How to Lure in Your Audience with Good Design

Have you ever glanced at an advertisement or a piece of artwork that you were simply drawn to? Chances are, you couldn't really put your finger on what attracted you to the design, but there's a good bet your designer could tell you precisely what tricks they used to lure you in.

The truth is, good design understands that your eyes are sending information to your brain at an astounding rate. But because your brain cannot possibly capture every detail, sometimes it sees the edges of a particular image and fills in the missing pieces of the puzzle based on your previous life experience. By capitalizing on this thought, you can use some clever design ideas that will gently encourage your prospects or customers to follow your lead.

Fancy Brain Tricks

Patterned Design

A fun way to add some uniqueness to your marketing designs is to play with what the brain sees by:

Using optical illusions to trick the brain into perceiving something other than reality.
Drawing attention to specific colors and shapes that can influence what people see, such as a blue color that is calming or a red that appears angry. Human beings actually see everything in 2D -- flat, just like a drawing on a piece of paper. By using shapes and colors, you can influence what people see, drawing attention to one message over another.

Remember: What people see in your marketing will depend on their background, knowledge, and expectations, but depending on how you present an idea in your design, you can persuade people to see things just as you intend.

The Power of Human Faces

Woman Handbag ad

As humans, we love to relate to each other. One of the ways we do that is by seeing where others are looking. You can leverage this inclination of following the direction of someone's eyes in your marketing! Lead prospects to a call to action or specific product by focusing the eyes of a printed figure where you want the reader to look.

The key to any great design is to be continually cautious of the perception of others. Even when you design a particular piece and feel that it looks a certain way, others will have different backgrounds and experiences -- all of which can cause their brains to present them with a different interpretation of the same image.

Ready to get started on your next print project? Contact us today!

100 Things Every Designer Needs to Know About People
by Susan M. Weinschenk, Ph. D.

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We design to elicit responses from people. We want them to buy something, read more, or take action of some kind. Designing without understanding what makes people act the way they do is like exploring a new city without a map: results will be haphazard, confusing, and inefficient. This book combines real science and research with practical examples to deliver a guide every designer needs. With it you'll be able to design more intuitive and engaging work for print, websites, applications, and products that matches the way people think, work, and play.

What grabs and holds attention on a page or screen?
What makes memories stick?
What is more important, peripheral or central vision?
How can you predict the types of errors that people will make?
What is the limit to someone's social circle?
How do you motivate people to continue on to (the next step?
What line length for text is best?
Are some fonts better than others?