Dave Hultin, Author at Marketing, content, & technology to help printers sell more printing

Direct Mail, Marketing Ideas For Printers, Course Corrections Keep Direct Mail Pointing the Right Direction

When you’re on your next airplane trip, think about this: Over 90% of the flight is spent making in-flight course corrections. Those course corrections are what helps to ensure that when we leave Fargo on a flight bound for Chicago, we’ll actually end up in Chicago and not some corn field in Nebraska! Just like a flight, design benefits from mid-course corrections too. To continue with the flight analogy, the ground crew spent a lot of time last year redesigning all direct mail packages from Marketing Ideas For Printers. The packages were all cleared for takeoff and are now “in the air.” That means there have recently been more opportunities for mid-course design corrections. After all, we want to make sure your direct mail subscriptions are all pointing in the right direction. We want to see these direct mail pieces land properly with you so that you can connect with your prospects and customers! Survey Says The trigger for our most recent mid-course corrections was the direct mail customer satisfaction survey. Each and every month, we follow up the delivery of the latest direct mail content from Marketing Ideas For Printers with that survey. We want you to know that when you submit those customer satisfaction surveys, we listen!

Odyssey, MIS, Marketing Ideas For Printers, Odyssey Print MIS Customers Get Unfair Attention

I’ve been “going public” with a lot of the questions we get from prospects checking out Odyssey, our new Print MIS. Some of the questions can be presented almost verbatim. Other questions are more “question behind the question” type questions, like today’s question: How can I get started with Odyssey without being overwhelmed? Here’s the simple answer to the question behind the question: By intentionally limiting Odyssey’s growth, we’ll be in a position to give an unfair amount of attention to the printers that use Odyssey day-to-day. Limiting Growth for Maximum Impact New software is exciting! But we get it; being on the front end of something brand new (like Odyssey) can be somewhat scary if you feel like you need to go it alone. But you’re not alone! One of the very best ways we can remove your fear of the unknown is by ensuring you get all the attention you need when you need it most. With Odyssey, by intentionally limiting the number of customers that we accept in the early days, we’ll be in a position to give Odyssey’s customers an unfair amount of attention. We’ll able to move very quickly to address the items that are the most essential to the success of customers using Odyssey. Our Core

Odyssey, MIS, Marketing Ideas For Printers, NO-DATA-CUSTODY-BATTLES-HERE

Recently, I published a blog post to make the case that Odyssey and Marketing Ideas For Printers are built for the long haul. You’d expect to hear nothing less, right? But what if you’re not using Odyssey for the long haul? Smart businesspeople make decisions influenced not only by the adoption of new software, but also by the departure options provided by that software. That’s why a question like this comes up sometimes: I like what I see in Odyssey. What if I get started now, but in a few years decide I want to move on? How do I get my data? Let me first start by saying we have no intention of running some “data extortion ring” here. We’re not going to hold your data hostage; that’s just not who we are. It’s your data, and we’re honored you entrust us with it! If, for some unknown reason, you find it necessary to part ways in the future, it’s still your data, and you’re entitled to it. Export Your Data That’s why you’ll see plenty of export buttons in Odyssey. As long as you’re a subscriber, you’ll always have the opportunity to export data from Odyssey’s reports. How About a Different Format? In a perfect world, software

Odyssey, MIS, Marketing Ideas For Printers, How Do I Know You're Print MIS Will Be Around

For those discovering Odyssey (our new Print MIS) and learning about Marketing Ideas For Printers for the very first time, it’s not surprising to have questions like this: How do I know Marketing Ideas For Printers will be around for the long haul? How can I be assured that Odyssey will be viable in the future if I choose Odyssey as my Print MIS? Those are good questions, and not too difficult to answer. It Starts with Our History The answer actually starts in the late 1980s with the birth of Ink Inc., which at that time was the name of the company that started the direct mail service provided by Marketing Ideas For Printers. Just click the history link at the bottom of any page on our Direct Mail For Printers website and you’ll see the story of how Ink Inc. began. Over time, we’ve added Websites For Printers (2001), Social Media Marketing For Printers (2009), and Email Marketing For Printers (2009) to the services offered by Marketing Ideas For Printers. Each service was quickly embraced by both new and existing customers, and each service quickly achieved sustained profitability. Each service has stood the test of time, and each service has adapted to continue to be relevant.

Odyssey, MIS, Marketing Ideas For Printers, How Much Does Odyssey Cost?

If you’re a “just give me the facts, please” type of person, the price for Odyssey is as follows: a recurring monthly subscription fee of $499 (USD), plus a $2,999 (USD) one-time setup fee to get started. Currently, Odyssey requires a website (with the Ecommerce Suite) from Marketing Ideas For Printers. That means you’ll have not only a forward-thinking Print MIS under your fingertips but also a world-class website! (Later, Odyssey will be available for use on any website.) Odyssey’s Pricing and Benefits So, I know what you’re probably thinking. “How does Odyssey help me sell more printing and pay for itself?” Or, there’s this one, “Switching to a new MIS is a huge headache. What’s so different about Odyssey that I’ll know it’s really worth it?” Finally, “I’m thinking about it, but why hurry?” Well, let me answer those questions for you with three of the benefits I believe will be the most impactful for you: Question #1: How does Odyssey help me sell more printing and pay for itself? By eliminating double-entry and creating a more efficient hand-off from your customers to your team. Just think of all the time it takes your team to copy the information from an online order and paste it into

What happens when you pour water into a cup? It takes the shape of a cup. Into a fishbowl? It takes the form of the fishbowl. You see the pattern here; water always takes the shape of the container it’s poured into. The water responds to the container; the water is responsive. It’s the same thing with website content: Website content takes the shape of the device displaying the content. Perhaps you’ve heard the phrase responsive website: The website content responds to the device that’s displaying the content, and that is what makes a website responsive. That’s why certain websites (like the one you’re viewing now) look great whether viewed on a desktop computer, a tablet, or a mobile device. Give it a try. Pull up this blog post on all your devices, and you’ll see the content beautifully displayed in a manner that fits the device being used. The Mobile Tipping Point There’s no shortage of studies showing the widespread adoption of mobile devices. As a planet, we crossed the tipping point in October 2016. (See Mobile and tablet internet usage exceeds desktop for first time worldwide.) We’ve not yet reached that level of penetration in the United States, but we will soon!

Odyssey, MIS, Marketing Ideas For Printers, The Personal Touch is Gone. Now What?

Gone are the days when you could count on a friendly smile with your purchase. Sure, you can still get that warm smile, but these days we head to the self-checkout line and intentionally choose to skip the opportunity for that friendly smile altogether. That’s a topic I explored in a recent article published on LinkedIn entitled, Connecting People to Process. (If we’re not already connected on LinkedIn, please take this opportunity to connect with me while you’re there reading the article. Thanks!) Who’s In Control? You don’t have a self-checkout line in your print shop, but your print-buying customers probably feel like most Walmart shoppers. They don’t always want a personal touch anymore! They want control – the control to regulate their buying pace, the control to access and change their order whenever they want, and the control to not wait for you. The Easiest Process Wins If your customers are exercising their control and choosing to skip the personal touch, that means they’re going online to order printing. Today, over 70% of buying decisions are made before a conversation with a real live human even occurs. 70%!!! And all signs point to that number going even higher in the future. Let’s go back to the

Mowing your yard or planning a vacation: that’s the kind of project you can accomplish on your own. Sometimes, though, a project is bigger than one person. A recent LinkedIn article, Growing More Than I Realized!, talked about the importance of teamwork in super-size projects. Here’s the key takeaway from that article: When your vision is grand, you have to let go and trust the team around you to carry out your vision. Trusting your team is an important part of the equation, but it’s not the only part. ENCOURAGE YOUR TEAM Just expecting your team to perform isn’t enough. You have to provide the environment, the guidance, and the inspiration for your team to make their own choice to join you on the journey. The world is filled with leadership techniques about that very topic. Leaders have poured days, weeks, and months into developing complex ecosystems around their teams. There’s a place for that, but there’s also a place for the simple day-to-day activities. Here’s a simple activity I do to help inspire the team around me. I take a few moments to scribble out a sincere hand-written note of encouragement to someone on my team. That’s it! That one simple activity can provide a big boost

Color is your world. It’s part of what you do every day. You know how color emphasizes your perception of the products it appears on, and so do your customers. Or maybe they don’t. That’s why it’s a good idea to remind your customers that they can Win Customers With Colorful Packaging. That’s the topic (and the name of!) the newest Print Tip added to the Ideas Collection of every website provided by Marketing Ideas For Printers. Here are the three tips your customers will see when they visit the Win Customers With Colorful Packaging tip on your website: Ask yourself which one color gets your message across. Always plan a family of products and marketing assets in advance. Always do a color-accurate printed proof. The tip finishes with this mandate: Always consider how things will look and how they will make your customers feel. By keeping these vital color rules in mind, you can create packaging, brochures and other assets that make your brand attractive to consumers and easily recognized. Here’s how Win Customers With Colorful Packaging is presented on one of our public demo websites. With content like this, you will always be the expert your customers turn to when they’re ready to print their

Meet Sal. When it comes to search engine expertise, she’s one of the most influential people I know! Sal has an “insider’s view” to exactly how search engines work, and I’ve had the opportunity to work with her firsthand for several years now. Sal has a knack for knowing exactly what makes a website appealing from a search engine’s perspective from the moment she first visits a website. Today, I’ll share some of Sal’s top suggestions on what you can do to keep your website in tip-top shape for search engines. Act Like a Human Sal is quick to point out that websites are, first and foremost, used by people. Because websites are used by people, search engines give preference to websites that are written to focus on a human audience. Contrast that with the earlier days of the internet. Search engines were very functional in their approach to the websites they visited, and search engines gave preference to websites that functioned well. Functionality is still important, of course; all of your links need to work, and your pages need to load without errors. But search engines are much smarter now. Search engines prefer websites that are not only friendly to web

« Previous Page — Next Page »