Give Your Marketing a Pro Look with Easy-to-Use Vector Icons

You can easily communicate your business offerings to customers with simple iconography. Learn how to attach industry-specific icons to your marketing materials for a sleek, professionally designed look.

The post Give Your Marketing a Pro Look with Easy-to-Use Vector Icons appeared first on The Shutterstock Blog.

You can easily communicate your business offerings to customers with simple iconography. Learn how to attach industry-specific icons to your marketing materials for a sleek, professionally designed look.

Cover image via Portrait Images Asia By Nonwarit.

An icon is a small vector graphic that symbolizes a meaning – much like emojis in a text message. An icon goes a long way, whether it’s incorporated into a logo or used to communicate quickly in a promotional piece. These universal graphics help to establish your brand’s message, summing up your products or services with simple, easy-to-decode imagery.

When designing promotions for your business, it’s important to utilize icons tastefully; stick to a specific style and color to ensure consistency across all designs. They can be used to amplify regular copy, or even replace copy entirely, but you should stick to the same set of icons across all your marketing collateral.

In this step-by-step tutorial, I’ll show you how to use Shutterstock Editor‘s tools to successfully incorporate icons into a flyer advertisement for a sleek, professional look.

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Step 1: Set Document Size

Shutterstock Editor typically defaults to pixel dimensions, which are reserved for digital designs. You can easily change to inches by heading over to the Canvas Size panel and clicking the dropdown arrow to select Inches.

Enter your own custom size by typing in values in the Width and Height boxes. For this tutorial, I’m designing a flyer advertisement at 8.5 x 11 inches. Hit Save as Preset to name your custom size and use these dimensions in the future.

Step 2: Add Background

In this tutorial, I’ll make a flyer for an independent financial services business. I am going to attach this professional image as my background element. Shutterstock assets will feature a watermark across the images; these will be removed once downloaded and licensed.

Head over to the Search (S) tool and use keywords to browse Shutterstock for the images you need in your own flyer. You can also upload your own images with the My Content (M) tool.

I’m going to add a rectangle overlay on top of the image. This will make it easier to read any text that we place over the image and also help tone down the colors of the image to better fit our color scheme. Head to the Shapes (H) tool and select a square; add color using the Fill Color panel, like a dark violet. Reduce the Opacity to 50%.

Step 3: Add Icon Elements

Icons help communicate your message while also adding interesting visual elements to your marketing materials. I’m going to add an icon to this flyer to enhance the business’s message of “smart savings.”

To promote the idea of smart savings, I’m using an icon from this set of business icons. Icon sets like this are super valuable – you can license this entire sheet of icons at one price and use each icon separately across all of your designs.

Hit Add to Canvas to bring on top of other design elements. I cropped away the icon I needed with the Crop command located under the Layer panel. Click Apply Crop when finished cropping; if you need to restart, hit the Reset button to revert back to the original image.

Matching the banner with your icon is essential for a seamless design. Select the rectangle and go over to Fill Color, then click on Custom and activate the eyedropper. Sample the background color in the icon for a smooth appearance.

A professional typeface, like Maven Pro, has the appropriate tone for a financial firm. Attach text by clicking the Text (A) button and selecting Add Headline. Insert a subheadline underneath your headline to educate customers on the services you offer.

Be mindful with your color application; contrasting light and dark colors ensures legibility in your designs. A darker background calls for text that is white or light in value, like a pale yellow. After applying the finishing touches on your icon, group the elements together by holding down the Shift key when clicking each item. Click the Group command underneath the Layer panel and then align the elements to the canvas with the Alignment tool.

Step 4: Insert Copy and CTA

Flyers leave lots of room for copy, so you can create additional messaging. Attach a slogan to summarize how your business can help potential customers. A short phrase, like “Make your financial goals a reality” exemplifies that your business puts customers first.

Tie your slogan to your business logo by sampling the same hue with the eyedropper in the Fill Color tab.

Enter a CTA, or call to action, when promoting your products or services. This encourages your customers to learn more about what your business offers.

Step 5: Download Flyer

When you’re finished, select the red Download button to license the imagery and export your design. You can select to also download the image files that you license to use in any of your marketing collateral down the road.

Save your design as a PDF at 300 DPI to prepare your document for print.

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Searching for more visual guidelines to help boost your business presence? Check out these informative articles:

• How to Design a Spring Sale Promotion
• Organize Design Elements with the Alignment Tool in Editor
• How to Create Realistic Screen Replacements to Promote Your Business
• How to Design a Facebook Post for Your Real Estate Business

The post Give Your Marketing a Pro Look with Easy-to-Use Vector Icons appeared first on The Shutterstock Blog.