News

In the same way that letterboxes were regularly bombarded with leaflets promoting special offers, so today in the high-tech era we now have our virtual letter boxes bombarded with spam or generic offers from websites we have accessed or used to make purchases in the past.

Variable data digital printing (sometimes referred to as vdp printing) first came to prominence through the likes of Readers’ Digest who used to post out hundreds of thousands, if not millions of prizes with recipients’ individual names printed on a ‘sample cheque’ to show them what you might be able to win. For the fact these kept appearing in people’s letterboxes year after year clearly indicates that variable data printing must work.

Variable data digital printing works!

However, are there any hardcore facts that back up the theory that people respond more favourably to marketing emails that have a ‘personal touch’. Try some of these figures for size:

• 75% of consumers respond more favourably when brands personalise messaging and special offers. (Aberdeen Group)
• 86% of consumers admit personalised marketing positively influences a buying decision. (Infosys)
• 80% of consumers appreciate it when vendors provide personalised suggestions. (DigitalCommerce360)

So, what exactly is variable data digital printing?

Variable data printing is a powerful weapon in any marketing arsenal where the objective is to increase business. For a fairly simple example of variable data printing, let’s say you sell wine online. You have built up an established database of local clients and from time to time you mail them with special offers in the form of a generic leaflet– everyone receives the same email, the same message, the same offers. While that may work to a degree, variable data printing enables you to email those same customers, but the promotional wines you offer them will be based on their purchase history or any additional feedback you have obtained through previous interactions.

Everybody wins! Now your clients only get emails that are tailored to already established needs and tastes, they become personal and a great advantage is it saves emailing a client with an offer that’s not going to be of any interest to them – after all, what’s the point of promoting a great red wine to someone who has only ever ordered white wine? Such an email simply tells the client you’re not remotely interested in them or what they like does more harm than if you hadn’t sent them an email at all!

Be as ceative as you like

Using images or photos can add even more impact to campaigns and is often referred to as variable data image printing. The photo at the top of this article is an example. Just supply us a photo and we can print tailored images to all your customer base. Customers are often amazed at variable data image printing resulting in even higher response rates. 

How does a good printer add value?

Here at the Entwistle Group we have a great marketing team who work closely with our design team. They help provide us with content to ‘print’ and they’re pretty good at what they do, as we depend on them to promote the Entwistle Group!

Where you are concerned, in a nutshell, all we require from you is a description of what you want and who you want it sent to. Oh, we also need the extra data – the list of recipients and all relevant information you have on them including purchase history – in today’s digital era most databases are now on Excel files which can be easily interpreted by software to extract and interpret relevant information. We would add that any client databases you provide us with are treated in the utmost confidence, are stored ultra-securely and no details would ever be shared with any other party. We do a considerable amount of variable data printing and we have an exceptional reputation as a trustworthy company which we would not risk damaging through unprofessional actions.

Once we have all the relevant information from you, we would then design a series of templates to be used for your promotional/advertising campaign for your approval, everything else including distribution can be left to the Entwistle Group, freeing you up to do business while we help you to increase it.

The more personal, the more effective

You would be surprised what useful information can be extracted from a database that can influence the look and timing of any distributed document or leaflet. An example would be a company looking to hold an annual exhibition or conference. Personal invitations sent out can make specific reference to product purchases or a particular element of the conference or exhibition that will be particularly relevant to the recipient and which will be more positively received than a simple notification of the event. Imagine how much more powerful a message will be if it acknowledges the recipient bought X number of items after last year’s exhibition and that you hope you will see them again this year, rather than just a message telling them the dates of this year’s event.

Advice is on hand

Not every business is aware of the existence or power of variable data digital printing, so if this is not something you know enough about to make an informed decision, why not get in contact with us and let is run through in greater detail just how effective a form of marketing this is, and how we can help you get a great ROI on a wisely allocated portion of your marketing budget.