Adding banners to elementary, junior high, and high school spaces has many benefits. For one thing, these banners help share school spirit and create a sense of community. For another, a school banner can relay information about upcoming events or other important news. 

Few things catch a viewer's attention than a big banner across a wall, entryway, or window. However, you need to approach your banner with a focused strategy and a creative mindset to get people's attention and win them over. 

Creating an Eye-Catching School Banner

Remember this: The first and most important reason you create banners is to grab someone's attention. 

School banners are designed to make broad, sweeping statements that catch the eye or turn the head in as few words or images as possible. Banners contain succinct proclamations you make with a tiny space in which you are attempting to lead someone into action, not just thought. They are designed to mobilize without giving much attention to the design itself. 

For instance, you want to boost attendance at your upcoming wrestling event. Think about the message you want to send to the entire student body walking in and out of the main hall of the school building. 

Now condense that message into a three- to five-word phrase. Use action words and not just words that make people feel good. 

Highlight Your Message

Make sure your message is the center point of your banner. While images, logos, and designs may instantly catch someone's attention, they must fixate their eyes on your three to five words. 

Minimize your design, create a clean negative space (background), and leave no doubt about what you want your viewers to get from seeing the banner. 

Remember: You only have limited space to work in, regardless of how large your banner is. 

So, make sure you highlight your message!

Deviate From the Norm

In marketing, you are constantly pounded with maintaining a consistent brand and message. While this is 98.7% true, there are times when deviating from the norm is more effective than staying on brand. 

Here's why: When people see the same designs, logos, and lettering all the time, they may lose their impact. Don't be confused – branding is essential to an organization's marketing initiatives. However, banners allow you to mix it up and create a design that nobody saw coming. 

Therefore, you can use your creativity to create crazy colors, wild designs, and funky lettering – whatever captures the attention of potential viewers. 

The only caveat is to ensure your banners are consistent with your school's branding efforts. 

Digitize Your Banner

Once you create the physical banner or wall graphic that you will place on campus, brainstorm with your creative team and figure out where to place the banner online. 

What are your online marketing channels? Social Media? Emails? Your school's website? Text messages? 

By distributing your banner through multiple digital channels, you can increase your market and get the word out about your goals. 

Choose Letter Colors Carefully

The first rule of combining colors is to use tones that contrast without blending into the background. If your colors are too close in tone or shade, they may be hard to read.

Better yet, you may want to avoid combining or alternating letter colors and stick with one solid color. Generally, it's better to keep things simple than to try to do multiple colors at once.

Enlarge the Font

Possibly, the best way to ensure people see your banner and read it is to make the font large enough. Letters should be one inch tall for every 10 feet away a viewer is. You can always make them larger, spending on how many words you need to fit on the banner.

Small letters have little visual or psychological impact and are also hard to see. Big, bold letters pack a punch, mainly because they are visible further away.

Only Go With High-Quality Finishes

Even if the banner is the right color, has the right fonts, and is eye-catching, if it's not well made, you risk the material being damaged more easily and having to replace it after just a few years. Choosing a manufacturer that will get you a high-quality and durable finish can pay for itself via advertising and save you money by not needing to replace it as often.

Choose the Right School Banner Background Design

One of the most common errors in banner design is placing a noisy background behind the banner's focal point. It lessens the impact of what you want people to notice first. The background should complement the main image or message without overtaking it.

While choosing a fun or interesting image might seem wise, things can quickly look messy or confusing. Your best approach is to keep the background clean with no design. If you want to add a few flourishes to the background, keep the design simple with zero distractions. 

No matter how complex or straightforward the background is, it should feel like it is part of the overall banner design concept.

Place the Banner Where No One Can Miss It 

If you order a banner, you choose a medium meant to be seen. This is an item that's supposed to be big and bold, and that's because you want many people to see it while walking or driving by.

There's nothing subtle about a banner. What distinguishes it from any other display or medium is that you have something to say and want everyone to see it. So, when designing a banner, remember to embrace this fact.

Therefore, your banner will fulfill its purpose if you place it where no one can miss it. Think about where the most traffic occurs in the school facility. Also, place the banner so people can see it without adjusting their heads or bodies.

For instance, when a person enters a hallway, classroom, or other area, where do they project first? If fans are sitting in bleachers, where are they most cast their first? These are the areas where you should place the banner.

If the banner goes outside, place it near the school entrance or where most people drive when pulling into the parking lot.

How to Use Banners 

Just like with any school branding idea, there's a right and wrong way to implement conference banners in your facility's lasting decor. We cover effective banner creation in another blog post of ours, Designing a Conference or Championship Banner for Your School. If you're looking for tips from the ground up, hustle on over there to get started.

Keep Things Bright and Sparkling 

In design, sure, but that's not our main point here. For pre-existing banners, be sure to keep them clean. We know it sounds obvious, but when you're focused on sanitizing the rest of your school, it's easy to forget the purely decorative elements. 

Plus, banners sometimes tend to end up hanging from the gym ceilings—out of sight and out of mind. But you'd be surprised at how much more impact they have while clean, even from a distance!

Think Outside the Box 

Sure, championship banners are an amazing way to celebrate your school's achievements, but showing off your school's accomplishments isn't the only use banners have.

Sometimes, a simple banner with your team's mascot and name is just the nonspecific piece of decor you need to take up space on that empty gym wall. Maybe, on the other hand, you need one to advertise an upcoming annual school dance. 

The applications for custom banners are seemingly endless, so don't sell them short if you're looking for a decor solution.

Order Your Banners From SportsGraphics

SportsGrahics offers high-definition, innovative designs for banners, wall graphics, wall padding, and other products for high schools and organizations. We can custom-design your banners to suit any athletic facility or school environment.

To find out more about our products or place an order, call us at 1-800-257-6405 or message us on our contact page.