Digital Printing Hot Spot

Written by:
Howard Fenton
Senior Technology Consultant
NAPL

If you study how innovative new technologies are added to high end equipment such as digital presses, you would find that it typically occurs in top down strategy. In other words, it starts at the high end of the product line. such as in the iGen family, and over time trickles down to other devices.

In 2008, I was called to Rochester, NY to see a new product. After signing a pile of NDA (non-disclosure agreement) forms, Quincy Allen, the former President of the production Systems Group Xerox, met me and walked me to the iGen beta machine.

For the first time, I was introduced to a host of new technologies designed to automate the time consuming color matching and process control steps required to ensure high-quality color. The new technologies in the iGen4 included:

• Auto Density Control. It uses a full-width array of sensors to automatically detect and eliminate density variations and streaks.
• New Carrier Dispensing System. Which combines dry ink and carrier
• High Definition Linearization. This process eliminates time consuming grey-scale calibration and produces better neutral greys and highlight shadows.
• Advanced Color Profiling. This innovation enables greater color consistency and realism in familiar objects such as faces and skies.

It was projected that these technologies would help users become 25 percent to 35 percent more productive than the iGen3. I have heard reports that this was conservative and that productivity was increased by as much as 50%.

If you have not heard of it yet, you will hear about Xerox Confident Color soon. It’s a way to improve color matching on a variety of devices. If you’re not sure how much blood, sweat and tears is involved in getting color to match today, you should ask your staff. It could be more than you expect!

Howard Fenton is a Senior Technology Consultant at NAPL. Howie advises commercial printers, in-plants, and manufacturers on workflow management, operations, digital services, and customer research. He is a paid contributor to this blog.

Written by Joel Basa
eMarketing Manager
Xerox Corporation

Howie detailed the importance of Performance Based Metrics in a December Blog Post. I was intrigued by his outline of the 4 “STEPs” to determine productivity of your shop. If you recall, the four components  were: Staff, Training, Equipment and Procedures. What are your thoughts on the importance of these 4 components? A few small thoughts.

Staff: I’ve seen a great amount of discussion on LinkedIn on the importance of an experienced operator. This is an invaluable resource and is often overlooked by many shops. I personally think this is the most important aspect of a productive print operations.

Training: This is very much tied to staff but understanding the capabilities of digital printing technology requires training. I’ve had discussions with operators that were not recently trained and some “not aware” of the full capabilities of their technologies. It resulted in some missed gains in productivity.

Equipment: This is without question the most discussed aspect of a productive print operation. However, the discussion needs to move past “speeds and feeds.” Does your digital press have features to help automate and make your press more productive? Our latest installment of YouTube Technically Speaking videos talks about these kinds of features (Full Width Array).

Procedures: Print Production = Manufacturing. If you buy into that statement then the procedures (on the press and off the press) are critical to creating a productive environment. Have you analyzed these processes? I’ve seen many print shops pay attention to every detail to maximize productivity from order to fulfillment.

I’m wondering how you would rank each of these “STEPs” of productivity. Comment with your rankings and let the debate begin!

Written by:
Howard Fenton
Senior Technology Consultant
NAPL

The first reason cited in 4 Digital Marketing Predictions For 2012 is that Content marketing (i.e. Blogging) plus Social Media is the key to success. Author Craig Kilgore says that “in 2012, more and more digital marketing agencies and in-house marketers will see the power of great content and what social media can do to help it spread. Blogging is hot again and here are 10 reasons why.

1- SEO: everyone wants to get to the first page on the Google search engine and focuses on search engine optimization. In addition to the key words, meta tags and links on your web pages, the Google rankings are also determined by backlinks for your blogs. In fact, some SEO experts say it’s more affected by the backlinks than keywords.

2- Thought leader: Researching and writing thought provoking blogs well makes you appear like an expert or thought leader. A good example is Seth Godin, who is considered as someone who writes edgy marketing stories.

3- Fast: Since blogs are short—usually around 3 paragraphs—they are more likely to be read by people who don’t have time to read books, articles or newspapers – who are your customers!

4- Show me the money: While you will not get rich, Google AdSense can sell ads on your blog. Daniel Sconce wrote some interesting tips about monetizing his blogs.

5- Voice: As a former editor of a magazine, I can tell you that there is high value to good columnists in magazines or newspapers. They drive traffic and maintain followers.

6- Social media: One of the theories of social media marketing is to push people down a sales funnel. It can start with a Tweet or a posting on Facebook that links to a blog, which can then lead to a website that has the sales pitch.

7- Target markets: As opposed to traditional marketing theory that says identify your target market, blogs are messages that customers consume to proclaim they are your target market.

8- Competitive advantage: It does not matter what you sell, blogs can create a unique competitive advantage to drive people to your website and motivate them to listen to you. The most popular blogs such as HufffingtonPost, TMZ, Mashable and Engadget create huge momentum.

9- Interactive feedback: Blogs are great tools to test ideas and motivate conversations with customers. Chris Anderson, the author of the Long Tail, says that the ideas in the book were honed in blogs.

10- What’s coming: Blogs can be used to announce plans or product announcements. They can generate feedback and help hone the offering or create interest and buzz. Sometimes a fast and easy way to post is to simply post a picture with a short description or 3 minute video.

How are you using blogs to drive traffic and increase your SEO?

Howard Fenton is a Senior Technology Consultant at NAPL. Howie advises commercial printers, in-plants, and manufacturers on workflow management, operations, digital services, and customer research. He is a paid contributor to this blog.

Written by:
Howard Fenton
Senior Technology Consultant
NAPL

According to a story from BizReport.com, 2012 will be the year that companies with strong brands start taking social media seriously. The most important tools listed were Facebook, SEO (search engine optimization) keyword changes, email marketing and social media marketing.

Experian Hitwise reports that Facebook was the top-searched term in 2011. According to Experian Hitwise, Facebook was on the most popular search terms because four of the top ten searches conducted by US users in 2011 were related to Facebook.  “Facebook” accounted for 3.10 percent of all searches made in 2011 for the third straight year, with an increase of 46 percent year-on-year.

Keyword searches for specific words grew in importance over keyword searches for website names. According to author Kristina Knight, “Hitwise reports an 11% growth of single-word searches in 2011 as terms like ‘face’ and ‘you’ made the top 50 searches.” Marketers need to understand the hit rates in keyword searches and update the keywords in meta tags to reflect these changes.

While Facebook continues to dominate, the up and coming new social media sites are Tumblr and Pinterest . “According to Experian Hitwise, Pinterest is now one of the top 10 sites within Hitwise’s Social category, getting 11 million visits the week of December 17. Comparatively, the week ending June 18 received 40 times fewer hits,” writes Knight.

In addition to Facebook, Tumblr and Pinterest two services that are growing are email marketing and social media marketing. According to a recent StrongMail survey, there are four growth opportunities in 2012:

• 68% of respondents say they’ll work to integrate email and social media in the coming year
• 60% of respondents will raise email marketing budgets
• 54% will invest more in social media
• 37% will increase mobile and search budgets

The StrongMail survey conducted by Zoomerang from November 16 to November 29, 2011, found that of the types of email marketing campaigns small business marketers (SBM) are looking to invest in, 44 percent said they would increase batch promotional programs, 39 percent will increase newsletters and 35 percent will spend more on lifestyle programs.

The study also reported that the top goals for the SMBs were:

• 48 percent: increasing subscriber engagement
• 44 percent: increasing segmentation and targeting
• 32 percent: increasing email opt-ins (subscribers)

How are you going to take advantage of the Hot Digital Marketing Strategies for 2012?

Howard Fenton is a Senior Technology Consultant at NAPL. Howie advises commercial printers, in-plants, and manufacturers on workflow management, operations, digital services, and customer research. He is a paid contributor to this blog.

Written by Joel Basa
eMarketing Manager
Xerox Corporation

I’m still amazed by the amount of engineering behind the printing process. It still seems like magic to me but to an engineer it’s not magic but instead a carefully calculated and designed series of subsystems to make a piece of paper accurately and consistently run its course and result in a printed piece.  Sensor positioning, air knifes, corrugating plates, vacuums…a few components that are part of the “magic” of printing.

We’d like to introduce a series of videos that we’ll be releasing the next few months called, “Technically Speaking.” The videos will cover a variety of topics with a more technical angle. The first video talks about the iGen4 Paper Path.  Scott and Mike take a more technical look at how paper is fed into this digital production press. Please let us know your thoughts.

What aspect of the printing process is the most “magical” to you?

Written by Joel Basa
eMarketing Manager
Xerox Corporation

Goodbye 2011 and hello 2012!!! 365 days goes by so fast! Since Christina just reviewed many of the things that happened on the Digital Printing Hot Spot Blog in 2011, I started thinking about 2012 and started to formulate my “Wish List” for 2012. My wishes tend to fall in one of 3 categories: Our Industry, Social Media, and Outside of Work. I’d like to share one wish from each of those categories with you.

Wish for Our Industry

I wish for consumers/businesses to realize print is far from dead. In the past few years, we’ve heard more and more about, “print is dead.” However, I think we should really say print is evolving. E-Presentment is going to rise but there are other areas of print that are aggressively growing: photo, digital packaging, etc.

Wish for Social Media

One wish I have for 2012 is for me to be more active on Twitter.  Twitter is such a powerful tool and way to communicate but right now I use it more as a way to consume information…not to share information. I hope I can share more info and join more conversations in 2012.

Wish Outside of Work

I’m an avid boxing fan. The one thing I’d like to see happen in 2012 is for a fight between Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather. Right now, both sides have been guilty of not wanting this fight to happen but I hope they have this fight in 2012…or at least commit to fighting in early 2013.

I have many more wishes…another one being I wish that you, the reader, will share your wishes with the rest of us! I’d like to know, what are your wishes from your industry, social media and outside of work? Please share your wishes in 2012 by commenting below!

Another year has passed, and while most of us are looking forward into the new year, I would like to take a moment to reflect back on 2011, more specifically at our Digital Printing Hotspot Blog.

2011 was filled with talk of industry trends, success stories, and tips to help your business grow, become more productive, save money, and satisfy your customers’ needs. Some of the most talked about themes, as displayed by this year’s tag cloud above were media, print, services, and social. Posts also frequently focused on customers, management, measurement, and technology within the print industry.

A special thank you to all of you fans for reading, commenting, and sharing our posts! It’s you who make our blog so successful. Just for you we’re bringing back some of last year’s top blog posts:

1.  Graph Expo Highlight: Xerox CiPress® 500 Production Inkjet System. What does it mean to you
Written by Joel Basa, e-Marketing Manager at Xerox Corporation

2.  Seven Common QR Code Mistakes
Written by Howard Fenton, Senior Technology Consultant at NAPL

3.  Left Brain or Right Brain? The Science and Art of Developing Direct Mail Campaigns
Written by Joel Basa, e-Marketing Manager at Xerox Corporation

4.  A Trip Back in Time… At the Xerox Historical Archives
Written by Joel Basa, e-Marketing Manager at Xerox Corporation

5.  Are We Clear? FreeFlow VIPPPro Publisher and Clear Dry Ink
Written by David Kirk, Manager, Xerox FreeFlow VI Suite Development

Enjoy! We hope you like what we have planned for the upcoming year!

Written by:
Howard Fenton
Senior Technology Consultant
NAPL

As the end of the year approaches, a common question we are asked is how should we plan for next year? Should we offer new services with greater value that have a high cost of entry or focus on improving our workflow that will save us a little money but will not cost much to implement? Unfortunately these are the wrong questions based on inaccurate assumptions. Let’s start with the assumptions. One assumption is that building a new service will require a large capital investment and will pay off big. The other assumption is that cutting costs will not cost much and result in small but steady savings. Both assumptions are wrong and neither focuses on the most important thing which is minimizing risks and maximizing rewards.

Different people have different opinions about risks and rewards. Psychologists measure this using games such as the ring toss game to measure a person’s risk-reward threshold. Called the Atkinson’s Risk Taking Model of Achievement Motivation, it evaluates how far away you are willing to stand when tossing rings with higher points earned for farther successful tosses. The further away the attempt the greater the risk but higher the possible score, the closer the target the less the risk but the lower the reward. I like this game when coaching management teams because it lets everyone see each others attitudes about risks and rewards.

The problem with the assumptions described above is that they are fundamentally flawed. Offering a new service does not always mean large investments and does not always result in big payoffs. A good example is large format printing which does not cost a lot but may take years to build a large enough customer base. In addition, offering a new service can be accomplished by partnering with another company who specializes in that work and minimizes the risk until enough demand is generated.

This is not a new idea. Printing companies have been outsourcing specialized finishing such as foil stamping as well as fulfillment for years. But the real question is how you partner today with companies offering the new value-added digital services. The days of investing in mailing and fulfillment services have passed for most companies who are now focusing on adding cross channel communication or marketing services. As a result, we are seeing companies willing to outsource portions of this new digital production including their web-to-print services, as well as their database and data analytics for cross channel and marketing services.

Also, investing in cost-cutting production strategies is not always free and does not only result in small savings. Cost cutting by working to improve your procedures may be free, but increasing productivity and reducing costs through automation requires investments in hardware and software. As a result, investing in new MIS systems or new finishing equipment could cost a lot but could also result in big payoffs.

But again the real question is how you minimize risks and maximize rewards. You could focus on procedures and processes which is free or you could identify investments with a fast ROI or return on investment. For example, what if a $15K investment in workflow software allowed you to reduce production staff or what if a $12K investment in a web-to-print solution allowed you to break into markets you could never sell to.

If you’re planning for next year and considering either increasing your productivity or bringing a new product to market, it’s not an either/or game. With a good team you could do either or both. But start with the correct assumptions. Either or both can be low or high cost and either or both can return low or high rewards. The right way to approach this is to analyze the risks and the rewards and then create a plan that minimizes risks and maximizes rewards.

What are your plans for next year? Are you cost-cutting or building new services?

Howard Fenton is a Senior Technology Consultant at NAPL. Howie advises commercial printers, in-plants, and manufacturers on workflow management, operations, digital services, and customer research. He is a paid contributor to this blog.

Written by Joel Basa
eMarketing Manager
Xerox Corporation

Coal or Presents? Look at your social media efforts for 2011. Now, what do you think you and your company will receive from the man from the North Pole based on these efforts? After many interactions with individuals in the print industry, I’ve learned there are many experienced social media practitioners but also many “rookies.” I decided to ask our Xerox Social Media Program manager, Diego Pereda, what are some basic do’s and don’ts for any social media practitioner. Here’s what he said.

Expect coal if you…

Use automatic content/feeds to populate your SM Channel
Automation in our industry is often a positive thing but Social Media its not. It requires a personal touch. A unique voice needs to be established and automation of content robs the “personality” out of a channel. Think Personalization.

Improperly Identify Yourself
Be it on a channel you own or a 3^rd party, proper identification is required. In fact the FCC requires you properly identify yourself.

One way “shout” or pushing content (lack of content that invites engagement)
Social Media…the keyword in this phrase is the first word: SOCIAL. Pushing content is critical but engaging in conversation is where the true power of social media is harnessed.

Expect presents and gifts if you…

Have Real conversations (we talk like real people, remember)
Use conversational language and have a conversation via your channel(s) similar to the way you would in a casual in-person dialogue. Don’t be too formal.

Listen, listen, listen (not only via a tool but also to conversations happening on platform)
My mom always told me to listen before I talk. The same principle applies to Social Media channels. If you haven’t started engaging in conversation via social media, it is recommended to first listen to the types of conversations occurring in your area of interest…and then speak.

Focus on relationship and engagement not campaigns
Build relationships and interactions via your channels. Be social. “In Your Face” marketing and focusing on campaigns for Social Media decreases the legitimacy of the channel.

What are some other do’s and don’ts for social media in the print industry?  Do you have any examples of social media efforts worthy of coal?  Worthy of presents?

Written by:
Howard Fenton
Senior Technology Consultant
NAPL

Did you read the press release announcing that nearly 75% of printers agreed that “Graphic communications providers will go out of business if they offer only print and distribution.” Xerox partnered with GMC Analytics to survey the Xerox Premier Partners Global Network and 718 printers responded. The Xerox Premier Partners is an international network of companies offering digital services, with 730 members in 48 countries on six continents.

Consistent with the four prior surveys, direct mail was the top cited application for generating new revenue (39 percent). Other applications (apps) ranked as follows:

• book publishing—23 percent,
• packaging—16 percent, and
• photo specialty products and TransPromo—13 percent each.

Graphic communication customers are especially interested in full-color variable data printing (increased interest reported by 75 percent), followed by web-to-print services (59 percent) and marketing consulting (47 percent).

According to the On-Demand Expo e-newsletter (May 2011), variable data printing is mainly used for direct mail marketing, customer relationship management, advertising, invoicing and applying addressing on self mailers, brochures or postcard campaigns. This means that our research on the growth in VDP is consistent with the growth seen in direct mail.

In the NAPL 2011 State of the Industry (SOI) research, variable data printing (VDP) was the top answer and its importance has been increasing. Compared to the 2006 SOI we find two interesting changes in the rankings. In our research, VDP remains the most valued service, while web-to-print services has evolved into second place.

While direct mail and VDP remain great sales opportunities that can also improve profitability, it’s important to recognize that there are still lingering concerns about the industry. In the Xerox research, sixty-nine percent believed the impact of the recession is making investments in other services difficult.

 Specifically the respondents site the greatest challenges to business success as:

• differentiating the business—67 percent,
• establishing new services—65 percent,
• meeting demand without sacrificing quality—59 percent, and
• current economic climate—45 percent.

What is your experience? Is your growth tied to certain apps and digital services or something else?

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Howard Fenton is a Senior Technology Consultant at NAPL. Howie advises commercial printers, in-plants, and manufacturers on workflow management, operations, digital services, and customer research. He is a paid contributor to this blog.