Printspiration Archives - Page 3 of 4 - Marketing, content, & technology to help printers sell more printing

If the toughest part of business is landing that new customer, the second toughest part is getting them to come back! The innovative Printer@Work email newsletter helps you sell more printing by generating that much-needed repeat business, with style! This time-tested feature has been a part of our websites for more than 12 years, with more than 300 publications produced. This subtle marketing tool is a win-win proposition: your customers get to enjoy the educational and entertaining content, and you get to stay front-and-center in their mind so that the next time they need to get started on a new printing project, you will naturally be their first choice. With a regular delivery schedule and consistently valuable content that your customers and prospects actually look forward to getting, the Printer@Work email newsletter helps you sell printing to your customers again and again. A Simple Idea with Powerful Results The idea is simple: each issue includes a thoughtful, uplifting message as a “message from the owner”. For example, a recent issue showed the Seven Wonders of the World through the eyes of a child: “to touch, to taste, to see, to hear, to run, to laugh, and to love!”, wrapping up with

Here’s a question that pops up every so often when a printer is checking out Websites For Printers: How big are the files customers can send using the Send a File tool? It’s become way too easy to take file transfers for granted. After all, it’s just like flipping a light switch: flip the switch, electricity flows, and the light turns on. It just works. Today, we’re going to elevate the Send a File tool beyond the “taken for granted” status. Today, we’ll give credit to the silent work done by the file transfer system and answer the “How big?” question. Drum roll: It’s not unusual to see file transfers well over 1.5 GB get from print buyer to printer without even a sneeze. Consider that a typical CMYK Photoshop file with a size of 4 x 6 inches at 300 pixels per inch is 8.24 MB. You could send over 180 digital photos like that in a file transfer of 1.5 GB. That’s a lot of data! For all practical purposes, there really aren’t any size limits, and that’s important in these days of mega-sized files. As a printer, you can take comfort in knowing that your customers’ files will

Every year, my wife and I talk about planting a tree. This has been going on now for the last 15 years, and, finally, I am happy to report that we have followed through and planted three trees this past Memorial Day weekend. The Best Time to Plant There is a Chinese proverb that says, “The best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago. The second best time is NOW.” Why did it take so long for us to do it? It’s not hard. In fact, it’s kind of fun to do. Plus, these days you can get immediate satisfaction by buying a tree that is already 3-5 years old. Trees are a lot like websites. Putting off planting a tree is a lot like putting off getting a website built or finally upgraded. Why do we do that when the benefits of completing this task are so obvious? Mature trees provide shade to decrease cooling costs for your home. They add beauty to your landscape and increase resale value. Trees make a great first impression on your home, and the same can be said about websites. Websites are the first image a potential customer has of your business. They allow

Every day at Marketing Ideas For Printers we have a daily check-in meeting. According to Patrick Lencioni, this meeting is one of the kinds of meetings found in healthy organizations. In his book The Advantage, Lencioni explains why these daily check-in meetings are so important and effective: It’s about the team getting into the habit of gathering once a day, for no more than ten minutes, to clear the air about anything administrative that would be helpful to know. Schedules. Events. Issue alerts. That kind of stuff. The most powerful impact of having teams meet every day is the quick resolution of minor issues that might otherwise fester and create unnecessary busywork for the team. We put a little twist on this daily check-in meeting by adding a simple twelve-dollar microphone and calling it our Microphone Meeting. The microphone helps emphasize who’s turn it is to talk, and makes sure everyone has the opportunity to be heard. To make sure the meeting moves efficiently, we follow these simple rules: Anyone can start the meeting by picking up the microphone. If you have the microphone, you have the floor. Once you’re done, pass the microphone to the person next to you (either direction). If you’d like another turn

How do you know if you’re a leader? Turn around and take a look. Is anyone following you? If so, then you’re a leader! Mark Twain’s quote puts it even more cleverly: He who thinks he leads, but has no followers, is only taking a walk. It’s so easy to let the term “leadership” become synonymous with owning a business or running a meeting. Sure, it can be both of those things, but that’s also so limiting. You are leading in ways you may have never even realized! You don’t have to look very far to see the sphere of your leadership influence. Are you leading your team at work with excellence? Good! How about your kids, are you leading them with high standards? Better yet! How about that near-miss when you ran the red light with your fist raised in the air, what kind of leadership example was that? It’s worth repeating: you may be leading in more ways than you realize! Please be encouraged, both on and off the job, to make sure that all of your leadership examples are positive ones! Remember, others are following you even when you think no one is paying attention! When were you a leader

Not too long ago, I became intrigued by a book mentioned by one of my favorite influencers, Michael Hyatt. The book Michael was referring to was Greg Mckeown’s Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less. Just inside the jacket cover was this profound statement: Essentialism isn’t about getting more done in less time. It’s about getting only the right things done. If life has you running around in five different directions at the same time right now, stop and let that sink in. The Layers of Life Personally, when reading this, I find myself thinking back to an earlier time in my life: no kids, no wife, and working at my “starter” job. Anything I wanted to do, I could do it! I had total freedom, and everything was within my reach! Then the layers of life started to show up: A beautiful wife, great kids, and a fulfilling career. One day you wake up and realize that there just isn’t enough time in the day to do everything you want. All of a sudden there’s a choice to make—either spread yourself too thin, or give something up. I believe that we all reach a point in our lives, perhaps without even realizing it, where the time that’s required to fulfill all of our desires and

Think back to a time before the Internet. (My kids always give me a puzzled look when I tell them that such a time actually existed!) Print buyers ordered printing face-to-face over a front counter or voice-to-voice over a phone. That still happens, but today’s print buyers order printing from your website, too! It’s easy to be friendly face-to-face, but are you being friendly online? Remember, you only get one chance to make a first impression. That’s why your online communication has to be clear, accurate, and friendly. Your online conversation, whether human or automated, is your digital dialog. Here are some tips to make your digital dialog as effective as possible. Say Goodbye to The Geek Your digital dialog shouldn’t be too geeky. Instead, it should be friendly … just like the face-to-face conversations you had before the Internet. Tips For Humans: Just because the conversation is happening online is enough to get some people talking geeky. Don’t. Imagine the conversation as if it was happening face-to-face, and then transfer that conversation into the digital dialog. Tips For Computers: This is where the geek-talk can really show up. Just because the message is automated doesn’t mean it can’t be warm and friendly. Use normal talk with real words. Put

There’s a lot of noise out there in the world of social media, and it can be downright difficult to stand out in the sea of noise! But, it’s not impossible. Here’s a tip that will help increase the odds of landing in your Facebook followers’ timelines with more frequency: Add some video! The next time you’re ready to add content to Facebook, make a video introduction. Here’s a basic step-by-step walkthrough of the process. Shoot a Good Video Introduction It all starts with a good video. Notice I said a good video, not a perfect video. It’s easy to get lost in the weeds and aim for perfect. Usually perfect is a good thing, but in this case good is acceptable because the purpose of the video is simply to lead the greatest number of visitors possible to the content you’re highlighting. It’s easier than ever to make a good video these days. Smart phones and any number of inexpensive digital devices are all up to the task. You won’t get perfect video, but you will get good video. Facebook loves video content, so it makes sense that if you can get the attention of Facebook, then Facebook will reciprocate and present your video (and the content it’s introducing) to more of your followers. Remember

Congratulations, you’ve started your new direct mail marketing campaign! You’ve faithfully sent out your newsletter for six months in a row. And…crickets. Nothing. You wonder…is it really even working? Self-doubt starts to kick in and you think: Is this campaign even worth it? Should I try to keep this campaign alive? The “Grass is Always Greener” Trap Each campaign you send needs to stand on its own merits, of course, but perhaps all your campaign really needs is a boost of, well … patience. It may be that you’re expecting results from your campaign way too soon. Unfortunately, wanting instant results can trap you in a “the grass is greener on the other side of the fence” mentality. Instant results are nice when you can get ’em, but when it comes to marketing let’s focus on the rule and not the exception. According to Jay Conrad Levinson, author of the hugely popular Guerilla Marketing series, the rule is that a marketing message must penetrate the mind of a prospect a total of nine times before that prospect becomes a customer. Here’s the second part of that rule: For every three times you expose your prospect to your marketing message – via ad, sign, monthly direct mail advertising, whatever – it

Have you ever had that feeling that things are “just a little too comfortable?” Your day is predictable. Your next move is on auto-pilot. All of a sudden, you’re in a rut. I found myself in one of those ruts with the way I used my computer, and that’s why I decided to replace my Windows computer with a Mac. This isn’t a “platform war” post on Macs vs. PCs, it’s simply a statement that my day was getting too comfortable and predictable using Windows. I needed to “think different” again and find new inspiration in what would otherwise be a predictable routine. Plus, I’m a Mac guy at heart, so I was looking forward to returning to the Mac! OK, maybe this post has just a hint of “platform war” in it! 🙂 Well, it worked! I broke up the routine on how I used my computer, and learned several new things along the way! Here’s one of my favorite discoveries: One of the biggest challenges was dropping down from two separate displays with Windows to just one on the Mac. (I purchased a 27-inch iMac. It has a beautiful large display, but it was still smaller than the combined

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