follow us – Brand Building for Small Business

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About Corel Draw: If you’re a graphic designer by trade, Corel Draw may not be your graphics editor of choice. If you’re a small business owner without a lot of graphic design experience choosing to do your branding in-house, Corel Draw is a great choice. You can pretty much address all your web and print graphics needs for a fraction of the price of the typical designer preference, Adobe. Since you’ve landed on this page in your travels, you probably already know that. If, however, buying a copy has been on your to do list for a while, there’s no time like the present. You can buy yours here and support this blog in the process.

A Quick Note About Versions: I’m using Corel Draw 18. As long as you’re using a version in that same vicinity (i.e., 16, 17, 19, or 20), your view should look pretty similar to the screenshots included throughout these directions.

You’ve created your social media pages to reinforce and promote your brand, and you regularly dedicate your time to adding content, so you want to be sure you’re taking every opportunity to properly promote your social media presence. If your small business has a physical location (office, retail store, etc.), hanging a sign in a high-traffic area is a great option and relatively quick and easy. I’ll show you the steps to create such sign in Corel Draw.

1. From within Corel Draw, go to File > New. You want an 8.5 x 11” portrait page that’s RGB and 300 dpi:

2. Select the Rectangle Tool:

Draw a rectangle in any size and then make sure the Lock Ratio is unlocked:

Then switch to the Pick tool:

Change the size of the rectangle to 8” wide x 10” high and then press ‘p’ to center the object on the page:

Double click the Outline Pen at the bottom right of the screen and change the color to dark gray, the width to hairline, and the style to dashed:

3. With the outline of your sign ready, next you can include the social media logos of your choosing. Since potential legal issues associated with using other companies’ logos can be daunting, we’ve done the legwork for you and compiled the logos that the major social media outlet wants you to use along with the rules for each. Visit our post, A “Legal-Approved” Free Collection of Social Media Icons, and simply copy a logo you would like to use from the post and paste the graphic into your Corel Draw file. Repeat the process for each logo you would like to use. I’ve selected three and each image is on top of the other at this point:

With one of the logos selected, lock the Lock Ratio and change the height of each logo to about 1.4”. You may need to move the logos around using the Pick tool so you can access each of them.

4. Next, select the Text tool so you could begin adding content:

Click anywhere on the page and type your business’s information for one of your chosen social media outlets. Then, set the alignment of the text to centered and choose your font and font size. I’m going to use Calibri in size 20:

Repeat that process for the remainder of your social media outlets:

Now let’s add the heading. I’m going to do “follow us” and “on social media” in two different fonts so I will create them as two separate text objects. Using the Text tool, click anywhere on the page and type “follow us.” I’m going to use the Candelion font at 160 pts in size and center the alignment. Repeat the process for “on social media”, which I’m going to type in all caps, add a space between each character, and set the font properties to Calibri, 25 pts, and centered.

5. You’ll see your sign is starting to come to life. Now you just need to clean it up. Press Ctrl + A, which will select all the objects in your document and then press ‘c’ to horizontally center them all:

Then, move the objects around using the Pick tool till everything seems vertically balanced. (Once you select an object, press Ctrl and continue to hold the key down while you move the object to retain its horizontal placement.)

6. Save your file, print (be sure to set your printer Print Quality to the best available option), cut (on the dotted line, which is 8×10”), and frame!

A Note About Fonts and Colors:
While the instructions described above will achieve the simple and modern design pictured, you can (and should) customize the look for your business. If you’ve been brand building from the start, you already have a Style Guide in place, and everything you create for your business should reflect the guidelines you’ve set for your logo usage, fonts, and colors. If you’re new to branding, be sure to review our story on The Role of a Brand Style Guide.

You’ve created your social media pages to reinforce and promote your brand, and you regularly dedicate your time to adding content. Now, you want to be sure you’re taking every opportunity to properly promote your social media presence. If your small business has a physical location (office, retail store, etc.), hanging a sign in a high-traffic area is a great option and relatively quick and easy.

I’ll show you the steps to create such sign in Microsoft Word.

1. Open Word, create a new blank document, and insert a rectangle. (When your cursor turns into a plus sign, you’re able to draw your shape.

By default, mine is blue. Right click the rectangle and select More Layout Options.

Set the properties to . . .

Size: 10” in Height and 8” in Width
Text Wrapping: Behind Text
Position:
- Horizontal – Absolute Position of .25” ‘to the right of’: Page
- Vertical – Absolute Position of .5” ‘to the right of’: Page

Set the Fill to No Fill and the Line to a Solid Line, Black Color, and .5 pt Width, choosing the Dash Type selection shown below.

2. Click inside the rectangle and type “Follow Us on Social Media”. Set the font to one or more choices that work as your heading and size to appropriately fill the space. Set the Alignment to Centered. I went with the font Candelion Regular in all lowercase at size 160 for “follow us” and (on the next line) Calibri in all caps at size 25 and added a space between each letter.

3. Next, decide which review platforms you would like to feature. We are currently active on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Pinterest and will be highlighting those. Then, go to Google to find logos. Most social media outlets will have a corporate page that makes their logo available to the public along with instructions for proper usage. For example, Facebook has a Brand Resources page easily found when searching “facebook logo” on Google.

As you find the appropriate source for each social media outlet, save the logos to your desktop.

4. Press enter within your document to advance to the next line space and then insert each of your saved logos (from the menu at top, press the Insert tab, and choose Picture) in the order you want them to appear on your sign.

Inserting each of mine took me to the bottom of a second page. So, the first step in adjusting sizing is to crop any excess space from the logos. (As you can see above, the outline of the Pinterest image is directly around the icon, so no need to crop that one.) That’s not the case for LinkedIn . . .

To crop, click Picture Tools (at the very top of the screen), click the Crop icon (at top right), drag the outer edges of the box tight around the logo, and press enter. Once all the logos are cropped as needed, try to match their size to about and 1.4” in height. (This will ensure you have adequate room for text.) To do so, click Picture Tools again and enter a height at top right.

Repeat for the other icons.

5. Click in the space after your first icon, press enter to add a line space, and type your profile name/URL for that platform; repeat for your subsequent logos. This process once again took me onto a second page.