Flyer design

A flyer gets about three seconds. In that time the reader decides whether it concerns them, and everything after that decision is a bonus.

Design that starts from that fact ends up subtracting rather than adding — which is why most flyers underperform. They contain everything the business wanted to say instead of the one thing that earns the next three seconds.

The hierarchy we work to

1. The hook — one line, large, answering "is this for me?" Not your company name. The offer, the event, the problem you solve.

2. Supporting detail — two or three short lines. What, when, where, how much.

3. One visual doing real work. Product, venue, result. Not a stock handshake.

4. The call to action — an instruction, not a menu of options.

5. Your identity — logo and contact, present and small.

Businesses reliably invert this, leading with the company name. The reader does not know your company yet, and the name earns nothing in the seconds available.

Designed for how it reaches people

The same content needs different treatment depending on distribution, and this is the question we ask first.

Handed out on the street. Read while walking, then pocketed or binned. Very large hook, minimal detail, pocket-sized format.

Door drop. Examined at home, sorted with post. More detail is tolerated, and something worth keeping — a code, a calendar, a useful reference — raises retention.

Counter or rack. Only the top third shows. Hook and identity both live in that zone.

Insert in an order or bag. The reader already knows you. Lead with the offer, not the introduction.

Noticeboard. Read from a metre away against a dozen competitors. Maximum contrast, minimum text.

A flyer designed without knowing which of these applies is designed for none of them.

Formats

A5 — the standard. Cheap, pocket-sized, room for one message. A6 — postcard scale. Forces brevity, good for inserts. DL — narrow, fits envelopes and racks. A4 — noticeboards and counters. Does not fit a pocket.

Double-sided costs marginally more and doubles the space — but many readers never turn it over, so nothing essential goes on side two, and the call to action repeats on both.

Production

• 3 mm bleed, 4–5 mm safe area
• CMYK with your printer's profile, Pantone references for brand colours
• 300 dpi at final size
• Fonts outlined
• 130–170 gsm for handouts, 250–300 gsm where it should feel substantial
• Press-ready PDF with crop marks

QR codes get tested. Minimum 25 × 25 mm, high contrast, quiet zone preserved, a label saying what happens when scanned, and linked to a specific page rather than your homepage. We scan the printed proof on more than one phone before sign-off — an untested QR code on five thousand flyers is a recurring and entirely avoidable failure.

What we will tell you honestly

If you have three services, one flyer listing all three will convert worse than one flyer about the strongest. We will suggest choosing.

If the budget is tight, print less and test. Two hooks, a few hundred each, distinguishable response codes — then print the winner. This costs slightly more per unit on the test and considerably less than ten thousand of the version that did not work.

If the content genuinely needs more space, it is a brochure, and we will say so.

Recent work

Related reading

Flyer design that works: hierarchy and the three-second test · Preparing artwork for print

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