Today I was healthy. A visit to my doctor yielded a lower weight than last year’s and better blood pressure scores. The doctor even recommended a flu shot even though here in Austin temperatures are back to the 70’s and the risk of flu is diminishing every week. Just to be safe, I got one. A second after the nurse took the needle out of my arm, she handed me an extremely poor document on basic facts about Influenza. Seeing printed materials every day, I thought this was a great example of what NOT to do with your printed documents (note that below is a high res scan of the actual document that the nurse handed me).

Here are a few “mistakes” that the creator (CDC) made in my opinion:

Mistake #1: Too Much Information

Though the CDC did use highlighted subject headings and made use of bold text, they did not summarize this topic enough. This is a patient education document that in 99% of the cases, patients scan for highlights – they do not read for deep comprehension. You only see the first page below, but in reality this was a 2 page black and white document that had as many words on the back page than the front. Even I, who is willing to read some fine print to know what I’m getting into, am not that interested in reading a chapter’s worth of material on something I know can be summarized more succinctly.

Mistake #2: Lack of Color & Creative Design elements

The only reason that an organization today would NOT want to use color in a public-facing marketing document is to make it easy for it to be distributed by photocopier. Unfortunately, these organizations don’t fully realize that color contributes to the ease at which the information is absorbed. In direct marketing lingo, it generally also can be used to obtain higher response rates on mailings. In simple, patient education marketing such as this, color is part of the mix that gets people to read a document. The other aspect are design elements such as using photos, icons, drawings, etc. It only took 5 minutes to find a document on the web that communicates the same message but does it in a more compelling manner. See below for a tri-fold flyer distributed by the New Zealand National Influenza Strategy Group:

Note the summarized copy, as well as the use of color and graphics to futher engage a reader. This New Zealand version is a success on these fronts.

Mistake #3: Relying on your Channels / Offices / Salespeople to reproduce marketing documents

My nurse said that most of the pharmaceutical companies provide enough pamphlets for all the patients who need them; however, this vaccine provider did not, and thus made the doctor’s office do their own photocopying. What resulted was a streaked, spotty black and white document. Also, the copier actually made the second page appear upside down due to incorrect copier settings. This would have never happened if some organization down the line, either the CDC or the vaccine provider, used a digital document library and on-demand printing to support their offices.

In some sense, this is about maintaining your brand identity, but mostly – it’s about your customers’ experience.  Providing a quality experience is the bedrock for an enthusiastic customer base, and great long term word-of-mouth business – even in the health field.