Steal These Ideas!: Marketing Secrets That Will Make You a Star, 2nd Edition

CHAPTER 6

KILL ALL ART DIRECTORS (WELL, NOT LITERALLY)

It seems as if there has been a conspiracy among art directors ever since paper was invented to create ads that are impossible to read. First they pick the smallest, hardest-to-read type and then go one size smaller. If that doesn't make reading hard enough, they will throw in some white reverse type to seal the deal.

You might think of this problem as the “23/63 effect” in which scads of 23-year-old art directors create ads that they fail to remember must be read by scads of 63-year-olds.

Art directors are not evil people and, in fact, they would like their ads to be seen. Seen is the operative word here. Their primary focus is on how the ad looks, from a design standpoint. Its readability ...