Cacophonous best describes the environment you’re about to enter. Hundreds of thousands of brochures, data sheets, white papers, case studies, newsletters, backgrounders, web sites, blogs, and more make up that noise. Ideally, you want to cut through it so people notice and buy your company’s products.
Most likely you’ve been asked to write product brochures and data sheets. Simply defined, these two pieces will promote and sell your company’s technology products. Everything written in these pieces directly supports the sales process. More specifically print version (because it still dominates):
Brochures are usually two to four pages of copy intended for a general audience (i.e. not the technical people).
Copy for a product brochure usually includes at least two or three of these words (or some variant): ease-of-use, speed, productivity, dependability, reliability, cost efficiency, and/or affordability.
In future, I think you’ll find that these words (or some variant): security, trust, protection, and privacy will show up more frequently.
Your overall word count can vary hugely depending on the product and what you’re doing. Generally, I’d be looking at 800 words of copy over four pages.
Don’t expect to distribute those 800 words evenly over the brochure (i.e., 200 words per page).
Depending on audience and product you may have a higher or lower word count.
Data sheets are usually one to two pages of copy intended for a technical audience. The copy usually consists of a general, though technical, description of the product and data specifications. There’s not much more to say about these.
A lot of companies merge the two pieces into a hybrid, ‘bro/data sheet’, to save money and target two audiences at once. This usually results in a brochure that’s filled with accessible product descriptions appended by a clunky set of data specifications or a data sheet that’s cluttered with marketing hype.
Never an optimal solution, it is a practical one in a print environment. Thank heavens for the web, which allows you to keep the pieces separate and appropriate to each of your audiences. You can even break the information down into smaller chunks and link it to technical information for different kinds of audiences (e.g. a glossary of terms for naive customers or technical details for more expert customers) thereby creating a type of ‘customized’ brochure online.
Yes, I know a lot of people create a print version of their brochures and data sheets then dump a PDF version on the web. I wouldn’t dismiss the practice; a lot of folks like to look at and print PDFs that have all the graphics and layout intact.
In any event, you have more to think about. Getting your materials noticed in such a crowded, loud environment requires creativity and, with technical products, accuracy. It’s a tough combination.
The most effective way to grab attention is to find a phrase or a word that excites people’s emotions. If you can also get visual images that reinforce your message, then you have a very powerful brochure. (This tactic can work for both technical and general audiences, although it’s much tougher to do with a technical audience.) The hard part is taking a single image or idea and using it consistently throughout the brochure.
Finally, with all of the attention that people lavish on their brochures and data sheets, there can be some surprising choices. For example, product names and company names are difficult to find or there’s no description of the product’s purpose. If you should find these or other problems in someone else’s work, be kind. It can happen to anyone.
