How to Design Flyers without Expensive Graphics Software

Designing your own professional-looking flyers is easy, thanks to the software provided by online printing companies like vista print.com. The days of just sticking in some random clip art and adding text and calling it a flyer are over. Actually, that technique is still effective for something like finding a lost dog, but it just isn’t appropriate for businesses (although there is some free clipart available online that would certainly qualify as professional looking).

The thing is that it has become so easy to do your own flyers that the cost of a designer is no longer a problem. Printing online simplifies the process, but don’t think that ordering from an online company will mean that your materials will take a long time to get to you. Quite the contrary: online printers are very fast, with quite a few having 48-hour turnaround times for standard orders.

Some of the online printing companies will require that you upload a completed design for printing, while others, such as VistaPrint, offer proprietary ordering software that lets you do the design just by uploading an image or choosing one of theirs.

The big advantage to doing your flyers with VistaPrint is their online templates. They have hundreds of designs that are already made and waiting for your details. You can see each one on your monitor and when you put in your information, you can move it around and rearrange it to suit your needs, all the while seeing how it looks.

If you do the design prior to uploading, you can do so on just about any computer. Word processors allow you to insert an image into a document, and then you can resize it appropriately. You probably have a selection of images associated with your business that you can draw from. Otherwise, do a search for free images online and download the one you choose to your computer. There are a surprising number of excellent free pictures available that you can use in whole or in part. With some basic editing skills you can change the colors, trim the edges, and even combine images.

If you elect to work from scratch, you can simply use the word processor’s basic image editing function to insert a picture and resize it to fit your document; then you are ready to add your text. Pick a large, bold font, and include all the pertinent details but no more information than you must have to let people know what is happening and where you want them to be and when to be there.

Microsoft Word and similar programs have flyer templates built right in. If you can find one of these that meets your needs, then the image and layout are done for you. All you have to do is plug in your info.

You may find that making flyers is faster and easier than you ever imagined. Why not give it a try, and see if you can come up with an original flyer to update your promotional material as inexpensively as possible?