There’s no doubt that the words we use in our marketing campaigns have to be carefully chosen. These words need to connect with our audience. The same can be said for typography: the way we present these words needs to also strike a chord with our target market.

So what makes good typography? Well for starters there’s much more to it than just picking out a nice-looking font in a suitable colour.

There are numerous things you have to get right, and they’re all extremely important. If one element isn’t quite right, it usually stands out a mile. Just think about that from a customer’s perspective.

 

The Different Elements

Here are some of the most fundamental elements of typography, with good and bad examples (on the left and right, respectively) of each, in order to help illustrate how important they are:

Typeface

Of course, you don’t just have to stick to one – you can incorporate several – but there’s something to be said for being selective (as the example above shows).

Colour

Again, less may be more. You can certainly use more than one, as the left example shows, but remember that it’s easily overdone.

Kerning

This is how we refer to the adjustment of the spacing between two letters in order to make the pairing of them more visually pleasing. (Kerning is not to be confused with tracking, which refers to the default spacing between letters and words.)

Here are a couple more examples of poor kerning:

Leading

Leading (pronounced like the metal) is the spacing between lines of text.

 

Other Important Elements:

• • Alignment – do you want the text aligned to the left margin, the right margin, or in the centre?
  • Justification – this means that the text is aligned to both the left and the right margins; the spacing between the letters and the words are adjusted in order to achieve this.
  • Scaling – should be kept in proportion with the original typeface; squashing or horizontally stretching text to fit it into a certain space is pointless as it ruins the aesthetic.
  • Widows – this is what we call a line of text that comes at the end of a paragraph but at the top of a new page or column. In the majority of cases, these are to be avoided as they aren’t very nice to look at.
  • Orphans – this is what we call a paragraph-opening line that appears at the bottom of a page (the reverse of a widow, if you like). Again, these aren’t ideal as they can ruin the aesthetic.

Marketing Expertise at Cuckoo Design

Typography is one of our many areas of expertise here at Cuckoo Design. We specialise in all things marketing and branding, and provide a wide range of clients with completely unique and memorable campaigns.

To find out more about how we can help you, give us a call today on 0161 660 8352, or you can email us at info@cuckoodesign.com.

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