The Hidden Cost of DIY Report Design

"We'll just format it ourselves in Word. How hard can it be?"

I hear this all the time, especially from nonprofits and small research organisations watching every penny. And I get it – every pound should go towards the mission, right?

Here's what that thinking actually costs you:

Your £30k research study gets ignored because it looks homemade in a world of professional communications. The policy brief you spent six months developing gets filed away unread. Your annual report fails to secure the funding you desperately need.

Be honest – bad publication design doesn't save money. It wastes the money you've already spent.

Let me paint a picture you'll recognise: Brilliant researcher. Groundbreaking findings. Six months of work. Then someone spends a weekend wrestling with Word templates, resulting in awkward page breaks, inconsistent formatting, and charts that look like they're from 2003.

That report now competes with professionally designed publications from organisations with massive communications budgets. Who do you think gets read first?

That's exactly what happens when we treat design as an afterthought rather than an essential part of research communication. Your findings become inaccessible not because they're too complex, but because the presentation actively discourages engagement.

Professional report design makes complex research digestible by creating clear visual hierarchies, strategic information flow, and engaging formats that respect your reader's time and cognitive load.

Your research deserves to reach the widest possible audience. DIY design often ensures it reaches almost nobody.

Ready to give your research the professional presentation it deserves? Let's discuss how strategic design protects your investment.