The evolution of marketing and advertising over the past couple of decades, from an outside perspective, has seemed a little bit like a predictable sitcom. On the one hand, lovable print ads and paper documents have long been the steady, reliable form of marketing and business communication. Web and digital media, and the other hand, has become the fun, unpredictable way to attract all kinds of new customers from around the globe, or fail spectacularly in the process.
But like our zany, mismatched sitcom characters, they have been destined to get together from the start.
It doesn’t take any complicated reasoning to understand why. The Internet, in all its many changing forms, will continue to become a larger part of our business and personal lives. That doesn’t mean that print is going away in the near future, though – people still love the look and feel of books, reports, and printed documents.
Since the two are likely to coexist for quite some time, it only makes sense to for companies to carry a consistent look throughout their print and digital publications. In other words, all the original rules of branding still apply.
Print vs. Web / Print and Web
So how does this impact your company? It means that you need to stop thinking in terms of one form of media or the other. Instead, think of the messages you’re trying to convey, and then the best ways to reach people with the same look and voice in both print and web materials. It also means that it’s probably time to stop having two or three different design teams to work on your materials. If you really want consistency, build it into your creative process by trusting the right team to help you online and off.