Make a good first impression with typography

Clothe the market-tested words on your collateral in an inviting font and color combination to draw your audience in.

Typography is a vital element of your branding and is considered an art form, but its power in marketing materials is often overlooked. It gives your target audience its first impression of your brand. It can easily pull the audience in to relay a message, or it can render a message incomprehensible and push the audience away.

Typography has a life of its own. It can have a modern or traditional feel. It can be conservative or unconventional. It can be exuberant or reserved. The options are endless for your brand identity. But choose wisely: The typeface that you settle on will have a strong influence on your audience and assist in creating initial and lasting impressions.

Effective Typography

The key to effective use of typography is to balance an eye-catching font with one that is easy to read. Often, the most memorable brand identities are the ones that marry a simplistic approach with a unique approach.

Typographic Classification

Here are some categories into which typography can be classified, with examples of associated fonts.

• Humanist: Includes calligraphic forms of lettering (Centaur, Verona)

• Old Style: Showcases a refinement of calligraphic forms (Bembo, Garamond, Caslon)

• Modern: Portrays a dramatic contrast in individual letters between thick and thin stokes and flat serifs—the small projecting features at the end of a stroke (Bodoni, Modern, Walbaum)

• Transitional: Shares features of Old Style and Modern (Baskerville, Fournier, Bell)

• Slab Serif: Have heavy, square-ended serifs (Rockwell, Memphis, Clarendon)

• Sans Serif: Includes letters without the small, projecting vertical and horizontal features at the end of strokes (Grotesque, Helvetica, Univers)

• Script: Think cursive regarding fonts in this category (Palace Script, Young Baroque)

• Graphic/Decorative: Comprises decorative fonts (Poster Bodoni, Hobo, Dom Casual)

• Digital: Depicts electronic-style lettering (Oakland, Isonorm, Modula)

Type and Color Interaction

Once you’ve settled on the appropriate typography, your team will need to consider the interaction of type and color as a powerful tool in portraying a brand attribute. Typography and color in combination can attract attention, help emphasize the concepts you want to convey, reinforce impact and recognition, create a mood, or strengthen the brand identity.

The primary consideration when joining type and color is readability. A high degree of contrast between the type and the surrounding background is key.

The importance that typography has in relaying marketing messages is similar to a person’s wearing the proper attire for a given occasion. Clothe your words in the font that best reinforces the impression you want to make and the core selling points of your biotech brand.

2 comments on “Make a good first impression with typography”

1. Joseph A. Chelius on December 3, 2011 at 12:45 pm said:

   Reading this post on typography confirms for me what I’ve long suspected about skilled art directors: that they pay as much attention to the words as they do to the graphics. Choosing typography that is “eye catching and easy to read” is like providing a courtesy for the reader. It invites a person in.

   Reply ↓
2. Adewale on December 25, 2011 at 2:22 pm said:

   I guess there are more ways to convey a message through type than just using ALL CAPS. I’ll definitely keep this post in mind when trying to make an impression through email. Thanks Chuck!

   Reply ↓