Product Spotlight: Tabloid, Large Square, Standard Landscape, and Posters

Introducing a batch of additional products on the MagCloud website. Our 11″ x 14″ and 14″ x 11″ Small Tabloid size, 17″ x 11″ Large Tabloid size, 12″ x 12″ Square size and 10.75″ x 8.25″ landscape-oriented Standard size all use our Wire-O Binding type. This binding method consists of a double-loop wire binding and pages that are all printed on our thicker 80# cover stock. Not only does the heavier paper stock offer a more substantial feel to these publications, but the wire binding allows them to lay flat and makes it so the pages of the publication can be rotated 360 degrees around the binding and is more durable.

Our Poster format is available in 12″ x 18″ and 18″ x 12″ sizes, and printed on the same 80# cover stock used for Flyers and Pamphlets. MagCloud Posters can be printed on both sides with the same high quality, full color digital printing used with all MagCloud products, and are made more durable with a UV coating on both sides at no extra cost. The best part is that all of this costs just $2.00 per printed Poster, or $1.50 per piece if you order 20 or more.

For inspiration, here are a few ideas for how these products can be used:

Calendars

The Wire-O Binding on the 12″ x 12″ Square and 11″ x 14″ Tabloid make these products great for calendars. Just rotate your content 90 degrees prior to uploading your PDF so that the binding will be on the top edge of your calendar. If you want to use fewer pages in your publication, the larger page size of the 17″ x 11″ Tabloid allows enough space for all the content for a single month to fit on a single page, making a tall and narrow calendar. A 12 month calendar with one page per month, plus two extra pages for the front and back covers will cost you just $7.04.

Catalogs

The larger format of all of these products offer an even greater opportunity to show off your products and services in a catalog format. Furthermore, both the unique shape of the 12″ x 12″ Square and the oversize dimensions of our 17″ x 11″ Large Tabloid will let your catalog stand out from the competition. In all cases, the thicker paper these products are printed on has a more substantial and expensive feel to help you leave a lasting impression on potential customers.

Portfolios

The landscape orientation of the 10.75″ x 8.35″ Standard, 14″ x 11″ Small Tabloid and 17″ x 11″ Large Tabloid offer a great canvas for displaying architectural renderings, fashion designs and large format photography as part of a portfolio. And with the same high quality digital printing you expect from MagCloud, you know you’ll be able to put your best foot forward when displaying your work.

Training Manuals

The ability for the pages of the Tabloid publications to rotate completely around the binding and lay flat makes them great for training manuals. As the trainee moves through their training, the wire binding will allow them to flip to the section they want to view and keep it displayed as the top page in the publication. This eliminates the need to hold open a book with one hand and also alleviates any concerns of losing one’s place.

Proof Books

We’ve discussed a number of ways wedding photographers can use MagCloud for their business, and our larger formats open up even more opportunities. What better way to encourage your clients to order larger format prints then to display their proofs in a large format book? Also, if you offer the option for professionally designed and hardbound photobooks to your clients, these larger formats offer an affordable way to show off how the book might look in print before investing in the expensive final copy.

Cookbooks

Similar to training manuals, the lay flat feature of the Tabloid products is also a benefit for cookbooks. It allows the cook to open the book to the recipe they want to make, so they won’t need to be flipping pages to find their place when they are in the midst of a recipe. The heavier paper stock is also a benefit for the durability of cookbooks, as the thicker pages aren’t as likely to rip if they should get stuck together over the years.

Brand Identity Guidelines

We’ve seen a number of brand identity guides published through MagCloud, detailing the appropriate colors, fonts and imagery that should be used for a particular brand. These guides are generally kept close by as a quick reference for designers, and as such can benefit greatly from the lay flat capabilities of these products. In addition, the larger page sizes of the Tabloid products offers twice as much space on a single page as our Standard products, allowing for more examples and detailed information within a given page of the publication. For example, instead of having fonts spread over multiple pages, they can be consolidated into a single page, making it easier for a designer to see all their options at once rather than having to flip through pages.

Media Kits

Show off the best of your business to the media in a large format they won’t soon forget. The professional feel of the heavier paper, combined with the high quality of MagCloud’s digital printing will make you look like a multimillion dollar company, without requiring a multimillion dollar budget.

Event Posters

Even with options like email newsletters, online ads, and direct mail, sometimes posters are the best way to get the word out about an event to a local audience. Whether you are advertising a concert, fundraising event, theater production or sports league sign ups, you can be sure to make a good impression with MagCloud’s full-color posters, printed in quantities of as few or as many as you need. And since no minimum order is required, you can order copies of your poster as you need them, and come back to order more when you run out.

Large Format Photography Prints

Similarly, the lack of a minimum order makes it possible to order just a single printed Poster if you’d like. This offers a great opportunity for professional and amateur photographers alike to order large prints of their photos for framing.

In-House Advertising Posters

In addition to advertising events out in the community, our Poster format can also be used in-house to highlight products and features in a high quality printed format. You can order a single copy if you only have one location, or if you have multiple locations, use our Ship to Group feature to ship one poster to each of your physical storefronts for a consistent display at an affordable cost.

Art Prints

Combining the Poster format with the MagCloud storefront offers a great opportunity for graphic designers and artists to sell their work. Content producers can add a markup beyond the $2 print cost, and for every print they sell, MagCloud will print and ship a copy to the customer directly and pay back the markup to the publisher at the start of each month.

We’re sure that there are many more ideas for how to use these products beyond what we’ve highlighted here, whether it’s using the Poster product to display the seating chart for your wedding or creating motivational posters for your classroom. If you have an idea that wasn’t mentioned, let us know in the comments below!

MagCloud for Graduation Memories

Congratulations class of 2012! Now that you’re graduated, what’s next? Graduation parties? Summer travels? Job hunting? If it’s any and/or all of the above, then we’ve got you covered.

From party invitations to summer travel itineraries to professional portfolios to thank you cards, we’ve put together some ways that MagCloud can help prepare you for the next step in your life.

 

 

Graduation Parties

Hosting a graduation party? MagCloud’s new square product is perfect for invitations and party programs. After the party is over, create a one-of-a-kind scrapbook with photos and memories so you’ll never forget the special day.

 

Summer Travels

Traveling this summer? Whether you are traveling alone or with friends, keep track of flights, train schedules, hostels, and global destinations before you leave – our flyers are perfect for travel notes and itineraries!  After your trip, compile all of your pictures and memories into a Square photo book or scrapbook to share with your friends and family!  Need a little help designing that photo book then try out our partner Poyomi’s on-line templates.

 

Job Hunting

Looking for the perfect job? Show off your work by creating a portfolio with MagCloud’s new 8×8 square product, or make your resume stand out with our Flyer or Pamphlet products.

 

Thank You Cards

A simple ‘thank you’ note goes a long way. Use our smaller flyer products to create unique thank you cards for your family and friends for their support – and even your potential employer after you nail that interview.

 

Have you used MagCloud in planning or celebrating a graduation, or other special event? We would love to hear how – please share in the comments below!

 

Congrats again, graduates and good luck!

How to Use MagCloud for Your Tutoring Business

Over the past few weeks, we’ve looked at various ways teachers and professors can use MagCloud to help their students get ahead in the classroom. Outside of school, MagCloud’s print on demand and digital publishing tools can also be a great resource for professional tutors, for everything from personalized study aids for their pupils, to marketing their business with promotional brochures and flyers.

Tutoring Aids

Whether you are tutoring a student in a subject one-on-one, or offering test preparation to a larger group, MagCloud can be a great resource for printing up workbooks and study guides that are tailored to the needs of your students. With no minimum order quantity required, MagCloud lets you print as few as one copy, making it easy for you to create personalized study aids tailored to your students’ needs both in and out of your tutoring sessions. For example, if you are helping a student prepare for the SAT, you could use MagCloud to provide your pupil with a printed workbook of practice questions that he or she can complete as homework, a digital reference guide of common mathematical formulas that can be viewed in PDF format, and a pocket review book with common vocabulary words and definitions, all tailored to the areas of the test where they need the most help. You can create these documents using any program that can export a PDF file, and easily update them for new students by uploading a new version of the PDF to the MagCloud website.

To get started, check out the step-by-step instructions offered in the MagCloud PDF Guides, and browse through our product specs on the new product pages.

Marketing Tools

In addition to publishing print and digital publications for your students, you can also use MagCloud as a marketing tool for your tutoring business. Our Pamphlet product is perfect for making brochures that include testimonials from past students, the range of services you offer, and your contact information. Similarly, our single-sheet Flyer product is great for creating price lists or highlighting your services in a more compact format. MagCloud’s print on demand capabilities mean you can order copies of your brochure or price list as you need them, in smaller quantities that traditional printing requires. You can even direct mail copies of your brochure to an address list of potential clients using MagCloud’s Ship to Group feature, or offer all of your marketing materials in a digital format through your MagCloud storefront for potential clients to view as a PDF. If at any point you want to add a testimonial or update your pricing, you can do so simply by uploading a new PDF to the MagCloud website.

If you need help getting started with a brochure or price sheet for your tutoring business, or are looking for some inspiration, check out our past blog posts about brochures and flyers for additional tips and templates.

Are you a tutor who has used MagCloud as a resource for your business? Let us know how in the comments below!

Powerful Publishing Tools for Professors

Over the last week we talked about using MagCloud in education, as a powerful tool for teachers, and a great asset for students who want to present their work professionally. Today we are moving forward with the same theme to discuss how professors can use MagCloud in higher education.

Whether you teach at a major university, a local community college or a continued education course, print materials for classes are always a concern as far as budget, turnaround-time and quality. MagCloud can help you with all of those challenges, providing beautiful printing, easy-to-use digital distribution options and no-minimum print runs to help you publish content for your students in a timely, affordable and more sustainable fashion. Let’s take a look at a few solutions for professors:

Syllabi

The syllabus is traditionally handed to students as a printed document on the first day of class. For distance education courses, the syllabus can be posted online or even better, mailed to students. By publishing your syllabus through MagCloud, you make it easy for your students and yourself. You can order a bulk of them to hand out in class, direct your students to download a digital version to their PC, tablet device or you can use our ship-to-group feature to drop ship a copy to each of your students on a mailing list.

Easy Re-prints:

There’s always at least one student who loses their syllabus, so when they come to you for help, MagCloud gives you an easy place to direct them–your own unique page–where they can choose whether they want to get a digital version or order a new printed copy that will be delivered right to them, requiring very little effort on your part.

Handouts/Flyers

Throughout the semester/quarter there are regularly occasions to distribute supplemental handouts and flyers. Handouts are a great way to provide support material like graphs, tables, or diagrams, or even slide notes to compliment PowerPoint presentations.

You can use handouts for specific project assignments, recruiting students to join the club you advise, or supplements to the lesson plan. No matter what the purpose, MagCloud is a great asset for printing any number of flyers or handouts. There’s no need to run to the print shop, as you can easily place an order online and have them delivered straight to your office in as little as 3 days.

Other Handout Ideas:

  • lesson outlines
  • supply and reading lists
  • activity guides
  • supplementary materials like graphs and statistics
  • lab assignments
  • study guides
  • slide notes for presentations

Course Readers

Course readers provide professors with the ability to customize specific texts for their classes. The material may include chapters from books, articles from magazines/newspapers, website print-outs, cases, or their own work. As a professor, you know that pulling this content together in a way that is compelling for the students is challenging. Standard black and white photo-copies can be tough to read, and photographs, illustrations and art suffer from poor print quality. MagCloud let’s you deviate from these long-antiquated types of course readers by making it possible for you to offer them as both full-color prints and in various digital formats.

Benefits of using MagCloud for your Course Readers:

  • free storage of the digital master in PDF format
  • no cost to you or your department– it’s free to publish, you/your students only pay when ordering print or marked-up digital files
  • publishing is immediate, so your course pack is available to students as soon as you click “publish”
  • it’s easy to make your content available to your students in print and digital formats
  • easily place orders for direct delivery to the department or use our ship-to-group feature to distribute to a mailing list
  • full-color, full-bleed printing makes it possible to showcase art, photography and imagery beautifully–no more grainy black and white images
  • easily direct students from all of your classes to collections for their course–you can sort publications by subject or class, and make it easy for your students to access all of your printed course materials in one place

Lab Manuals

If you have authored your own lab manual, you simply need to upload your document as a PDF file for publishing. You can choose whether to order the manual to distribute in class, or if you want to make it available for students to purchase themselves. MagCloud will produce high quality books up to 384 pages from your PDF that can be made available for print, digital download.

Student & Alumni Newsletters & Magazines

We know that being a professor means that you do a lot more than teach classes, so whether it’s for your Mock Trial Team or Journalism Faculty, publishing a newsletter through MagCloud will definitely help your community’s message stand out from the crowd.

Along with community newsletters, a number of educators are using MagCloud to publish the student magazines that they advise. MagCloud’s on-demand printing options mean that you don’t have to sacrifice print quality for a smaller budget or even a small readership. Whether your students are putting together a publication for their program of a couple hundred, or even for their class of 30, you can be confident that all publications are printed in full color with a full bleed on HP Indigo digital presses. These commercial presses have been calibrated to provide a high quality output of all your content, from crisp text to brilliant graphics. Our professional service features make it possible for your students to turn out a publication you can all be proud of.

Example Publications:

A Note About Using Copyrighted Work:

Federal copyright laws protect all original works of authorship fixed in a tangible medium. When using material that has been written, recorded, or designed by someone else, it is important to make sure that you are not violating copyright law by improperly using intellectual property belonging to someone else. While some items are public domain, most course readers are not considered “fair use” of published works and copyright owners retain all rights to grant or deny permission to use. In other words, do your homework before you print someone else’s content.

Are you an educator using MagCloud? Share in the comments section how you’ve used MagCloud for your needs.

MagCloud for Students

Earlier this week, we touched on ways that teachers can use MagCloud for everything from class assignments to printing coursework, but MagCloud can be a great resource for students too. Today we’ll look at a few ways that students can use MagCloud for both schoolwork and extracurricular activities.

Thesis and Final Projects

As we are nearing the end of the school year, many students are likely working to complete a thesis or final project. MagCloud offers a great option for publishing these works, whether you are writing a text-heavy dissertation or putting together a more visual project culminating a study in design or photography.

For text-based works, the MagCloud Standard product can be used for printing and binding up to 384 letter-sized pages, with printing in full color to accommodate both text and any corresponding images and graphics, and a perfect binding that gives your publication a professional look and feel. At the same time, you can make your publication available in a digital format, for viewing as a PDF download.

For students completing projects in an area of art or design, our Square and 8.5” x 5.5” Digest products are both great options for showing off graphic works that are anywhere from 2 to 384 pages long. With a single PDF upload, you’ll be able to create a high quality printed piece that does justice to the work you’ve put into your project, and also have the option for a digital version that can be viewed on any computer or mobile device.

Example Publications:
Photography Series
MFA Thesis
High School Senior Project
BFA Thesis Process Documentation
Graduate Thesis Process Book

Portfolios

For students studying architecture or design, as well as those with a more literary or journalistic focus, having a portfolio of work is of great importance, particularly looking beyond the school year. Whether you’re interviewing for an internship, applying to schools, or looking for a job, having a strong portfolio of your past work will likely be an important factor in achieving your goal. As we’ve discussed before, using MagCloud to publish your portfolio offers a number of convenient options, both during school and beyond.

While you are in school, you can easily update your portfolio on the MagCloud site as you complete new work, simply by uploading a new PDF to your MagCloud account. You’ll also have the option to keep your portfolio private, so only you can see it, or make it public for others to browse on the MagCloud website. When it comes time to apply for the position or program you want, you can order as few or as many print copies of your portfolio as you need, or even direct mail copies to a list of addresses. You can also offer a digital version of your portfolio and direct people to the URL for your publication in the MagCloud storefront, where they can download it as a PDF.

Example Publications:

Yearbook/Photography Student Portfolios
Architecture Design Portfolio
Interior Design Portfolio
Fashion Design Portfolio
Architecture Portfolio for Graduate School Admissions

Resource for Student Groups

During the school year, MagCloud is a great resource for students outside the classroom. At all levels of education, students active in clubs, sports and other extracurricular activities can use MagCloud for printing flyers, newsletters, and even full-length magazines. For example, when a club or sport is looking to attract new members or publicize an event, the MagCloud Flyer and Pamphlet products can be a great way to get the word out and offer additional information, without requiring a large volume of prints.

For groups that are more established, particularly at the college level, MagCloud’s Standard, Square and Digest product types offer a great opportunity for creating newsletters to stay in touch with both current members and alumni alike. Groups can take advantage of MagCloud’s direct mailing service for recipients who prefer receiving something in print, and simultaneously offer the same publication in digital formats for downloading as a PDF.

A number of middle school, high school and college-aged students have already used MagCloud to publish student-run magazines on topics ranging from art and literature to fashion and lifestyle. Regardless of the topic, MagCloud lowers the barrier to entry for creating these types of magazines, with no upfront costs and no minimum print runs. Students can offer their publication through the MagCloud storefront for customers around the world to purchase and read in both print on demand and digital versions. Printed copies can also be ordered for local distribution as they are needed instead of all at once as a large bulk order, cutting down on the cost of storage and potential waste.

Example Publications:
BYU Editing Students’ Travel Magazine

UF Asian American Students’ Magazine
Emerson College Lifestyle Magazine
AIGA Colorado Design Magazine
Journalism Students’ Fashion Magazine
High School Literary and Art Journal

Are you a student who has used MagCloud, either in or outside the classroom? Let us know in the comments below!

MagCloud Goes to the Head of the Class

MagCloud has been a friend of teachers, trainers and curriculum designers for some time.

Offering an easy way to bring lesson plans to life and engage students, MagCloud is being used as an educational tool both in and out of the classroom.

 

 

 

 

Curriculum Resource Planning and Teacher’s Aids

A number of educators and researchers are using MagCloud to share curriculum ideas and best practices. Whether using our Standard product to create a best practices magazine or simply a short curriculum synopsis with our Pamphlet product, MagCloud makes it easy for teachers to collaborate on current curriculum initiatives.

Example Publications:

Class Projects

Self-publishing provides students with a creative way to showcase their understanding of a topic, their personal perspectives and their own artistic work.  Publications like Bulldog Press and FIT have allowed high school and college students to express themselves and demonstrate their evolving skills.

Example Publications:

Workbooks, Study Guides, Training Materials and More

Teachers, instructors and trainers have used MagCloud to print field guides, camp workbooks, how-to guides, study-guides, training manuals, and educational workbooks to complement a variety of educational needs. In some cases these are printed ahead of time for use during a workshop or class, while other times they are simply made available online for attendees to purchase as supplementary or stand-alone training materials or as samples for other teachers.

Example Publications:

The Lorax Storytelling Tool

MagCloud has also developed a Storybook tool for creating custom books using templates, characters and backgrounds from the movie The Lorax. Used in conjunction with Scholastic’s custom Lorax curriculum, students can write a story that describes one creative new idea for how they, their family, or their community could live more sustainably.

Share in the comments section how you’ve used MagCloud for your teaching needs or read about some additional ideas from Jim Vanides, a member of the HP Office of Global Social Innovation.