10 steps to your new printer - laser printer vs. inkjet printer

As an entrepreneur or member of a board, in spite of paperless e-mail communication you still have a lot of communication printed on paper. In order to print your correspondence on paper, you either need an inkjet or a laser printer. Think about what you consider important in a printer and find out in these ten steps, whether you should buy a laser or an inkjet printer.

Your requirements
Before you buy a new printer think about your requirements: How many pages do you print per week/month? How many of them are in color? Do you print many photos (on special paper)?

1. Speed
   Laser printers print faster than inkjet printers. If you often make a lot of prints within a short time, it might make sense to buy a laser printer.
   
2. Quality
   When printing with laser printer, the print quality is better.inkjet. In addition, the ink of the laser printer is (somewhat) water-resistant and abrasion-proof. Printing with inkjet printers, your prints are neither water-resistant nor abrasion-proof.
   
3. ! Health !
   If you decide to use a laser printer, you should set it in a well ventilated area that is not someone's office. The toner dust is toxic and damages the genetic material of human cells! An inkjet printer on the other hand can be safely put right next to you in your office.
4. Purchase and printing costs
   Inkjet printers are cheaper to buy than laser printers. Since the cartridges of inkjet printers are relatively small, they are much cheaper than the toner cartridges for laser printers.
5. Size
   Inkjet printers are relatively compact and can fit on any desk. For a laser printer, however you need a separate table and of course a seperate room - unless you want to ruin your health.
6. Media to print on
   For inkjet printers you will find an incredible number of different media to print on, such as photo paper and other special papers in all kinds of sizes, labels, t-shirt transfer paper, printable CDs/DVDs). For laser printers, it is more difficult to find different printing material.
7. Ports for memory cards and cameras
   Most new printers (both laser and inkjet printers) have connections for various memory cards or digital cameras. So you can print directly from your memory card or digital camera without having to go the detour via your computer.
8. Photos
   Photos can be printed in very good quality with a sharp image on any type of paper when printing with a laser printer. For an inkjet printer you need special photo paper to ensure that your pictures look good.
9. Scanning, copying, faxing
   If you scan many documents, but do not really have room for a separate scanner, consider a multifunction device. Inkjet printers with integrated scanners are still relatively small. The multi-function devices and laser printers however really take a lot of space.
   If you often make copies, but do not want to buy a copy machine, a laser printer with a copy function could be a good solution.
   Among both inkjet and laser printers you can find multifunctional devices that also have a fax option.
   A multifunction device (whether laser or inkjet printer) does not only save space, but also money, since you only need to buy a device and not several different ones.
10. Maintenance
    With inkjet printers, you have to ensure that the ink does not dry up and the print head does not get clogged. Laser printers require relatively little attention from their owners.

Advertising with flyers - preparing a brochure step by step

Although the creation of flyers and brochures can be very time consuming, it is worth it. You have the opportunity to present your company/club. And not just with words, but also with images.
In addition, flyers and leaflets can be read anywhere and over a longer a period of time. Products or services that need a lot of explaning can easily be presented in a flyer or brochure.

1.Budget
Before you get started, you should determine your budget. The amount of money needed depends on whether you wnat to design the leaflet yourself or hire an expert.

2. Hire a designer or make it yourself?
If you think about making the design of your flyer on your own, you need to figure out, whether it is really worth it. Calculate how long it will take you to learn the software and how to design it and also how long it will take you to get the flyer ready to have it printed. Then multiply this number by your hourly wage and double the amount - for all the suffering and trouble you will go through when creating the flyer yourself, when nothing works out the way you had imagined.
Then consider whether it is worth this sum to your or if you should rather hire an expert.
You should provide your graphic designer or agency with sufficient information. The more information you provide to your designer, the faster and easier he/she can work on your flyer.

3. Purpose
Consider the purpose you need the flyer for. Do you want to run image advertising and you want to present your company? Do you want new members for your club? Do you want to collect donations for your organization?
Do you need short information leaflets for your stand at a fair or a comprehensive brochure with prices?

4. Type of flyer/brochure
Depending on the scope of the content or the information that you want to pass on, you need to decide on a flyer or a brochure.
- Flyer: A flyer has at least one page and consists of a single piece of paper that is folded.
- Brochure: The brochure is somewhat more comprehensive and consists of several, usually stapled pages.

5. Audience
Who will get your flyer? Should it appeal to young people or rather to adults? Depending on who you appeal to it does affect the design of the flyer.

6. Quantity
How many flyers do want to print? Printing will get cheaper per flyer if you have them print more. But do you really need 10,000 flyers or brochures? Maybe 5,000 or 1,000 are enough? Printing too many does not make sense if you are not able to distribute them in a timely manner. Nobody likes to read an outdated brochure. It is always possible to have copies printed later on.

7. Distribution
Where do you want to distribute your flyer? Where will you put it so people can pick it up?
Depending on where you will put your flyer, it should be designed differently, so that it stands out and will be picked up by people.
Will you send him by mail?
If you want to send your flyer primarily by mail, you should consider what else you want to put in the same envelope. Do not have your flyer printed on heavy paper if you intend to send it with a letter, as the envelope will get too heavy and you will end up paying a lot for shipping.

8. Content
The contents of your flyer or brochure is based primarily on the purpose of the flyer, the target group and the distribution. Formulate short, precise and clear sentences. Think about a meaningful and clear structure for the entire text. The target audience should understand what is at stake!
The entire text should be structured in a way that even when just skimming through it will become clear what is going on. Add highlighted key words to your text that jump immediately when reading.

9. Pictures and captions
You might think captions are unimportant. The opposite is the case. Captions are usually read before the actual text.
Do not describe the image, but set up important performance data in the captions.
How to get budget-friendly photos if you do not have your own, you can read here:>Budget-friendly photos for your advertising<

10. Selection of a designer or an agency
Agencies can be found in the yellow pages. Freelance graphic designers who usually work a lot cheaper than agencies are more difficult to find. Ask people you know, other business owners, who they are working with. Check with several graphic artists and also sit down with them to figure out whether working with them would be possible.

11. Selecting a printing company
If you work with a graphic designer he/she will be able to help you when choosing a print shop. Otherwise, you can of course ask different printing companies and get quotes from them.

12. Printing and print-ready file
If you want to create your flyer yourself, you should ask the printing company which file formats can be processed there. If you create your flyer for example with Microsoft Publisher and the printing company does not have this software, it will be impossible to print the flyer.
Most printers will need a PDF file containing your data. This should have embedded fonts and graphics - this can be set when creating a PDF file.
Images should also be converted to CMYK. Most digital cameras create photos for the screen view - these photos are only available in RGB. If you do not know how to convert them, just pass them to the printing company. Also make sure you have high-resolution photos with at least 300 dpi. Otherwise, your photos will print slightly blurred/fuzzy or pixilated.
Do not just make photos or graphics that you insert in Word, Publisher or any other program bigger! Photos are usually inserted with the biggest size possible and if you just make them bigger, they will become blurry or pixelated.

Budget-friendly photos for your advertising

Many small businesses and associations often have no budget for images for advertising, such as flyers or websites. But photos do not always have to be expensive.

When downloading photos from the Internet, Google Images seems like a great chance to get free material. However, you must be aware that these photos are copyrighted and therefore should not be used on promotional materials. Moreover, these photos were mostly optimized for the Internet and therefore the quality is not sufficient to have them professionally printed.

Therefore, you should draw back on photo pages, which let you have artwork with user licenses. On the following pages you can download pictures with an inexpensive license: www.pixelio.de, www.freedigitalphotos.net, www.morguefile.com, www.imageafter.com, commons.wikimedia.org, www.photocase.com.

When using images other than your own, you should always ensure that you purchase a license and may use the photos on printed material.