Blog

Why procrastinate?

3 October 2021 Stuart Nimmo

We all know the facts, customers like being treated as privileged individuals, yet we scatter-gun generic marketing messages hoping they bite.

So why not be savvier?
Communication is best when it is one to one. Communication is best when it is direct and meaningful. So how come so many are just following the flock when being different makes you stand out.

We’ve recently done a select mailing for an event. Being able to have a catchy line which linked to the mailing aided us to get more time with recipients than an online campaign. You’ve heard us before but here’s a refresher on why direct mail is so good…

• A leader in response rates – yes how much physical mail do people get, therefore it attracts more time and attention with the recipient. Can you remember what you saw on whatever social media channel yesterday?

• Highly personalized, with digital print technology, we can add more personalisation than just names and locations, you can make it highly relevant to the individual in many different ways.

• Opened and read, with creative physical mail running alongside so many other channels, it is a refreshing experience for the receiver.

• Creative, lumpy mail creates a buzz, interest which stimulates more of the senses. Doing something which is out of the ordinary size or colour wise, also grabs attention.

• Tangible (physical) – it’s kinaesthetic one of the key learning methods, after all, marketing is teaching your audience about a product or service

• Versatile – seasonal, in shape, in format, in whatever manner you need it to be.

• Familiar everyone loves receiving a piece of creative engaging post.

• Simple to do – HAD-Print are a skilled practitioner with making your requirements fit within Royal Mail’s distribution channels – we take the hassle out of a mailing.

• Trust-building with too many scams being online, the real-world physical item adds kudos to your message about being taken seriously.

• Cost-effective, whether it is using bulk mail rates, specifying to fit within a certain mailing band, a lot can be achieved within the standard letter and up to 100gms

• Highly trackable – whether through delivery or engagement. There are many ways of tracking and monitoring engagement with direct mail. Clever use of short links, QR codes can make this monitorable in a compliant way.

• Highly targeted, we stated social can be a little scattergun in its approach. With careful use of datasets, and demographics targeting can be achieved to the relevant audience.

• A complement to digital marketing, it can link up, feed into and even be used as an engagement tool back. Exclusive offers belong in the club as they say, why not make Direct Mail part of the club USP?

• Data-driven – if you run a CRM, make sure you set triggers to fire crafted physical communications, or Direct Mail to trigger subsequent online progressive actions.

If you need case study material for any of these, have a chat with us. We have worked with some great clients over the years and also have brilliant case studies from peer colleagues around the globe!

Race to where?

1 August 2021 Stuart Nimmo

As things get going again, it seems that some of the basics of marketing are getting tossed aside for Arnold Schwarzenegger and his famous “Oozy nine-millimetre” approach. Or being politely put, the scattergun hitting as many as possible with as much low impact marketing collateral.

Everyone likes being treated as an individual, personable, being given time, the basic respect of being treated as a human. So why in the rush to get going again are so many making the mistake of misfiring the marketing gun?

Just some examples being:

• YouTube zoom video links via WhatsApp, so why would I give up my time, when you haven’t got to know me? Conversational basics would identify whether I am prime for your product or not.

• Email invitations, to an event which I haven’t yet justified whether it’s for me. A prime case of jumping the gun.

• Illicit harvesting of data through Linkedin profiles from prolific business networkers and bombarding inboxes with un-requested “I’m wonderful, I’m doing these seminars which you should attend”

In the examples above, understanding the customer journey is key. Hoping to speed up the process by jumping stages, actually sets these individuals back to a negative point on the journey before commencing under normal circumstances. Ultimate end-user perception of these products/services is key. The advent of digital media in the customer journey has increased the number of touchpoints in the conversion process from prospect to customer. The key is looking at the longevity of the touchpoint. Digital media is notoriously renowned for having a short lifespan, such as Facebook or LinkedIn people struggle to remember what they saw the previous day. Email marketing only works once the originator has gained trust from the recipient, especially as it is the original spoof electronic scam platform, we all remember Princes from Nigeria claiming they needed release money. So the perception of email marketing has an interesting positioning in the mix.

So how do you overcome it?

There’s the challenge, originality, creativity and timing are all at play in making an awesome campaign, which smartly tied elements come together, not to act as a barrage of content, but a carefully crafted progression of building trust.

Old school marketing talks about the marketing mix, a toolbox of touchpoints that enable the prospect to build trust through carefully crafted discovery. (Or omnichannel campaign) This relies on you knowing your customers and most significantly their traits and personality, or their customer persona.

In building an omnichannel campaign, progression is key. Understanding how prospects need to relate to your offering is at the heart of building progressively connected touchpoints on your customer journey.

So how does a mixture of touchpoints work?

Marketing is educating your customer about your product or service. Educators work on people learning on Visual Auditory Kinesthetic basis. You need to ensure that the mixture of touchpoints use all of the three learning receptors to ensure you capture every potential opportunity. So a solely digital platform-based campaign will only feed the visual and auditory receptors. Adding physical marketing like print helps you to enable another touchpoint feeding the Kinesthetic engagement with your prospects.

So utilising a printed piece with a sure-fired call for action to engage onto a digital platform can provide progression. This is getting so much smarter with the advent of clever digital back ends. Using managed short links allow you to build a profile of recipients through the use of Personalised URLs underneath QR codes, which is great for 1-1 print mailers. This can allow for the recording of future actions in the journey by utilising a CRM system to record engagements. A good CRM can be set to trigger further physical print engagement, which aids the customer journey towards a successful closure of a sale.

So back to the race, progression is building trust. The underlying principle of “know, like, trust” is at the heart of the customer journey. Somethings you can’t rush, it’s subject to the product or service, yes a low-value product will have a shorter journey, however, one with a higher entry point will need a bespoke approach.

The innovators are the ones doing some disruptive marketing coming out of the pandemic. Disruptive, innovative, different whatever you call it, is challenging the norm. With so much digital communications used during the pandemic, there is a desire to cut through the noise which a saturated digital environment has created. Physical is the key to innovating in this space. Being tactile, challenging and surprising, Royal Mail Marketreach showcases some of the most outstanding pieces and data around the responses, which when used carefully can outperform just digital alone.

In an age where everything evolves so quickly, it is fair to say no one individual is an all-around expert. They don’t exist. The ability to listen and absorb is essential, equally when dovetailing elements together to form a true progressive mixed fulfilling media delivery of your product or service.

Here at HAD-Print, we have acknowledged this from the start. The buzz words of collaboration which seem to be on the rise post-pandemic, were already within our principles well before. So we happily work with strategists, digital providers, fixed media advertising to seamlessly work together.

Print is a valuable tool in the marketing mix, the limits are your imagination.

Transformation…

25 July 2021 Stuart Nimmo

Easy to say but takes some planning and progression.

Some people say I am very demanding and my benchmark is high, or aspirational, but standing still and not aiming high does not get you anywhere. Even though we’ve reached a level that is now more comfortable than where we were 18 months ago, I am still keeping my eye on the ball, and looking to reach further.

One part of HAD-Print which has needed stretching is our bindery/print finishing capability. 2-3 years ago, we were most definitely at a point of hard graft over, working smarter. The last period has seen significant changes. The addition of a professional OPP laminator has added more scope to our final presentation of our jobs and projects.

One of the biggest changes has been the addition of a Duplo DC-445 creaser and inline F1 folder. To some, it might be a statement of really? Yes, the productivity gains have been exponentially significant. We’ve had creasing and folding machines previously, however, the inline nature of one action after another is a significant milestone jump. The fact we move seamlessly from one specification to another within minutes, from the heaviest cards through to lightweight leaflets. I know from when I started in the trade in the early 1990s this level of inline automation and handling the level of variances stocks would never have been dreamed of in this level of equipment.

Whilst this is a tangible investment, I will say a smart investment, as our capacity and ease of throughput, now meets some of our more demanding customers. Yes, we have found coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic, fewer people have planned their actions, thus we are working more reactionary than ever before.

I know we have only just touched the surface of the potential we can achieve with this bit of equipment, as fold combinations and ultimately 7 months in, we are still on the learning curve. We’ve discovered ways and means of finishing materials from sizes we never thought we do before, like A4 6-page brochures, even stretching up to 8-page brochures (however this is out of specification for the machine!)

Interestingly this piece of equipment has allowed us to springboard the rest of our print finishing capability. This is essential to us preparing the covers for our recently added Duplo DB290 Perfect binder.

The level of pride of what we now deliver is so much higher, I look back from where I started in the trade, and what we achieve here at HAD-Print is impressive for a print business of our position. The variety of products is more than the B1 Litho house I worked in 20 years ago, and significantly more than at the start of my career. As I write this, we are implementing and learning the quirks and best options around our entry-level digital die-cutting table. Again the accessibility of what we can do, which was the preserve of larger print houses now is easily accessible.

I don’t knock the humble beginnings. I remember one print broker being highly dismissive of us at the beginning of 2017, however I know I’m not chasing him for work, as I believe in working with people who are on equally interesting journeys of progression. Our offering has evolved, progressed and is now able to deliver exceptional results.

What’s your journey? Are you ready to engage your customers with some different? Why not start a conversation with us, and let us help you add something tactile to your customer’s engagement with you?