Amasia Marketing Consultants

1. Most of the decision makers for a project in China do not like to browse your website to find out what you are capable of, especially when it’s all animated and in another language. Many of them even do not like to look at your presentation/brochure on computer, they prefer something printed and put on their coffee table by their secretary, so you need a brochure of high resolution in both language, in addition to your website, which can be enjoyed like a magazine or a book.
2. The layout should be as professional as a magazine. Here is an example of professionally designed brochure except for the fact that there should be more information, and show more styles you can do. Do not use an inappropriate portion of huge fonts to emphasize something you think important. You can also take a look at the website of one of the most established international design frims in China. It is very convincing. Click here to find some other references for your brochure design. And here.
3. We cannot show you samples of brochure produced by other designers, we are not allowed to do that.
4. Do not forget that your competitors in China are all like Wilson Associates, very experienced in working in China, so we will not consider recommending your firm unless your marketing materials are competitive enough.
5. Remember that your brochure will be printed by the client’s secretary using a normal printer, A4 paper, or use a laptop to show to the chairman on a projector. So the scale and size need to be suitable for these purposes. Some designers make the brochure’s layout unusla and creative but not practical. We may have to cut a picture into half if we try to print it out and mail to the client ourselves. The best brochure design is a .pps or .ppsx format which takes exactly the screen of a laptop, perfectly for showing on projector, and it is suitable for printing on a A4 paper too. PowerPoint can make some nice effects of the pictures and the titles. You can convert it to .PDF too of course and use full screen mode to check the effect.
6. I have to mention the magazine again. Pls try to design your brochure using a design magazine as a model, some good pictures need to be big enough to cover an entire page which you see on the magazines a lot, some less important pages can be smaller emphasizing part of it.
7. Check if there is any picture that is blurring. Take that out or make it smaller.
8. Do not ring your own bell except you can list something to prove it. Those words like “award-winning/exceptional” would distract the potential client’s patience/interest and ignore something more important. Some designers would try to convince you because they try to understand the clients, always listening…those are…excuse me, stupid remarks because every designer says, including the students in college! To be honest, when I see a brochure from an international designer trying to sell herself/himself to me, and it is full of such words, I just ignore it. We need to work with designers who have a brain of selling herself/himself.
9. Because of the language and cultural diferences, it takes more time for an international design firm to prove its ability as well as find out what the client wants. So your brochure is very important. You need to prepare a brochure listing all your projects that are related to the project and focus on the expectation of the client, with the same style/nature/quality they are looking for.
10. All the related and important awards and publications are suggested to be listed in the brochure too.
11. The brochure should consist of  photos of identical projets finished, in addition to some but not many renderings, sketches, drawings of design development level details.
12. Each brochure/presentation/practice profile should have a section of company profile and possible leader architect’s profile (the one who will visit China for presentation). Another section of each brochure should be your company’s understanding of how to work in China, the difference of doing business if you do not have much experience in China, showing that you are prepared for conflicts and challenges.

China’s constuction is booming  and most developers are inexperienced in working with international designers. Therefore do not expect them to provide clear and complete information, such as the schedule and budget, at the beginning. Such details will definitely be determined by the client only when a designer is selected. In China it takes more time and efforts to sign a contract if an international design firm is to be hired to do the job, especially when neither parties is experienced in working with a foreign company. So just make sure it is attractive and what the client want in the first place.

How much do we charge for making a set of brochure for you?

Typically we charge $300 for this kind of work. We would divide your works into different categories which might be interesting to a potential Chinese client, and then will choose the pictures which style and design are favored in China to emphasize them. We know how to explain the projects and the designers too, so we will add the words of our own, in addition to the texts provided by the designer. The format and layout would be suitable for the client to use. So yes, we do better work in this particular area. You may be able to find a professional graphic designer to do a nice job but we know what the clients want.