Make your documents stand out with these quick typographic tips

Want your documents to look more professional? Here’s a simple way to make your documents look more professional in under 5 minutes.

The secret lies in making the body text look great because, let’s face it, there’s more of that than there is headings or tables.

First, choose a good font (if you are allowed). I know some corporations insist on a standard font, and it’s likely to be a boring one like Arial or Times New Roman. If that’s what you have to use you can still make it look good.

Here are the 4 things you need to set:

1. Set the point size between 10 and 12. A given point size does not make every font the same size so you will have to use some judgement to get it right.
2. Set the line spacing between 1.2 and 1.4. The default single line spacing is too tight, and 1.5- or double-spacing is too loose.
3. Set the alignment to Left. Justified text messes with the spacing between words and makes text harder to read.
4. Adjust margins to get the line length right. Lines need to be approximately 65 characters long. That’s roughly 2½ alphabets. For A4 documents you will need margins that are bigger than the default 25mm (1 inch). You might need 35mm each side.

Try these 4 settings and your documents will look more polished and professional.