Banks and Credit Unions, Business Process Improvement, Document Design, Healthcare & HIPAA
Transactional Document Design Best Practices
on March 3, 2017
Effective Document Design: Principles and Best Practices for Impactful Customer Communications
First impressions are critical, especially in customer communications. Presenting your client communications with dated design strategies and layouts could mean lost business opportunities for your company.
Consider updating the appearance of your company’s documents, much like you would your professional attire. You wouldn’t want your style to remain fixed in a previous decade; similarly, your documents shouldn’t project an old-fashioned or out-of-date image. This might be the moment for a refreshed visual approach, an update in technology, and an opportunity to boost your response rates. With evolving customer expectations, the design of your customer documents is more significant than ever.
Why is Color Important in Document Design?
Appearance truly matters. Are all your company’s printed communications solely in black and white? This might seem like a minor detail, but human eyes are naturally drawn to color. Think about the volume of reading material people process daily. The amount of information can feel overwhelming. Without elements to make your information distinct, color, for example, which helps our brains identify important messages, key points can be easily overlooked.
FSSI’s Color Specialists and Graphic Designers strategically add variable color to documents, making a company’s most vital messages stand out. For instance, “Billing Due Dates” are prime candidates for variable color. The reader’s eye can quickly locate the information they need without meticulously reading the entire document.
Strive for balance in your statement design’s layout. Understand your audience. Present all necessary information as clearly as possible, but do not inundate your customers with excessive text. Customers absorb information more effectively when there is adequate white space on the page. Avoid redundancy to make good use of the available area.
Simplify. Refine your content by removing duplicate fields and concentrating instead on your company’s primary messages. This approach creates more usable white space for other purposes. Marketing messages, special offers, or even prompts for action could be placed within this white space to make full use of the page.
Document Composition Services
After refreshing your document aesthetics, it’s also crucial to confirm you are using current technology. FSSI, an outsourced printing company with nearly four decades of experience, not only collaborates with clients to update underperforming customer communications according to design best practices but also assists in distributing them to consumers through multi-channel approaches.
FSSI maintains up-to-date technological capabilities and helps adapt all printable documents for web and mobile viewing. This allows companies to format documents suitable for print, online, and mobile device platforms. Direct Mail is also seeing a resurgence. FSSI specializes in Direct Mail and can customize statements, bills, invoices, and direct mail pieces using variable data printing technology to address consumers as individuals.
Personalized documents that feature data-driven images and messaging have been demonstrated to increase consumer response rates and, consequently, return on investment.
Achieving Results with Personalized Customer Communications
Many businesses possess valuable customer data but don’t fully apply it. By gathering information on individual consumer purchases, event attendance, or past usage of discount codes, companies can carefully tailor information to match their customers’ interests. Consider how much more effective your message could be if you could generate specific advertisements and calls-to-action focused on what your customer wants to see.
FSSI provides practical document redesign solutions. Our messageStreamOne template management system facilitates this customization process for its clients, removing the guesswork.
FSSI uses your company’s consumer data and tracks the response and conversion rates of your communications. Your data is also protected with us. We operate an SSAE18 Type II secure facility and adhere to strict data guidelines across numerous industries governed by compliance regulations.
A key benefit is that all this customization will assist your company in saving advertising expenditure by only sending messages pertinent to specific consumers. Your company’s response rates will naturally rise because individuals receive information that directly pertains to their needs and interests. Customization and personalization are fundamental. Strong communication is vital to all businesses. When you focus on these crucial aspects of your communications, you can derive greater worth from each customer interaction.
Ready to Enhance Your Customer Communications?
Well-designed, personalized documents are no longer a mere option but a necessity for meaningful customer engagement and improved business outcomes. If your current documents aren’t delivering the results you need, it’s time for a change.
FSSI offers the expertise and technology to transform your customer documents into effective communication tools. Our specialists can help you apply data-driven insights and modern design principles to create communications that connect with your audience and support your business objectives.
Take the next step towards more impactful customer interactions. Contact an FSSI communications specialist today to discuss how strategic document design and personalization can refine your outreach and produce better results for your organization.
Call us at 714.436.3300 to speak with a specialist or to schedule a consultation.
