How to Ruin Your Company Image

So you turn up at your networking meeting and head for the members information table. And there it is! Along with all those professionally produced leaflets, business cards, tiny roller banners and professional displays sits the offending article:

Yes, it’s the ‘DIY postcard or leaflet’. The business owner probably ‘copied’ it from a totally acceptable postcard or leaflet of another company and has then set it up in Word on his PC and then printed it on 80gsm white copier paper from his desk top printer.

And guess what? It stands out like a sore thumb in all its nastiness and it marks the business out as a DIY’er! Take heed, don’t be tempted. We all spend spend time and money creating a brand image for your fellow networkers to buy into. Usually a professional, copper-bottomed business that can be relied on. One that people want to buy things from.

The majority of networkers and businesses have it right. The have got a designer and printer to do something that fits in with the company image they are trying to purvey.

So what’s the motivation to ruin your company image?

At the meeting you talk to the business owner with the cheapskate sales bumf and they seem intelligent enough, they don’t drag their knuckles on the ground or slaver down the front of themselves. They can string two words together. So stop and think. Why would they do such a thing?

• They don’t stand up and say how poor their firm is or how they have failed with a customer, but that is what their home made leaflet shouts from the middle of the table.
• Is it because it is cheaper to use a desk top PC and printer? It can’t be, surely. We have all seen these Blue Peter efforts blathered in 40 pounds worth of ink to make them look so bad. For the same price they could have had 250 postcards designed and printed professionally. It just doesn’t make sense.
• Is it because they are short of time? The art of management is delegation. Why waste your time doing a DIY design and print job that someone has spent years learning and has more talent in their little finger than you have in the whole of your body? Run your business and outsource what you can’t do well, you understand that.

If you vaguely fit into any of the bullet pointed statements above, hang your head in shame. £40 quid to ruin your networking reputation, that’s all it takes and on a bad day you can do it for a lot less.

Think smart, think professional design and print. Don’t let your first contact be memorable for all the wrong reasons.

Don’t ruin your company image, take Yorkshire Powerhouse advice and get an expert

Have you any questions?

Here at Yorkshire Powerhouse, we’re happy to help as much as possible – is there anything else we can do to help you, do you have any further questions or can we help introduce you to an expert – please let us know: