The Print Marketing Renaissance

One topic we bring up from time to time, here, is the idea that print marketing is all about standing out from the pack. I know, it sounds ridiculous. But things have changed. The days of opening a mailbox to a flood of junk mail are over. Print marketing today is about risk. It’s about creativity, and it’s about trying something different. We’re not here to talk about junk mail, or sending out millions of generic postcards. It’s time to treat print as a non-traditional marketing source.

Business2Community has recently published an article showing 7 major events in marketing, and why they all point toward a return to the print medium. It’s a great article (which you may have seen on our Facebook page), but we’re going to go one step further. We’re going to give you a few ideas that may inspire you to take B2C’s list to heart.

Broad-Interest Publications are Leaving Print

Newsweek announced earlier this month that they would be ceasing all print publications. Dozens more general interest magazines are leaving print behind, and that means that a huge opportunity for marketers is opening up.

Does your business cater to a niche audience? Send out a brief magazine appealing to their interest. It doesn’t need to be a weekly, or even a quarterly, thing, but what could make you stand out from the crowd of catalogs better than this?

Changes in Consumer Usage Open the Door for Digital Integration

Digital integration is no longer an option for marketing – it’s a requirement. Today’s consumer demands more from marketing materials. More information, more detail, more interesting content, and more bells and whistles. For your next campaign, try including a print component that plays off of your digital efforts. Push consumers to your social media pages, or direct them to your other digital resources. Just don’t rely on QR codes to do the job for you. Innovate!

The Social Web is Crowded, Make Things Personal

Print has always been the most personal form of marketing communication. What do you think makes a better impression with a new client: A direct message on Twitter, or a hand-written ‘Thank You’ note?

Our print solutions can make all of these things possible, and print has not seen consumer interest like this in several years. Take advantage of the possibilities, and give us a call.

The Tray Way is the blog for Tray, experts in the printing, mailing, logistics and promotional products. You can learn more about our capabilities by visiting our website, as well as our Facebook and Twitter pages. For information about the company and its successes, visit www.trayinc.com

Learning From Mistakes

In today’s digital world, all eyes are on you, all the time. The critical eye of the consumer never closes, and the world of social media has created a place where even the smallest branding faux pas is a recipe for complete financial disaster. There are cases of poor taste, such as this May advertisement for Belvedere Vodka. Even worse, there are times when brands can be persecuted for things they have absolutely no control of, or involvement in.

What can you do when your brand is thrust into the spotlight of consumer criticism? Can either of those examples serve as a template for escaping a PR nightmare?

The Skittles Strategy

When details about the tragic Trayvon Martin shooting went public, Skittles and Arizona Iced Tea became unintentional icons of lost innocence. The brands were spoken of almost as often as the investigation itself. Consumers, invested in the horrific details of the killing, began to accuse both brands of profiting off of the tragedy and media exposure. Neither brand had anything to do with Martin’s death, but both were being ripped to shreds on social media for failing to respond.

 Image from Ad Week

What did they do?

Skittles and Arizona Iced Tea were forced to act, and responded with letters of condolence to Martin’s family. They said it would be the last word on the matter, and both brands stuck to their guns, refusing to give in to the public outcry.

What went wrong?

Consumers were convinced that both brands were pulling in record profits from the media hype, and demanded financial recompense. It was a bizarre and unfounded complaint, born from a collective desire for closure that court proceedings was not providing. Arizona and Skittles did their best to avoid further scrutiny by keeping silent, and they ended up being seen as uncaring and cold.

The Belvedere Vodka Strategy

In early March, Belvedere began a commendable social media effort, relying on a strategy of casual humor, and easily shared jokes, each one a clever ad for their product. Unfortunately, the casual attitude went too far, and an ad that never should have made it past editing wound up on their public-facing Facebook page.

Image from Huffington Post

What did they do?

The ad was a clear misstep, and the backlash was fast and fierce. Belvedere pulled the ad once the blogosphere had gotten wind of it, and issued a series of apologies. They attempted to save face with a donation to an anti-sexual violence non-profit, but the move was seen as a shady PR stunt, and the brand has still not fully recovered.

What went wrong?

By the time Belvedere had responded to the complaints, any response they made would have been too little, too late. Unfortunately, once that ad was made public, there was nothing they could really do to make up for the damage it caused. Even though Belvedere went one step further than Skittles and Arizona, they were still seen as a corporation saving face, instead of an apologetic brand. They owned their mistake, but it wasn’t enough.

So, what can you do differently?

Any brand of reasonable age and size is in danger of falling into an inescapable faux pas like those above. It’s an unfortunate – but unavoidable – aspect of business. The solution lies in relying on the expertise of a branding agency, and using all of the available tools you have to protect your investment. If the worst happens, you need to be able to rely on a team that is flexible enough, fast enough, and smart enough, to turn the situation around.

The Tray PML Way is the blog for Tray, experts in the printing, mailing, logistics and promotional products. You can learn more about our capabilities by visiting our website, as well as our Facebook and Twitter pages. For information about the company and its successes, visit www.traypml.com

The Tray Way: Cross-Channel Marketing - The Online Catalog

To complete our May blog series on cross-channel marketing, we wanted to close the month with a product we have been heralded for as of late: The Online Catalog

Whether it is for B2B or B2C purposes, the online catalog offers a number of benefits 

• Create a more automated system 
• Reduce inventory 
• Improve turnaround times
• Make your brand seem more "tech-savvy"
• And, when combined with a website, social media channels or even print marketing, develop a cross-channel marketing workflow that allows for greater reach.

At Tray, the creation, development and implementation of online catalogs has been a perfect supplement and evolution to the work we have been known for. Our work with DoubleTree by Hilton helped revolutionize their internal communications abilities. According to their press release:

Prior to 2011, when a DoubleTree property wanted to order customized printed collateral or branded on-property materials for their hotel, they were faced with many different procedures. They envisioned a comprehensive toolkit where all promotional materials could be ordered from one place including on-demand digital, offset, large format and specialty items

We are extremely proud of our work on that project, but that work is quite elaborate and involved a number of moving-parts and approvals. While it was literally award-winning, we understand that not all businesses have the time, energy, budget and desire to be praised nationally. They want something that is functional, appealing to the eye, easy to use and affordable. For this reason, one of our favorite case studies is our work with Gator Athletics. We worked on creating an online catalog that they could promote and share through all their channels. It aligns with all their branding and criteria, despite not having the revenues of a multinational hotel chain.

Are you considering creating or improving an online catalog for your business? What are the most important features you are looking?
 





The Tray PML Way is the blog for Tray, experts in the printing, mailing, logistics and promotional products. You can learn more about our capabilities by visiting our website, as well as our Facebook and Twitter pages. For information about the company and its successes, visit www.traypml.com

The Tray Way: Can Social Media Save the Post Offices?

Despite the recent news that online advertising spends will surpass print advertising spends in 2012, there is a bit of irony that arises in relationship to how the use of the internet could potentially help the postal mail community.

It has been made quite clear – even beyond the direct mail trade circles – that the inevitable closing of a number of postal branches is looming, with May 15th being the date circled on the calendar. If you have read some of our posts last week, you may have learned that there is an opportunity for some branches to be saved through public petitioning. As Ruth Y. Goldway, Chairman, Postal Regulatory Commission said in a press release last week:

“It has been thirty-five years since the Commission first adopted post office closure appeal rules. As the Postal Service has moved forward to reduce its retail network, and the Commission has received an increasing number of appeals of post office closings, it is important to simplify the process and to make it easier for the public to participate in and to understand our decision-making process. The new rules will allow postal customers to submit their petitions and supporting documentation in plain language. In addition, these changes will save the Commission money.”

Based on the Commission’s Order Adopting Final Rules Regarding Appeals of Postal Service Determinations to Close or Consolidate Post Offices, the process for starting an appeal is:

• A Postal Service decision to close or consolidate a post office may be appealed only by a person served by that office. An appeal is commenced by submitting a Petition for Review to the Postal Regulatory Commission. 
• The Petition for Review must state that the person(s) submitting it are served by the post office that the Postal Service has decided to close or consolidate. The petition should include the name(s) and address(es) of the person(s) filing it and the name or location of the post office to be closed or consolidated. A petitioner may include other information deemed pertinent.

The question becomes, “how can the public take advantage of the opportunity for their voice to be heard?” While there is some debate on what effect the petitioning process will have as it relates to the other criteria that will be used to make final determinations, whatever weight it does carry, it goes without saying that multiple petitions for one branch will be more favorably viewed than a single petition. 

So how can you encourage a locally-based group to become involved? Ironically, the best method could be through a campaign using a medium that is an indirect cause for why some of these closures are happening in the first place: Social Media. 

Many have blamed social media channels (as well as email and other person-to-person communication technologies) as the reason postal mail is diminishing. However, because social media has the capability to find and connect with like-minded individuals almost instantaneously, it may be the ideal way to gather petitions for this cause.

As experts in integrated marketing, if saving a local post office were our project, we would conduct some simple research through Facebook, create a Fan Page, fill it with both factual and persuasive content, promote the page and urge individuals in the branch’s territory to petition the commission. The page could have tabs that provides instructions and criteria, as well as best practices on how to word your explanation. Everything that a potential petitioner would need could be found in one place. 

Will a campaign like this work? It is unknown at this point because of the number of moving parts that still exist in this decision-making process. However, a group of voices can be a powerful thing, and if May 16th comes, and your post office still has its doors open and its employees are still working due to your efforts, you will know the answer.

The Tray PML Way is the blog for Tray, experts in the printing, mailing, logistics and promotional products. You can learn more about our capabilities by visiting our website, as well as our Facebook and Twitter pages.
information about the company and its successes, visit www.traypml.com

The Tray Way: What it Means to Create an Award-Winning Best Practice

It is hard for us to be disappointed with how our 2012 started.

Last week, the Print on Demand Initiative (PODi) announced that our organization won their Best Practices Award for digital printing, in the category of Marketing Resource Center for the DOT 2.0 project we did with DoubleTree by Hilton™.

We are extremely proud about the finished product, which was judged based on measured results, value proposition, functionality, scalability, relevance, creativity, and innovation. However, to get to the level of being a "Best Practice", it takes something extra, specifically a client / vendor collaboration that has a common goal of creating something that has the capability of being special.

The team of companies that worked on the "DOT 2.0" project had it in their mind to revolutionize a basic process for DoubleTree that many companies take for granted: Building a comprehensive, single-source, web-to-print toolkit for their international brand. In less than four months, the project team streamlined the collateral printing process of the entire company by creating a toolkit for each hotel property to utilize to develop their own specific promotional materials (e.g. door hangers, menus, key cards, conservation cards, stationery, vehicle signage, etc.). This process allows DoubleTree branding to stay uniform, but also allows for individual franchises to use unique add their unique information when necessary. Additionally, instead of two weeks for delivery, the printing and mailing takes closer to two days.

The goal, which we achieved, was for GMs and Directors of Sales to Directors of F&B and Front Desk Managers (or any hotel employee with the proper access) to order the items he or she needs – and any employee at all can reorder an item that was placed previously. This is especially important in an industry with a high employee turnover rate where the person who created a piece of custom collateral may no
longer be with the organization.

In all, to be recognized with an award for the development of a product that we worked hard on - and came out so successfully - is wonderful. However, beyond the outcome, it was the collaboration with the the client, and the fact that they were as pleased with the outcome as us that truly resonates, and in our mind, makes us a best practice.





The Tray PML Way is the blog for Tray, experts in the printing, mailing, logistics and promotional products. You can learn more about our capabilities by visiting our website, as well as our Facebook and Twitter pages.
information about the company and its successes, visit www.traypml.com