hot day when you’ve been sweating hard and you just finished filling up with gas, that big number seems reasonable.  At least when they put it into nice, cold and refreshing liter size bottles.  If you were not at a place that relied on your convenience to mark up prices you may think twice about paying eight dollars for multiple gallons of soda. This paying extra for convenience is completely understandable, but what if you didn’t […]

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Posted in Print & Package Design, Tips

How is Printer Ownership Like Pool Ownership?

Every once in a while we get thrown for a little printer loop.  This time we were prepared because we had our trusty new printer selection algorithm to help us.  The loop in question was that often the needs of a customer do not equate with the dollar amount that a customer is willing or able to spend. Naturally not everyone considers a new office machine to be an investment.  I would counter that if you are looking to replace a machine that has lasted 10 years with little issue than it may be possible to look toward investing in another machine with a similar lifespan.  That machine will likely […]

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Posted in Advertising, Print & Package Design

Sticky Prints by Dan Dettman

Wells Print and Design Services offers a number of ways to print leave-behind materials with friends, customers, and colleagues.  As fall sporting seasons move on, a printed schedule is still the preferred way to look up the home team’s opponent and game time.  Wells is able to print magnet schedules or static cling schedules on the new wide format press.  Printing a company logo along the hometown’s team creates a subtle customer loyalty piece.  An office or home refrigerator may be the place to keep your logo in front of customers from the beginning of fall into winter. Along with refrigerator magnets, car magnets are a non-permanent approach to promote […]

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Posted in Advertising, Print & Package Design

3 Key Components to a Good Logo Design

If you’re considering replacing your company’s logo or you’re trying to come up with your first logo design, there are three key components to a good logo design that will help you find a logo that best suits your company image. Simple Logos In a very practical sense, a complicated logo isn’t easy to reproduce. What may look great on a sheet of paper becomes a bit more blurry when printed on a small business card and suddenly resembles a smudge when printed on a pen. A complicated logo is also more difficult for your customers, current and potential, to remember. Think of the most famous logos that instantly pop […]

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Posted in Advertising, Logo Design, Print & Package Design

The Importance of Font

You put a lot of thought into your company colors, the images or icons you’ll use to represent your company, the placement of elements on your website and print materials, but did you stop to consider the font style you’d use to convey your message? Font selection is just as important, if not more important, than all of the other elements combined. The wrong font and your company message (or even the name) could be confusing, even downright unreadable. Sometimes the font choice is pretty obvious, a construction firm won’t be represented well by a font that looks like a calligraphy master created it. Likewise, a wedding planner probably won’t […]

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Posted in Advertising, Branding, Logo Design, Print & Package Design, Website Design

Brochure vs. Palmcard: Picking the Right Print Advertising

Once upon a time every company believed they needed to have a brochure so they rushed out to have one printed that included a ton of information about their company and possibly a few pictures. Quite often not a lot of thought went into the creation of a company brochure, it was just something you had to have. Today that’s changed and many businesses are trying to be more streamlined in their marketing approach and gathering clients. For some companies a trifold brochure still makes the most sense but for other companies a smaller palmcard with only two sides is the better choice. And, in some cases, a company may […]

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Posted in About Tingalls, Print & Package Design

5 Reasons to Continue with Print Marketing

Social media is growing daily with more and more outlets for businesses as well as individuals and more people embracing the technology as a way of life. But will electronic media ever swallow up print marketing? We don’t think so and here are our top 5 reasons why. There’s Credibility in Print Anyone can publish anything online, accuracy and reliability aren’t necessarily inherent in information found on the internet. But print carries a sense of credibility which boosts the reliability of a company. It’s Tangible There is something to be said about a piece of advertising that is tangible, one that you can hold in your hands, tuck in your […]

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Posted in About Tingalls, Advertising, Print & Package Design

Negative Space in Logo Design

Negative space is the area around and between the subject of an image. It’s often an overlooked principle of design but it’s almost as important as the subject itself as it gives the eye a place to rest and can increase the overall effectiveness of the composition. Sometimes negative space is referred to as white space, but this can be confusing as it’s often not white. Using negative space in your logo design is important as it creates aesthetic composition and a general feel to the logo itself. A very busy logo with little negative space may be perceived as active, exciting or cluttered. A logo that features a lot […]

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Posted in Logo Design, Print & Package Design

3 Key Components to a Good Postcard/Brochure Design

If you’re handing out print materials to your customers there are three key components that will help you create good print marketing materials. It doesn’t matter whether you are considering a simple postcard or a more complicated brochure; these tips will make your material more inviting and informative to the public. Defined Purpose The very first question you should ask yourself before designing a postcard or a brochure is what is your goal or your purpose. What are you trying to tell your audience? What action do you want them to take? You may find that you actually have a couple goals; perhaps you want to tell them about a […]

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Posted in Advertising, Print & Package Design

What are QR Codes and How to Use Them

Whether you don’t yet know what QR codes are or you’re a frequent user of them, be prepared because they’re going to become more popular than Justin Bieber and you’re going to see them everywhere you turn. QR codes stand for quick response codes and they’re basically barcodes that can be read by smart phones. This literally can bring your print material to life and allow even a simple business card to interact with your potential client’s phone, which is quickly becoming everyone’s lifeline. A QR code can be customized to include a variety of information including phone numbers, vCards, text messages, HTML links or regular text. When a phone […]

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Posted in Print & Package Design, Tradeshow Marketing, Website Design