How do printers find or attract customers? Usually they have a sales force that “knocks on doors” using prospects from local directories, referrals and cold calls. For many small and medium-sized printing businesses, the telephone advertising directory, or Yellow Pages directory, is a key vehicle for self promotion. Smaller printers often wait for customers to come through the door. They rely on local advertising, word-of-mouth and prominent locations with higher visibility signage.
Printers either actively seek out customers or promote in some manner and wait for them to call or visit.
Even those printers who are proactive in promotion find that calls come in regularly from people who are contacting the printer for pricing on potential jobs. How do these people find the printer? They find printers through publicly available print or electronic directories.
Some printers use direct mail to reach customers and potential customers. They buy local mailing lists or mailing lists compiled by list brokers by industry, market, or geography. Many have a brochure or other collateral material that they leave with or mail to interested parties.
Direct mail is important because it can demonstrate the quality and innovative approaches (coating, diecutting, embos-sing, foil stamping etc) that the printer offers. Unfortunately, most printers’ DM is mundane and uninspiring.
Thus calls from prospects can result from almost any of the signage, listings, mailings or other contacts made by the printer.
As we move into the future, the most important approach used to find printers will be search engines. These will replace the printed directories that are now in use and provide links to the printers’ website.
Social media can also play a role in client acquisition, retention and loyalty. It’s all about establishing credibility and engaging prospects. Meaningful interactions with your audience are an extremely effective way to accomplish that. Keep in mind that frequency and relevant content are keys to the success of any social media strategy.
Search engine optimisation is key. Increasingly, new leads will be generated via websites as search engines make content and index your site. If you haven’t done so already, build your site around a content management system. Many of these, such as WordPress, are free. Rather than have your website read like a capabilities brochure, consider structuring your site as a one-on-one conversation with your best client.
QR codes are weird printed barcodes that are read by smartphones and link to a designated website. They can be printed on ads, brochures, and signage.
The printer’s website is important for many reasons. It should be more than a picture of the building and a list of equipment. In the old days, prospects simply selected a potential printer from a list, based on geography in most cases. In the future, prospects will google “printer Sydney” and choose from a list and then click on selected items to review the website.
In this new world of electronic media, printers will have to use the internet to promote printing services.
Frank Romano is professor emeritus at the Rochester Institute of Technology
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