Go Print When a Presentation Matters Most

Given the restrictions of 2020 thanks to COVID, the term "slidedeck" has probably entered everyone's vocabulary far more than they care to know.

With nearly everyone spending at least three hours a day online in digital meetings, digital slide presentations have become commonplace. However, that doesn't mean going digital is the best choice for those decision-making events.

 

The Tangibility of Print

The standard for a powerful presentation has been and continues to be the professionally printed presentation package.

Why? In a word - tangibility.

People are tactile creatures, especially when making big decisions that have significant ramifications. Print presentations finished in high-quality stock and graphics meet that innate drive to have something physical in hand before making a big commitment.

 

3 Reasons Digital Falls Short on Presentations

Going digital with your presentation with a digital slidedeck doesn't have the same effect on people as print. Here are three reasons digital falls short in this way.

1. Digital Overload

Most audiences are now suffering from digital overload.

You don't have to go far to hear the constant complaining about having to chew through 50 to 300 emails a day, thanks to an over-reliance on digital communication.

What kind of attention are your presentation attendees going to have left to click open and read through another digital presentation, no matter how well done? 

 

2. Easily Manipulated Digital Content

Digital files can be easily manipulated, especially if they are going through multiple hands to get to the presentation party.

Many assume that by converting a slidedeck to a PDF format, the file will be protected and its integrity kept the same. This is a false hope. Without a fully encrypted form protection, the file can be tampered with. And when a presentation matters, the sender should make sure the content isn't tampered with from the version sent to the version being presented.

 

3. The One-and-Done Digital Dilemma

What happens when a digital presentation is complete?

Does the recipient in a meeting save the digital slidedeck for future reference? It's unlikely.

Most people just hit the delete button, hoping someone else has a copy if they actually need it again down the line, or hope that it was saved in their email folder. The likelihood of someone reopening a digital slidedeck to read its content completely is highly unlikely given the digital blur most people are under today.

 

Capture Attention with Print Presentations

A print presentation on high-quality stock makes a huge difference in all of these situations.

People have something tangible to read and hold that isn't a computer screen. In fact, a professionally finished presentation in print is probably unique and an immediate stand-out in 2021.

And, the presentation can't be faked, fudged, or tampered with without ruining the package in total. The same can't be said for a digital file.

Finally, people do actually look at print material repeatedly after seeing it for the first time. If the document isn't discarded right away, most folks will reread the package before deciding whether to file it, scan it, or recycle it. And that means your message sink in even deeper. 

When a presentation matters, deliver it in print!

To contact Chuck Gherman, Theresa Kauser or Veronica Carter for more information about how Printing Arts Press powered by PROforma can help organizations with their Marketing and Human Resource needs through promotion and print communications please visit www.printingartspress.com.


#Print #Directmail #Marketing #Mail #Banners #Publications #Postcards #PromotionalMerchandise #BrandedApparel #Catalogs #HRmanuals

 

Gain Undying Loyalty by Building a Company Customers Love

 

Every person has go-to brands for the things they buy – from their car and their phone to their coffee, cosmetics, or slippers.

And behind every brand is a company people know and love. When you want to attract people to your brand, it starts with building the personality of your business. Successful companies give people hope or a vision: their brands represent a cultivation of we could be.

Whether this is honest and pure or fun and funky, the brands we champion are an expression of our better selves.

 

Unique in a Sea of Monotony

Lululemon is a global sportswear powerhouse with a meteoric rise to success.

Founded in 2000, the company bounded into a crowded market and built a niche as a “lifestyle” fitness brand, offering clothes that perform excellently in the gym while looking great outside of it.

Lululemon knows that, beyond upgrading their health and hygiene habits, maturing women are ready to spend more on their wardrobes. And brand evangelists (the ‘Luluheads’) rave about clothes that flatter the figure, add color and sass, and hold their shape after 1,000 washes. Lulu’s target customer is a 32-year-old woman who has “figured it out” after graduating from the unhealthy lifestyle choices of her twenties, and Lulu inspires women to connect with their best selves using taglines like “Be You with Lulu” and “Slimming Silhouettes is Lululemon.”

While Lululemon’s outrageously priced clothes seem like an impossible sell, they are anything but. Instead, they make women feel proud to show up at the gym and allow sweaty moms to look cool at the grocery store. And that psychology works.

After all, it’s not men women are trying to impress – it’s other women.

 

Designing Your Customer Experience

Moving beyond strong marketing, customer experience is where the rubber meets the road.

Clients that adore your services should feel that doing business with you is like coming home. Here are three ways to make that happen.

 

1. Craft Excellent First Encounters

If you want to develop a strong bond with clients, a great first experience is key.

Consumer Reports surveys show that nearly 91 percent of customers will not return if a company botches the initial encounter, and two-thirds of people will walk out of a store when they feel the service is subpar.

While those statistics sound scary, the opposite is also true: top-notch companies are highly successful in customer care. Recent data shows that 81 percent of companies with excellent service records are outperforming their competition.

 

2. Offer Self Help Options

While five-star personal service seems like the gold standard in sales, that may be changing. Today 40 percent of consumers say they prefer “no-frills” self-service over tangible human contact, so smart companies should add simple DIY options.

How? Educational content such as newsletters, tutorial videos, or “how-to” tip sheets might be a good option for some. Perhaps live chat support, FAQ pages, or express product lines will bring convenience your clients appreciate. Web-based service portals may allow you to personally interact with customers while offering the flexibility and privacy they desire.

 

3. Prioritize Quality Over Speed

When you DO have personal contact with clients, slowing down can be the best approach.

According to Gallup’s research, the service is defined as “courteous, willing, and helpful.” (In contrast, customers who received “speedy” service were just six times more likely to be engaged.)

 

Making Brand Admiration a Reality

When people love a company, they’ll go out of their way to recommend it to friends.

They take pride in its products, purchase more frequently, and give it a second chance when mistakes occur. By building a business that customers love, your reputation will thrive, and your sales will too.

 

To contact Chuck Gherman, Theresa Kauser or Veronica Carter for more information about how Printing Arts Press powered by PROforma can help organizations with their Marketing and Human Resource needs through promotion and print communications please visit www.printingartspress.com.


#Print #Directmail #Marketing #Mail #Banners #Publications #Postcards #PromotionalMerchandise #BrandedApparel #Catalogs #HRmanuals

6 Winning Direct Mail Campaigns

 

Direct mail offers results that other channels just can't match.

According to a recent study, direct mail has a response rate as high as 9%. However, there are always ways to engage your audience better and improve your mailers' effectiveness. These methods below catch your recipents' attention and increase the chances that they'll read and respond to your direct mail piece. 

 

6 Winning Direct Mail Campaigns

1. Instill Curiosity with a Quiz

Do you worry your direct mail envelopes are going in the trash unread?

Take a page from Harvard Medical School's playbook. In a recent mailing to woo subscribers for their Harvard Heart Letter newsletter, they put a heart health quiz on the front. The answers to the three-question quiz were inside the mailer, giving recipients a reason to open.

 

2. Benefits, Not Features

As marketers, it's so easy to get caught up in promoting all the neat features of your product.

Your readers, however, don't care about that. They care about how your product can be of benefit to them.

HelloFresh hit the mark with a February 2020 mailer that highlighted three big benefits to ordering their kits. At a glance, readers could see that the service could save them time, save them money, and offer more variety.

 

3. Leverage Testimonials

Research shows that a recommendation, whether from a friend or a stranger, has a lot of sway on reader opinions.

In fact, 70% of people will trust a recommendation even when it comes from someone who they don't know. 

Florida Gulf Coast University used the power of testimonials by putting recommendations from past students right on their mailing postcard. Having names, faces, and a glowing recommendation from current students helped convince potential attendees that the school is a good choice. 

 

4. Use the Magic Word

No, not "please." The powerful word that gets your mailer a second look instead of a quick trip to the recycle bin is "free." 

A March 2020 mailer from Estee Lauder catches attention with bright coloration and a prominent offer for a free gift when people visit their counter inside Macy's. Offering a gift is a way to get people inside your brick-and-mortar location, where there is an increased chance that they'll take the opportunity to buy.

 

5. Catch the Eye with Familiar Forms and Images

When Nestle was promoting their Kit Kat Chunky bar in the UK, they used a familiar image -- a Royal Mail card about an undeliverable package.

However, instead of the normal reasons for failure to deliver, recipients learn that the free chocolate bar Nestle intended to send them was "too chunky" to fit through their mail slot. The mailer served as a coupon to get a free bar to try from the store.

 

6. Invite Recipients to Interact with Your Mail Piece

To raise awareness for World Water Day in Belgium, the organization demonstrated the importance of water in an innovative way.

They sent a postcard that could only be read after the reader held it under running water. This tactile trick increased engagement and also got the group a viral bump on social media.

No matter what your business, it's possible to catch readers' eyes and attention with your direct mail pieces. Think about how to evoke your recipient's curiosity, which can lead to engagement and conversion.

 

To contact Chuck Gherman, Theresa Kauser or Veronica Carter for more information about how Printing Arts Press powered by PROforma can help organizations with their Marketing and Human Resource needs through promotion and print communications please visit www.printingartspress.com.


#Print #Directmail #Marketing #Mail #Banners #Publications #Postcards #PromotionalMerchandise #BrandedApparel #Catalogs #HRmanuals

Volume Control: Striking the Right Balance in Your Customer Communication

 

“Trust is earned in drops but lost by the bucketful.”

(Security and privacy expert Fatemeh Khatibloo, Forester Research)

Do you want to be a consumer-first marketer?

You need to earn people’s trust – and to keep it. When you do this well, it creates a series of encouraging relationships that translate to profits and sustainability. But violations of trust can sabotage your business.

When it comes to marketing, brands tend to believe more is better. If customers have started a relationship with you, it seems obvious that more texts, print ads, or emails will entice them to spend more. But no one wants to be known as a target. Over-marketing puts your company at risk because it expends your goodwill.

Marketing begins by establishing a relationship between brands and consumers. But over-marketing kills that relationship. The Social Break-up study provided clear evidence of this phenomenon. Did you know:

• 91% of consumers have unsubscribed from permission-based marketing emails
• 81% of consumers have either “unliked” or removed a company’s posts from their Facebook news feeds
• 63% of followers have “unliked” a company on Facebook due to excessive posting
• 54% of customers said they unsubscribed from a list when a brand’s emails came too frequently

When you overcommunicate to customers, eventually, you’ll find you must put out greater effort only to receive less dynamic results. Before you hammer people with content you must calculate the long-term cost of the messages you send.

 

Allow Customers to Manage the Cadance and the Channel

Are you over-marketing?

There is a fine line between “just enough” and “too much,” and your customers may vary on what they appreciate. To find the right balance, you may want to allow clients to control the content flow of your marketing spigot.

Preference centers are customer-controlled portals that invite users to select the types of messages they would like to receive and the preferred times. A tech publication, for example, might provide options for newsletters about business tech, consumer tech, product reviews, and new gear launches. Papa John’s pizza divides its preference center into sections centered around food preferences, delivery options, payment types, and marketing preferences.

Empathetic brands work to delineate preferences across three dimensions: communications channel, content type, and desired frequency. Some people may prefer weekly text messages, while others request a monthly print newsletter.

 

Here are three ways to hone preference strategies for each dimension:

Ask your customers

Streamline systems that directly allow clients to share the style, frequency, and mode of communication they prefer.

Follow your brand from an outsider’s perspective

Want a crash course in communication optics? Opt-in to your own promotions and put yourself in a prospect’s shoes to observe where authentic and helpful morphs into overselling and chaos.

 

Streamline your processes

If you have multiple sectors in your business posting emails, Tweets, and ads, things quickly become chaotic. Set some boundaries or place one person in an oversight position to avoid over-promoting.

 

Treat permission to market as a gift

While most people have favorite brands they’d love to see more of, for most companies the best approach is “less is more.”

And messages tailored to a client’s specific needs or pain points are certainly more relevant and welcome than generic mass marketing. Treat permission to market as a gift, and allow people to have a say in when and how they would receive from you – no strings attached.

Respectful empathy positions marketers to act less like piranhas and more like friends.

 

To contact Chuck Gherman, Theresa Kauser or Veronica Carter for more information about how Printing Arts Press powered by PROforma can help organizations with their Marketing and Human Resource needs through promotion and print communications please visit www.printingartspress.com.


#Print #Directmail #Marketing #Mail #Banners #Publications #Postcards #PromotionalMerchandise #BrandedApparel #Catalogs #HRmanuals

Printing Arts Press powered by PROforma wins 3 Print Excellence Awards

 

Printing Arts Press powered by PROforma is proud to announce Awards won from the Printing Industry affiliate Graphic Media Alliance Print Excellence Awards for Calendars, Digital Books and Magazines: 1 Gold, 1 Silver and 1 Bronze.

Graphic Media Alliance President, Jim Cunningham, stated how impressed the judges were with our members’ incredible and creative work in such a difficult year due to the pandemic. “If there is one thing to take away from 2020, it is that our industry is more essential than ever. Printing helps keep commerce going, keeps products on shelves, keeps important safety communications alive and election ballots secure (CISA.gov/News). During the Pandemic Print Label sales were up 30% with Print Packaging sales up 64%.” Printers and print packagers have been specifically included as essential workers in the updated Guidance on the Essential Critical Infrastructure Workforce by the United States Department of Homeland Security's Cyber Security and Infrastructure Agency ( CISA.gov ) released on April 17, 2020.

All of the Gold Award Winners in the Regional Competition are entered in an Association competition for the Best of Category and Best of Show prizes that will be awarded in September at the 2021 Grand Ceremony Sponsored by Millcraft Papers. The Millcraft Paper Company is committed to the support of sustainable forest management and thereby adheres to both the Forest Stewardship Council® ( FSC.org ) and the Sustainable Forestry Initiative® ( Forests.org ) Chain-of-Custody Standards in providing responsibly sourced paper products.

Each year, the Graphic Media Alliance holds its Print Excellence Awards Competition to reward Ohio, Michigan and Northern Kentucky printers that demonstrate excellence in 35 categories. Judges this year were longtime Premier Print Award Judges, Ken Eberhart (Merrick Printing, Louisville, KY) and Jeff Ekstein, Willow Printing Group, Ontario, Canada. Ken and Jeff are experienced judges and printers whose combined expertise spans more than 75 years in print.

 

About Printing Arts Press powered by PROforma — For over 75 years with more than 85 Print Awards from creative design to print marketing to print publishing to mailing services  to promotional merchandise we’re able to meet our Central Ohio clients’ needs with easy online ordering while delivering fast results and generating cost savings. Founding Stockholders include Dr. Warren G. Harding (nephew of President Warren G. Harding) of the current OSU Harding Hospital, and John Vogt of the current Norfolk Southern Railway. For more company history or general information please visit our website at PrintingArtsPress.com and at LinkedIn . For more information please contact Chuck Gherman, General Manager and President at Printing Arts Press powered by PROforma and 2019 Chairman of the Board of Graphic Media Alliance (previously PIANKO).

About Graphic Media Alliance — Graphic Media Alliance is an affiliate partner with over 20 Printing Industry Associations across the country.  Graphic Media Alliance serves almost 300 commercial printing companies and suppliers to the industry in its service area of Ohio, Northern Kentucky and Michigan. For complete information on Graphic Media Alliance, please visit GraphicMedia.org .

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