THE ART OF THE FONT by SMP Training Co

A SPECIAL GUIDE FOR TRAVEL AGENTS

How was the trip then? Imagery and fonts are very important to your marketing activities. You can win or lose business if your image or slogan or the font type do not attract the person reading your promotion to make contact. The rule of thumb is 80% visual and 20% wording. Once the reader is attracted by the image, and then pulled in by the words, they seek meaning in what they are reading. Hence content and the offer becomes important at that point. First things first however â&#x20AC;&#x201C; you must work your attraction magic to attract, hold and convert the reader. This Art of the Font brief should help you. SC. ÂŠ2012 Steve Crowhurst, Selling Travel, SMP Training Co.

I like writing, I like text, the written word, the calligraphic word, slogans and I study fonts! Call me crazy but over the years I’ve seen some wonderful travel ads and I tend to make a study of them. I collect the best slogans and then rework them – something I did when I had my own agencies. I do this now for my training business too. Capturing someone’s attention amidst all the noise going on around them is an art form and it starts with imagery and text.

The travel image is supposed to cause that “ooh and ah” response in the reader’s mind and that in turn will switch on the “I gotta go there!” area of the brain. Their eyes are now looking for the second switch, the slogan, to find out if this has meaning to them. After that, their eyes are reading the text and reporting the message to the brain and then the travel gene steps in and deciphers the offer as fulfilling a deep need to escape, to travel, to explore, to go there, to complete a personal journey, a dream.

If you use the same old bland type face and not-so-inspiring imagery then all your marketing efforts are a waste of time, or could be. Travellers still respond to low ball pricing but then those trips only produce a few bucks for you. Promoting quality products using quality fonts and images will up your commissions if you invest the time and energy. The two must go together. You cannot win promoting quality travel products using slap-dash text and layouts that just don’t work. Placement & positioning are all important. White space is important. Here’s one of my own designs, playing on the word Buddhism. You can do this too!

Listed below are the fonts I used to create the cover title.

ART: Braddon

OF THE: Ariel Rounded MT Bold FONT: Berlin Sans FB

WHEN PROMOTING TRAVEL: Andalus

To learn about fonts you must literally review each one and as you do that, you do more than look at it. You study it and you try to relate it to travel. You relate it to a destination, a type of travel, a mode of travel and you try to imagine using it in a slogan when you want to make a powerful statement. There are fonts for climbing mountains and there are fonts for ‘having tea’

and there are fonts for promoting China and there are fonts

for religious tours too.

There are hundreds of fonts, however the best place to start is located within MS Word or whatever word processing software you use. Shown here is the drop down menu in Word that shows you the shape and style of the font. Easy!

You start by scrolling through this list to eye-ball what’s available and possible. Next you could type a word – let’s go for TRAVEL and Travel and apply each font to these words and see how they look. ©2012 Steve Crowhurst, Selling Travel, SMP Training Co.

The following examples will be enlarged to a font size of 48 pts. Working large gives you a better idea of how the text would look in a slogan.

Ariel

TRAVEL - Travel BAILY

TRAVEL - Travel Copperplate Gothic Bold

TRAVEL - Travel Algerian (no lower case)

TRAVEL - TRAVEL CHINAONE

TRAVEL - Travel DESIGN

TRAVEL - Travel ÂŠ2012 Steve Crowhurst, Selling Travel, SMP Training Co.

I have used the generic text in MS Word and chosen fonts that you might not ordinarily use. In the past I have completed this task for every font found in that drop down menu and also searched online for more fonts which can be purchased as a download. Some fonts are free to download and use but not to be resold.

Now, you can play with the colour combinationsâ&#x20AC;Ś BAILY

TRAVEL - Travel Algerian (no lower case)

TRAVEL - TRAVEL DESIGN

TRAVEL - Travel The colouring of your text should support the image you are going to use and especially if you intend to layer the slogan over the image itself. You can use a white font colour on a dark background for instance. There are some combinations however that just do not work such as red on gray.

TRAVEL - Travel ÂŠ2012 Steve Crowhurst, Selling Travel, SMP Training Co.

Now we can explore adding different fonts to an image – see which one works for you.

ADVENTURE!

Adventure!

Perhaps a bit too obvious. Adventure travel needs some OOMPH! The lower image squeaks out the word which sounds or reads like adventure.

Capture as many supplier slogans as you can. Record them and file them away in your marketing folder. Be aware of copyright and trademarked slogans and words – these you typically cannot use. Other slogans that are not marked can be used for marketing that supplier’s products. When you wish to use a supplier’s slogan always ask for permission to do so.

Usually a slogan will come with it’s own graphic specifications re size and colour and your supplier will want those spec’s maintained.

Positioning and white space is important. Never crowd your words into a tight space, beware of how close your text is to an edge and be very aware of any text covering a selling point in the image like the view, a face, the sun, a wave… make sure the selling points in the image can still be seen.

Come with US to

LONDON COME WITH US TO LONDON

YOUR MISSION NOW IS TO EXPLORE ALL THE FONTS IN YOUR WORD PROCESSING SOFTWARE AND TO START STUDYING THE LAYOUT OF SUPPLIER PROMOTIONS, POSTERS & BROCHURES.

Coming in the fall of 2012

Hi, I’m Steve Crowhurst and I’ll be opening my online travel agent’s store in the fall and that’s where you can click for self-study manuals and presentations – all based on my “no fluff” street savvy tips, tools and techniques. I’ll let you know when it’s up and running.

All the best and keep selling!

Steve Signature font: AajaxSurrealFreak

www.sellingtravel.net

ÂŠ2012 Steve Crowhurst, Selling Travel, SMP Training Co.