Several people who registered for the Ezine Design Q&A asked about printing out their ezine to create a print leave-behind. Here are my thoughts on this:

It is a VERY good thing to have a print newsletter to leave with people you meet or audience members. NOT just a business card or “all about me” brochure. You want to leave them with something memorable that they perceive as valuable.

In most cases, however, printing out your electronic newsletter is not a great idea. It is possible to design the ezine so that it includes page breaks, but you can do that only with the archived version on your website, not the version you email. This complicates things already.

Then you’ve got to staple the pages, and it still LOOKS like you just printed out your ezine on your home laserjet. This approach detracts from your professional image and can reduce people’s trust in you and your message.

In addition, the way we read newsletters online and offline are very different. So there may be some “disconnect” while reading a printed out ezine.