Open Source Software is one of the biggest boon for the Small and Medium business. Being freely available and the code being customizable according to your business need, Open Source sure is a strong value generator for the Small and Medium Business.
The challenge: we are not designers and we would not want to pay for creating small brochures/ templates
Many SMEs have this challenge, where they don't have separate budgets earmarked for their marketing and to top the issue, they are themselves not from the marketing domain and might not really understand design aspects. The catch that they get into is, even if they have to roll out a small announcement in the form of an Email, they still have to go and look out for someone/ some company which can help them create good looking and attractive brochures.
The solution: Desktop Publishing Softwares
There are many Desktop publishing software's available online, but one of the strongest is Scribus. An open source software which is being supported and grown by a community of enthusiasts globally. Scribus can run across platforms as: n Linux/Unix, Mac OS X, OS/2 Warp 4, eComStation and Windows.
Scribus has many unexpected touches, such as powerful vector drawing tools, support for a huge number of file types via import/export filters, emulation of color blindness or the rendering of markup languages like LaTeX or Lilypond inside Scribus. The Scribus file format is XML-based and open. Unlike proprietary binary file formats, even damaged documents can be recovered with a simple text editor – sometimes a challenging problem with other page layout programs. Scribus has been translated into more than 25 languages, and more are coming in the future
The challenge: we are not designers and we would not want to pay for creating small brochures/ templates
Many SMEs have this challenge, where they don't have separate budgets earmarked for their marketing and to top the issue, they are themselves not from the marketing domain and might not really understand design aspects. The catch that they get into is, even if they have to roll out a small announcement in the form of an Email, they still have to go and look out for someone/ some company which can help them create good looking and attractive brochures.
The solution: Desktop Publishing Softwares
There are many Desktop publishing software's available online, but one of the strongest is Scribus. An open source software which is being supported and grown by a community of enthusiasts globally. Scribus can run across platforms as: n Linux/Unix, Mac OS X, OS/2 Warp 4, eComStation and Windows.
Scribus has many unexpected touches, such as powerful vector drawing tools, support for a huge number of file types via import/export filters, emulation of color blindness or the rendering of markup languages like LaTeX or Lilypond inside Scribus. The Scribus file format is XML-based and open. Unlike proprietary binary file formats, even damaged documents can be recovered with a simple text editor – sometimes a challenging problem with other page layout programs. Scribus has been translated into more than 25 languages, and more are coming in the future
What all can I do with Scribus?
You can do two things primarily with Scribus. Use Scribus to design and produce magazines, newsletters, print-advertising, brochures, calendars, and pretty much anything that requires text to look visually appealing on paper. Scribus is also a great tool for authoring PDF documents with advanced features such as forms, buttons, passwords, and more. You can make your PDF documents even more 'intelligent' by using Javascript from within Scribus.
Its easy for you to create powerful marketing brochures with the pre set examples. Since there are many inspiring designs for almost every purpose available, it’s quite easy to find examples to stimulate your imagination. However, learning from existing examples is something different than copying a layout – it’s actually hard work, because you need to analyze a layout, for example by using a ruler to determine page margins, dimensions etc. This isn’t to say that all that you see that is eye-grabbing is good design for all circumstances. Start with a sense of what you want to do, perhaps educate someone or show off some visual display or product. Your intended purpose can then help you look for good examples of design that do this well.
How do I create my first page and background in Scribus?
Source: http://docs.scribus.net/content/en/images/Rembrandt1.png
Just like you open, create and edit documents in a normal word processor, you do a simple process of click File > New, and Scribus brings up the dialogue box as shown above. After you click OK, you will find the following screen in front of you:
You can now normally add any picture/ text to the document and get ready to publish your first cover page! The final result could be something like this:
Source: http://docs.scribus.net/content/en/images/Cover_en1-page1.png
Save Cost and time
Being free and easy to use, Scribus is one of the most powerful desktop publishing applications which help SMEs save both cost and time.
There are many such online platforms available, which are benefiting the Small and Medium Enterprise segment. To know more, get in touch with the experts at IndiaMART Knowledge Services. Do drop in a comment to this post to let us know what else would you want us to share about!
Scribus - surely a great tool for marketing solutions..
ReplyDelete