Thursday, September 27, 2012

Top Tips to Make Your Banners Really Stand Out

If you are using printed banners for a tradeshow, stand or other marketing endeavour for your business, then it is crucial that you do everything you can to make them really stand out. After all, making your banners stand out really is the point of using banners in the first place, and if you are using them at something like a tradeshow then you are going to need to make sure that yours can stand out even better so that visitors come to find your stall rather than those of your competitors.
There are many ways you can make your banners stand out, here we will have a look at several of them...
Contrast
First of all, when you use your printed banners you need to make sure that they are printed in colours that are going to stand out. This means not only using colours that are eye catching on their own, but also using a colour scheme that creates more contrast so that your text stands out against your background for instance. To do this, try and use colours that are at the opposite sides of the colour wheel such as white and black. However this won't always work - and for instance blue and red are two colours you should never use together if you want your banners to stand out.
Consider also the colour of the room you are going to be in - if you want your banners to stand out in a hall then they need to be a contrasting colour when compared to the walls they're hanging on.
Size and Resolution
The size of your banners of course will have a big impact on just how much they stand out, and as a rule the larger the banners are, the better you'll be able to catch the eye with them. Of course though there will be limits to how big you can make your banners and this will be dictated by just how much space you have to display them.
When making printed banners you also need to think about the size of the writing specifically, as this is what people will need to read from a distance - so make sure you maximize the space you have by using large writing that's well centred.
Finally, make sure that the resolution of your banners is high and that the colours are vibrant. This will not only make them stand out, but also make your printed banners look professional. This is a matter of choosing the right company, as well as choosing the right image.
Type
There are various types of banners and they come in various materials - make sure you have the right type for you. If you are outdoors for instance then you will need vinyl banners to avoid water damage, while if there is a lot of glare you should make sure they are also matte so they catch less light. Pop up banners meanwhile are printed banners that stand on the ground rather than hanging and this can be useful for catching attention as people walk past your stall at eye level. These can also be folded down for easier transportation. Make sure you use the correct type of banner for the job.

Friday, September 21, 2012

Top Ways to Customize Your Belongings

Customizing your belongings is a great way to make them more unique and more 'you' and this way you can find that you enjoy them even more and that you feel even warmer towards them. At the same time if you want to give someone a customized gift then this is a great way to give someone something that is not only perfectly tailored to them, but also something that you have shown took time, thought and effort.
Many people don't know how to customize their own things, but this is a real shame bearing in mind how easy it is to do. Here we will look at a few different ways to customize your items...
Printing
There are many printing companies on the web that will help you to print your own items, and using these you can print your own printed t shirts, custom banners, embroidered hats and more. All you have to do here is to upload your image to the website, select the product you want, and then order the amount you need. This way you can quickly get lots of great items that have your own design on them in your own colours and ensure that they will look professional. You can also sell these to make a profit and the great thing is that you needn't know anything about embroidery yourself.
Sewing and Embroidery
However if you do know a thing or two about embroidery or can sew then this is a great way to personalize your clothes and at least your material belongings. Take a shirt and embroider a nice logo on it and this will be a perfect gift for people or even a small business you could run through eBay.
Engraving
As a rule, you unfortunately can't embroider jewellery as it's simply too hard. However what you can do is to get these things engraved which basically means that a name or something else is carefully scratched into the surface. Often this is used to make jewellery for our loved ones with messages like 'I will love you forever' in them.
Physical Alterations
How smug do people look who alter their items in clever ways. For instance the person who turns their laptop bag into a rucksack, or the person who connects a Bluetooth keyboard to their phone with a hinge to make a mini laptop. Well you've got to start somewhere and if you're interested in making your own items more personal then this is a great way to do so - even if you start off with only minor tweaks.
One great way to make a physical alteration is to combine two previous items, and this is even better if you make the other part yourself. Simply learn 3D printing and you can make anything you like in a range of materials - then just use a strong adhesive to add these elements to your existing items.
Another way to alter of course is to remove parts, and this is something a lot of budding fashionistas will do - cutting holes and hemming clothes to make them shorter, more revealing or just more unique.

Saturday, September 15, 2012

Top Uses for Custom Clothing

The web allows us to create a vast range of things that otherwise would never have been possible. It's thanks to the web for instance that all kinds of people are now using 3D printing in order to create their own inventions and custom phone covers for instance, and it's thanks to the web and 'Print on Demand' publishing that anyone can now see their name in print and think of themselves as an author who's actually selling books.
Another thing that the web enables us to do, which is pretty impressive when you think about it, is to create our own printed stickers, our own printed t shirts and our own embroidered hats to generally make all of our things personalized or to create corporate gifts and merchandise for our business.
Here custom clothing is perhaps one of the more popular uses for this service, but what are people actually using these sites for? Here are a few uses for custom clothing...
Customer Services
If you run a shop and you want to make your staff look more uniform then what do you need? A uniform of course - and that means you need them all to have a consistent and professional look that makes them easily identifiable as working for your business. Using branded t shirts or embroidered hats is a great way to do this and it will mean the strengthening of your brand as well as making it easy for customers to get the help they need.
Dance Troupes and Stunt Teams
If you are putting on some kind of show or dance, or if you're going to appear on X-Factor as a group, then what you need to stand out is a consistent design that tells people who you are and that makes you more visually a team. A great way to do this is by all wearing matching printed t shirts or embroidered hats.
Web Owners
If you run a website and you are proud of it and want people to ask you about it, then wear a t-shirt with your website name on it and you will find it starts to come up in conversation a little more.
Individual Style
Of course another reason to use embroidered hats and custom t shirts is just so that you can look unique. If you have a strong and personal sense of style an you want to make sure that you stand out from the crowd with clothes that no one else is going to have, then there are few better ways to accomplish this than by wearing your own custom clothing that you had made.
Gifts
And obviously this is also a great gift to give someone that will be entirely unique and that will show you've put time and effort into coming up with their present.

Friday, September 7, 2012

A Meeting Facilitator Should Come From Outside the Organization

Organizations of all sizes have meetings. These gatherings are a way to get different members of the organization on the same page; and they are also a great way to evaluate current strategies or brainstorm new ones. However, unproductive meetings cause the company to hold even more meetings as resources are continually wasted. By some estimates, the average American worker spends 100 hours per month in meetings. Companies can avoid wasting expensive labor by making a commitment to holding more productive meetings. The best way to make this commitment is by bringing in a meeting facilitator.
When a company works with a facilitator, it sends the message that these meetings will be productive. The first thing that a facilitator will do is sit down with organizational leaders to determine why the meeting is necessary. In some cases, this research might show that a meeting is not the best way to address the problem. When the meeting facilitator determines that this type of gathering will benefit the company, the professional will begin planning the gathering.
A well thought-out meeting is a more productive meeting, so every facilitator will prioritize the planning phase. He or she will work with organizational leaders to outline objectives that need to be met during the meeting. These objectives can then be used to structure the rest of the meeting, by deciding: the types of questions that a facilitator asks, or who is asked to take part in the discussion. Once the facilitator has determined who needs to attend the meeting, he or she should make sure that each individual is able to attend. When a key decision maker is busy, many companies opt to hold the meeting without them, but this is a huge mistake. The end result is that employees will waste time in a meeting that will not produce a final decision.
Next, the meeting facilitator will distribute a summary of the information that he or she has learned. This information might include meeting goals and background information that will be used during the meeting to make decisions. By giving each organizational member access to this information, the facilitator ensures that everyone will be on the same page when the meeting starts.
During the meeting, attendees will understand why it is best to outsource the task of facilitation. The meeting facilitator must: lead the group discussion, ensure that each individual has a chance to speak, and direct the group to discuss certain ideas. A facilitator who comes from within the organization is likely to sway the direction that the discussion takes due to his or her own biases. Additionally, some team members will be reluctant to share thoughts or go against the leader's opinion if they think that they are jeopardizing work relationships. An outside facilitator focuses on the problem at hand, and guides the group to a solution by asking for a consensus and ensuring that everyone is given the chance to speak. This ensures that meetings are more productive, which means that less meetings are necessary in the future.