As we spend more and more time researching and experiencing brands online, it’s important that our digital shop fronts not only look as attractive as their bricks and mortar cousins but also offer the same immersive experience. Add that to the environmental benefits that come with digital collateral and you’re onto a winner.
If we take the university prospectus as an example, it’s one of those rare souvenirs of print that has survived the rise of tablets, e-readers and smartphones. But that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be hauled into the 21st century. Universities are meant to aspire to enjoy the practical and reputational benefits of staying ahead of the digital curve through thinking and innovation, yet they are rarely hailed as a leader in style and content. It may be the very first taste a new student gets of a university, so both eye-catching design and engaging content is well worth the investment.
There is of course still a time and a place for printed marketing material; it has value for parents and families as well as non-English speaking students. So, whilst a full printed prospectus might not be necessary for some institutions, depending on your audience, an integrated approach of printed and digital collateral may be the best option and is often what we recommend to our clients – albeit the lines are blurring between offline and online with the popular use of QR codes and Augmented Reality.
Thanks to technology, prospectuses and brochures are becoming much more of an immersive experience for an ever-increasing tech-savvy audience. With the use of video, talking heads, 360-degree virtual tours, explainer animations, plus extensive back-end analytics so you can see what content is being engaged with helping to inform refinements and future marketing activity, it’s easy to see why.
Pearson Business School
This prospectus for Pearson Business School is a good example of how we brought their prospectus to life, utilising a range of functionality. This short video for Escape Studios guides you through the benefits of digital publishing.
Queen Mary University of London
There’s so much more, too, like engaging clickable maps in this Queen Mary University of London undergraduate prospectus.
Henley Business School
You can even make the ‘mandatory’ detail more engaging – linking to other sites or using pop up functionality. Here’s how we did exactly that for Henley Business School’s careers service.
Bringing your brand to life
Digital publishing is very much a collaborative approach and we follow a rigorous process to ensure what we deliver is exactly right for your brand:
- Flat plans and content curation: We’ll develop a flat plan detailing the flow of the entire brochure. We’ll suggest where we should position CTA’s as well as any initial ideas for how to best use the functionality of the platform.
- Creative development: Our creative team will explore 2-3 routes options including front cover/inside spread examples as well as other key spreads to show how the idea/style tracks through.
- Design development: During this phase we’ll bring the chosen idea to life using beautiful design and custom fonts as flats with annotated narrative explaining the spread of interactivity from audio visual to page turning functionality.
- Offline conversion: We’ll design an offline version using the same design and pagination, utilising paper engineering techniques to bring it to life. We’ll use QR codes and short trackable URLs where relevant.
Costs will depend on the size and scope of your project, however as a guide a 20-page brochure including platform subscription would cost c.£15K.
To find out how Hunterlodge can create an interactive brochure, prospectus or magazine for your brand, contact nick.friend@hunterlodge.co.uk
