So you want to create a design for your custom postcards. While it may sound simple, you should always follow a specific process in creating these postcards. It is not about slapping that postcard picture on the design.

For truly professional and effective postcards, you will want to cover all the important elements of the design properly. To get you started, let me give you this seven step design and printing process for custom postcards. Follow these instructions and you will quickly build a great design for postcards that is fit for professional distribution.

1. Know the goals of your postcards.

The first and most important step when starting a postcard design is for you to try to know the real goals of your prints. What exactly do you want to achieve when you print these custom postcards out?

Do you want to give a special greeting to many people? Are these postcards for marketing? Do you want to sell a lot of stuff with them? Or maybe you just want to uplift the reputation of a certain brand or company? It is important to really determine that precise goal as this will determine how you will approach your postcard designs.

2. Brainstorm your theme and design.

Once you have set the real goal of your postcards, the next step is to brainstorm the theme and design. Depending on your goals, you should be able to think of several good and promising approaches to your postcards.

Make sure that you try to determine what your target audience will like to see within your postcards so that you can at least integrate that while you flesh out the theme and concept that you want. Try to draw out a few of your best ideas, and lay them out as well as initial reference for these initial drafts.

3. Start gathering the raw design elements.

Now before starting to actually create these designs digitally, you will want to start gathering raw design elements for the project; it is best to do this early on so that designing those drafts will happen a lot easier.

Besides additional pictures and logos for your postcard drafts, you will also want to get the proper postcard templates, extra font styles, backgrounds etc. Make sure you get what you need and more so that you will have lots of options and variations for your postcard designs.

4. Create several drafts.

Afterward, you can then start creating your individual drafts for the postcard. Using the best design software that you are comfortable with, start building up your designs.

Try to get a postcard template from an online postcard printing service so that you can be sure that your design is set properly to standard postcard printing options. Of course, add in all the different elements that you got from raw material hunting, and form the specific designs that you brainstormed earlier.

5. Do some initial audience testing.

Once you have the drafts, remember that you also need to do some initial tests. Try to print a sample of your postcard design and show them to other people. Try your colleagues first, then your friends and family.

If you can, try to also get some random people or audiences to give their feedback about your postcard drafts. Take note of the weaknesses and strengths of each one so that you can determine the best design concept for your postcards.

6. Adjust and improve the design.

Using the feedback you gained from people, you can now choose the best draft design and then try to adjust them in preparation for printing. Try as much as you can to improve the designs, by addressing all the constructive comments that you got. Proofread and review the design several times as well to make sure that everything is as close to perfect as possible.

7. Finalize for printing.

The last step is of course for finalization for printing. Make sure you check your color values in the design, and of course review if you are using the correct file format for printing. Also, make sure that you try to set all the essential material options that you want for printing. See to it that you match all the requirements that your postcard printer needs from you as well, so that you can print your postcards properly through their process.

So that is the design process that you will want to follow when trying to develop your own custom postcards. It might sound tedious, but if you do it step by step, it should be easy enough.Image Source: http://images.google.com