Proofing Your Business Leaflet Before Printing – Step by Step

Despite the near-ubiquity of online platforms, and the explosion in viability for digital marketing solutions, print is most certainly not dead. In fact, in many cases print can outperform digital options in terms of reach and customer on-boarding, especially for local businesses growing local custom. Creating a professional flyer or leaflet is hard enough, but even harder is receiving the 500 you ordered to find that they’re unsuitable, or even incorrect. Here we’ll look at how to proof your leaflet design, and properly prepare it for print.

Spelling and Grammar

The first step you should endeavour to take is to proof all of the text content on your flyer. Spelling mistakes are extremely common, and can easily slip through to print if you aren’t careful with checking over the copy on the file, while variable entries like dates, times and addresses can be subject to change between drafting and printing. It is important to check the final flyer design itself – mistakes with the text can often manifest between drafting it and populating the flyer design with it.

If you’ve been looking at the same design and the same text for some time, it can be hard to notice issues, even glaring spelling errors or incorrect dates. To increase your chances of picking them up, read the flyer backwards, word by word; your brain will be forced to engage with each word, instead of skimming over each sentence. You should also have a second person proof it after you, to make doubly sure nothing is missed.

Image Resolution and Colour Mode

Your next concern should be the flyers’ visual aspect. One of the major pitfalls in designing a business flyer, especially for those doing so for the first time, lies in treating the images and assets used to create it correctly before sending off to print. Without due care, designs can come back looking entirely different to the design file, from incorrect colours to pixelated images and logos.

To ensure your business flyers look professional, make sure all images imported to your draft are high-resolution. In certain design software like Adobe InDesign, image placement is done via ‘links’; a placeholder frame indicates the size and placement of the image, and that frame is then linked to a high-resolution version of that image. This way, the software doesn’t struggle with large amounts of data, with the image loaded and placed in the import process. Including the right image resolution in the attributed links file will ensure a high-resolution outcome for all assets. Also, make sure your design is drafted in the correct colour mode. Printed media uses CMYK, while RGB is standard for digital work such as websites and banner ads.

Legibility and Final Thoughts*endsubheading*]
Lastly, carry out an ‘idiot check’ of your flyer. Test out its legibility by printing off a prototype that’s sized correctly. Will you need to alter any font sizes, or re-arrange any images for better readability? Have you accounted for bleed? Elements of your design may be cut off if outside a specific margin area, so make sure no important information straddles your bleed margin. Lastly, think about the paper on which you want your leaflets printed. Double-sided leaflets would benefit from a thicker stock, around 160gsm. Once you are satisfied, you are free to send your design off to print!