Brochures are sales pieces.
Focus on persuasion instead of information. Brochures offer more opportunity to make your case persuasively and support it credibly. Your brochure may outlive your current advertising campaign. That long shelf life means that your brochure can have a powerful cumulative effect on your corporate branding.

Your brochure text must help sweep your prospect toward a profitable sale by presenting information clearly and convincingly, using a strategically sound persuasive structure. 

Before starting to write, it’s important to understand how the brochure will be used, including where the brochure fits in your sales process, how it will be distributed, who will read it, and what action you want your reader to take next.  Knowing the desired outcome helps you to understand the content and structure for your brochure, whether for lead-generating or sales-closing.

Begin with your customer, not your product.
That is, it should make the person reading your brochure feel that his or her key problems are understood before moving on to discuss the solution.  Build rapport first, then sell.  Your customer will have pains that your products or services relieve.  These pain points need to be touched upon before they can be addressed persuasively. The most important thing about your product or service to your customer is how it relates to themselves. Therefore your brochure text must answer their questions and overcome their objections. Face up to common questions and objections in your brochure text.

Keep earning readership.
Each page should contain elements that attract, intrigue, persuade … then intrigue further.   Your brochure needs to be a real page-turner.  Entice, enchant, and occasionally surprise your reader. That’s the only way you earn the chance to sell to your reader.

Sell benefits, not features.
Brochures often exist to explain features, it’s actually best to sell those features through the benefits, citing case studies and real-life examples.

Maintain a consistent voice.
Don't write in a boring conservative style or write a product brochure like it’s an internal report. Your brochure is a key marketing piece, and it must be written to take full advantage of that hard-won one-on-one time with your potential customer.

Don't overwhelm your readers with technical jargon
Although the complete story must be told, technical information should be presented in technical form, as a table, chart, or diagram at the end of the sales persuasion.  You should never break the 'romancing' of the reader from flowing brochure text. Technical information may be most effective (and persuasive) placed in its own section, where it can be appreciated in depth by technically oriented customers and referred to as-needed by the rest.

Credibility through captions.
Credibility can be established  through tone and content, you can show that you are the expert by demonstrating expert answers in engaging language or with visual proof using photographs or charts. Research shows that captions are some of the most-read and remembered bits of copy, so use them and use them well.  Drive home in words the competitive points illustrated by the pictures.  Credibility can also be established through customer testimonials, case studies, excerpts, or independent test results. You need  to substantiate the idea that your brochure is not full of advertising bluff; it’s truthful, useful information.

Brochures should end with ACTION
Direct the customer’s next step. Don't end with a table of specifications, or a corporate summary. You need to know where the brochure fits in your sales cycle, and knowing the next step in that process.  Your desired outcome must be asked-for.  It sounds obvious, but if the next step is for your customer to call you , then your brochure should end by asking for the call.

Summary
Your brochure could be a powerful sales tool.  It could be a durable corporate asset, a persuasive structure, helping you make the most of your marketing investment.  And that’s what all your marketing communication should do. 

Practical steps
Before you start, get a realistic budget.  You need to look at least as good, if not better than your competitor, so gather together your main competitors’ brochures. This may help decide what you need to cover.

To maximise the potential of your brochure (if your budget allows) use :-

• a copyrighter to generate your persuasive text. 
• a graphic designer to put it together, add impact and style to it, (get him/her involved early in the project)
• a professional photographer to ensure crisp, high quality images.
• a reputable printing firm to give the brochure a quality feel.

It’s best to get decision makers involved at the early stages. Have a brainstorming session to thrash out your ideas. Write the basic content yourself but edit yourself aggressively before submitting to a copyrighter. If you can use half the words, do. Low-cost stock photos may reduce the photographers bill.

Use a fresh pair of eyes to proof the draft before going to print, meticulously check every detail.  Don't let anyone proof it who’s been involved! People tend to read what they think they’ve written.