My mom loves orange juice. It is a must have in the fridge. To give you an idea of the seriousness, there is ALWAYS a backup carton somewhere. Just in case someone drinks the last of the first carton before the next trip to the grocery store.
I was up visiting for the holidays and one morning I went into shock. As I opened the fridge in my pre-coffee stupor to find milk (for a tasty breakfast of Multi-Grain Cheerios), I glanced at the orange juice carton which said “Fire generations of growers.”
What kind of advertising is this!? You don’t advertise that you fire people. You certainly don’t brag about firing 5 generations! That’s just...not right. It’s not okay. No one wants to support a company getting rid of all it’s employees, especially Grandma! You would never increase sales with copy like that!
I stared in shock for a moment.
Then I read it again and realized it said, “Five generations of growers.”
Oh. Oops. Guess I should make coffee my morning priority.
Font matters! Your prospects aren’t paying attention at the best of times. Maybe they aren’t always in a pre-coffee stupor, but they certainly aren’t admiring the classy, quasi-cursive of your font choice. (Unless they are in advertising or a calligraphy enthusiast.)
Play with different fonts. Do it! It’s fun. It adds character to your text. It can help your message stand out. But when you get ready to publish your ad, make sure you run it by someone who is known for being a little...spacey.
Rules to Prevent Font Confusion
Just a few guidelines from my experience in keeping the focus of the advertisement on your message, rather than how attractive your ad is.
Make sure it’s unmistakably legible.
Learn from someone else’s mistake. If your pretty font blurs the line between a V and a R, ditch it. Or if it confuses any other letters for that matter. Odds are your prospect has a mild interest at best. If your copy is difficult to read, they will move on to your competitors with more easily digestible information.
The font should not detract from your message.
If the font is more interesting than your message, ditch it. Unless you are submitting your ad for a competition where it will be judged on your artistic merit, the art doesn’t matter. The ONLY thing that matters is if it sells. That’s it. Nothing else.
So if you are showing your ad to someone and they comment on how attractive your font is, that’s a red flag that they aren’t noticing your message. If they don’t see your message for the packaging, you won’t sell.
Use a common font for most of your text.
Make your message easy to read. People are accustomed to reading in Times New Roman, Arial, Courier, Courier New, and Helvetica. Most pages on the internet use one of those. Your clients will be used to reading those fonts and therefore your ad will be easier to read.
Avoid Comic Sans (breaks my heart).
Comic Sans is just so delightful, fun, and happy. I hate to offer this advice, but it is for the good of your cash flow. Just skip Comic Sans. It doesn’t look professional. It looks like all of my middle school writing assignments. Unless you are advertising something for children, like an after school day care. Then it MIGHT be okay.