Reading Response 6
Creating a brochure for a client that we only know through our research, seemed like it was going to be a walk in the park, but now I can see there are a lot of factors to consider. To effectively represent the information, we need to follow the principles of variety, conciseness, audience, design, and many others.
In our composition, I think we have a good start, but we are not quite near the final product yet. It is still very plane and has the basic skeleton of what our final draft is going to look like. As far as conciseness goes, I think we need to look through our draft and make sure we are saying exactly what we want to say. Our brochure right now is mostly paragraph text. I think we can switch some parts of the paragraphs into bullets, which are easier for people to scan through and will get the main points across more efficiently.
Design is going to be a large part of making a successful composition. This can include how many folds or leaflets our brochure has, colors, boarders, pictures, and even how we place our material. As of right now, I think we have a strong base as far as the format. We have a tri-fold brochure which includes one side as a detachable form/mailer. We will soon add complementary colors in backgrounds, boarders, and pictures.
The principles of audience are also going to be a large part of our group’s brochure. So far, our text is very informative, and as I said before we are going to make it easier to read. Our brochure needs to grab the audience’s attention and not bore them at all. We will try to incorporate pictures or design principles to make anyone reading this want to volunteer for the event.
Comments
Comments.
I really like the idea of using more bullets. I think that would be a great way to make it easier to read. I think your other ideas are really good to. I'm intereted to see specifically what you are looking to consider to make our brochure even better. One thing that I think is very important is the layout. I know you said that you really liked it, and I agree that the trifold is good, but i think that we could do better about the actualy layout of text. Right now it kind of looks like an essay. It's double spaced, justified, and each section is lined up. I think we should create text boxes that we can move around and make off center. I think that would really improve the layout.
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I totally agree with you-- I thought this project would not be so bad, except for the whole group work thing. After realizing we are actually working with a real organization, the stakes got a bit higher. We have a responsibility to help out with the organization's annual event, and I think it is our duty to exercise the principles we have been learning in this class. The ideas you have to revise your brochure are strong. I looked at your group's brochure and I agree also that you could add bullet points to make it easier for the reader to scan. Your tri-fold format is much like my group's brochure---a definite plus in my book. Good luck on your next draft!
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I agree that we need to work on making the text more concise. I think if we add some more variety to the text by shortening some of the sentences and by changing some of the word order, our brochure will be much more interesting. Also, I really liked the idea of adding more bullet points. I know when I look through a brochure, I am much more likely to skip the paragraphs and scan through the bullet points. I think adding bullet points would definitely make our brochure much easier to read. I also agree that we need to work on how we address our audience. As you said, our brochure is very informative right now. We need to focus more on persuading our audience to volunteer or donate. Overall, I think we have a very good start and some great ideas for our next draft!
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I think you bring up some good points. We defiantly need to make sure our sentences stay concise. We are competing with multiple groups for a single client. This means we have to be able to make our brochure the best at effective at conveying the information and even the most aesthetically pleasing. After reviewing the rest of the comments from my blog, I can see many people feel the same way as I do about bullet points. This will be one of the first revisions we can incorporate into our project. We are doing great so far and I know we are going to make our project much better.
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I totally agree with you. At first I also thought that this project would be fairly simple and easy to complete. The basic outline of the brochure was the easy part, but when it came to being specific, the project became difficult. One of the main problems that we ran into was trying to relate the Clinton County Humane Society to the National Humane Society. The problem was is that these two are not associated with one another. One thing that I thought we did well with was tying the pictures to the text. By doing this, our group felt that we could keep the reader interested and focused on the information that was being presented.
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I agree that the design is going to be a large part of making a successful brochure. I liked your idea of using more bullet points. It will make the sentences easier to read. I agree that our brochure is informative. I think, however, we can improve its effectiveness by changing the structure of some sentences or revising some sentences to be concise. The color is an important factor too. I really liked your idea of inserting the logo of CFRC on the front page with "Christmas Day" text. I think using some complementary colors will be helpful to make it more interesting. I agree that we need to follow the principles given in the textbook. I think we have to consider the audience when we revise our composition.