Quick Printing

This morning another printer asked me the question, “How can social networks such as Facebook and Twitter help my business?” That’s a good question because without a plan or focus, the printer may only be adding to the noise and clutter on the Internet. Social media tools need to be part of a complete selling program or they will just waste printers’ (and their customers’) time.

Facebook and Twitter are great tools to keep your face in front of the customer and develop a dialog about what the customer’s printing needs are and how you can fulfill them. Printers can use social media to promote their expertise and become a source for print information in their local cyber-community. With this viral marketing, you can solidify your relationship with current customers who will spread the word about your company. The payoff on social media is when prospects become interested in your service.

Social media fails most printers because they just do it and hope for results. Getting out your message via social media can be like putting your shop at a busy intersection and hoping customers will just drop in so you can try to sell them something. Just because you are there doesn’t mean people will come in and buy. You have to be proactive and be out in front of your customers, asking for the order. You have to have a purpose for your use of Facebook and Twitter. It has to compliment the other sales activities you do. That purpose should be to either get the customer to contact you or to let the customer know who you are when you make the sales call.

To get started, I recommend that you use Facebook and Twitter to drive customers to your website and your blog. You should have an interactive website that has information to make print buying and ordering easier. You should have a blog that has information to help your customers and explain the benefits of printing. You should also be trying to capture information about your site’s visitors so you can begin a dialog with them. You want to give the impression to the customer that you are the printer from whom they should be buying.

Combining social media with direct mail, outgoing telephone sales calls, and face-to-face sales opportunities will increase the sales activities that will generate new sales. Even in printing, selling is a numbers game, and the more times you touch a customer and ask for the sale, the more successful you will become.

If you are printer, you need to invest in a smartphone. A smartphone is a cell phone with an Internet browser and a camera. What it does is open a new service opportunity for printers called mobile marketing.

Mobile marketing links the print world with the Internet. By scanning a QR code that is on a printed piece, a smartphone user can be instantly directed to an Internet page on their smartphone’s browser. Mobile marketing is big in Europe and the Far East and it is just hitting the US. Printers should see any company that sells a product and has a website asking about including a QR code on their printed marketing material.

Haven’t heard about QR codes? A recent episode of CSI New York featured a QR code as a clue in an investigation. The National Basketball Association used a QR code for a promotion during half time at this year’s All-Star game. HBO ran a special QR code in a television ad during the final episode of Lost. QR codes are quickly going mainstream in North America.

If you are a printer, buy a smartphone and make sure you have a QR code reader application downloaded. You need the application to read the QR code. Then you will need to learn how to create QR codes for your customer. It is a simple process that is explained through hundreds of YouTube videos online.

What is exciting is that mobile marketing will drive printing as more customers try to drive eyes to their websites. The QR code uses are unlimited and can make printed material even more powerful when linked to the Internet.

Now printers will ready need to get a functional website to promote mobile marketing.

Hopefully, you have seen some of our announcements and press releases about our new book, “No More Rotten Eggs – A Dozen Steps to Grade AA Talent Management,” just published by McGraw-Hill and available in book stores everywhere and online.
We have been asked why we would suggest a book on hiring now when, in fact, many companies are still in the downsizing mode. Well, the fact of the matter is that this is the right time to hire. Not to add staff, but rather to upgrade staff. Given all the discussion of a structural change in the industry, it is only logical that business owners recognize the need to restructure to cope with these structural changes. And when they restructure, they need to be sure that their current staff will fit their new vision. There may be better people out there and now is the time to get them. If you wait until the recovery is underway then you will be competing again for the top performers and you could lose.
So don’t wait – start now. And if you want to know how to do it right, buy our book!

So simple it is deceptive, so basic we don’t do it, yet it has increased sales in shop after shop. The old Army bromide said, “Things that get done are what the Commander looks at.” That’s true with your total sales as well.
Sales go up when the team measures where they are in relation to the goal today; not tomorrow nor at the end of the month – but today, while we still have a chance to do something about it.
And it doesn’t do any good to just know total sales; total sales have to be related to the budget and goal.
But if you are like most shops, you simply measure your progress by comparing this month’s total with this month last year or last month. That’s a waste, for things have changed. You could have reduced staff or overhead or, conversely, added staff and overhead since last year.
So, all progress must be measured against a budget that provides positive cash flow on today’s costs: forget about last year. We’ll tell you more about how we can mess up setting a monthly sales budget next month – so be sure to look for us.
Now we assume we have a monthly budget. That’s the B in your morning PBG. Now, let’s set a goal. Huh? Thought the budget was the goal? No, the budget is not the goal – meet the budget in most places and you get to keep your job for another month. Big deal.
Your job is to beat your budget decisively, and we define that as being 20%. So, if your budget is $100k for the month, your goal is $120k. When you and your team bring sales of $105k in; well, adequate job, but not great job. Don’t expect anyone to get excited for doing what you are supposed to do.
However, pop a $135k on a goal of $120k (and thus a $100k budget), then you are going to make some serious money and that’s calls for a “Great job. Attaboy!”
Anyway, the Goal is the G in your PBG report. Now you need to calculate the P, or Projection. How do you do it? Basically, divide sales through last night by the number of days you have been open this month, and multiply by the number of days you are going to be open. Running out of space here, but if you want full specifics of a daily PBG click on over to: http://www.crouser.com/twitter/pbg.pdf.

Bob Hall
Executive Editor, Quick Printing magazine

I just got back from the Sir Speedy/PIP Printing convention in St. Louis. Other than it being hotter than the hinges of Hades, it was a fun time. Once again I was confronted by a few folks wanting my opinion on the future of offset printing. They quoted such stalwart gurus as Frank Romano in predicting that offset was on the long downhill slide into irrelevance. I replied “Balderdash” or words to that effect.

Sure, digital printing is where the growth is and digital printing will wind up with more and more of the “marks on paper” work we do. However, at the same time that digital is capturing a larger percentage of the information communications market, that market is getting is getting larger. Some of that new information will stay in electronic form but there will still be a robust and growing appetite for printed stuff — whether digital or offset.

Bottom line is that offset — while accounting for a smaller percentage of overall information communications — will continue to account for a big bunch of dollars for the foreseeable future.

Remember, as long as you take in work in digital form, your customers will see you as a digital printer whether you output on an iGen3 or hang CTP plates on a Ryobi or Heidelberg press.