Top 7 Reasons to Automate Your Print Production Workflow

Over the past many years, businesses have been using automation as a means to increase productivity, reduce human dependency, and cut overheads. Slowly, print businesses have also started to leverage automation with the help of Web to Print solutions. In addition, there has been a significant increase in the adoption of automation by the print business after the Pandemic. Business owners are looking for ways to mitigate risks associated with the pandemic. They also want a solution that offers flexibility, adaptability, and a healthier bottom line. And automation is perfect for that. There are many reasons why print industries must introduce automation in their print workflow. Let us discuss them only one by one. But before that, let us see what print workflow automation is.

What is Print Workflow Automation?

The idea behind print workflow automation is that each printing process step can be digitally linked to other steps. This creates a chain of programmed events which keeps the job moving continuously forward. This chain event starts all the way from order intake and ends at the delivery of finished products. This generates a stream of data that monitors costs, tracks jobs, and yields insights to make the production of jobs more efficient. Web to Print software plays a major role in establishing automation in print production workflow.

Why You Need Print Workflow Automation

Increases Productivity and Profitability

To gain the advantages of automation, applying it in every business process is not necessary. Even a minute degree of automation can reap massive benefits in the form of boosted productivity and speed. Having said that, you must aim for broader adoption to gain competitive agility and improve productivity to a great extent. One can implement automation with the help of Web to Print solutions.

Minimizes Errors and Delays

Miscommunication is a known culprit when it comes to losing profits. Verbal and email communication are highly susceptible to misinterpretations and communication delays. However, by print workflow automation, you can eliminate all such miscommunications. In addition, you can ensure that no task is left and all deadlines are met with the help of automated messaging and job tracking.

Improves Turnaround Times

More automation means fewer variables in the estimation of production costs. This is the reason why print businesses employing print workflow automation can deliver job quotes more accurately and quickly. Faster job quote also means that the customer will approve it faster. All of this results in quicker turnaround time. This drives client delight. It also allows your print business to move on to other new projects.

Offers Financial Controls for More Accurate Accounting

Manual accounting is expensive, especially when it leaves a room for error given the amount of data entry, filing, archiving, and retrieving files. With print workflow automation, companies can go paperless with job accounting. This eases data retrieving and reduces possibilities of accounting errors.

Since this is a cleaner approach and also a virtually error-free process, you can retrieve invoices and approve it faster. This again empowers organizations to move to other projects.

Better Control of Corporate Branding

Even if the print job varies greatly, print workflow automation enables to establish a company’s brand consistency across various jobs. There are templates available that help in establishing a company’s brand through its specific brand images, unique layouts, colors. In addition, templates also streamline job creation and submission for customers.

Streamlines Production Processes

The most obvious benefit of print workflow automation is streamlining of the production process. This is a huge advantage as it is useful for high volume jobs. It is also useful for projects that need a large number of print variables. Automation boosts the speed of the workflow, leaving you with a more efficient workload. One can streamline production processes with the help of Web to Print software.

Easier to Avoid Bottlenecks

Elimination of human error is something that people find it tougher to address. However, automated workflow will surely make you address this. It is because it restructures your overall printing processes, causing reorganization of the workplace. Also, it is important to accept the fact that humans are a key source of production line issues. They are a major cause for creation of bottlenecks in the workflow.

These bottlenecks cause obstruction in the job volume. With print workflow automation, you can reduce these bottlenecks. You can eliminate needless touches and reduce labor expenses. You can also add more automation wherever it is required. So, in short, you must find a key point where you can implement automation for maximum improvement.

Conclusion

Printing market is booming and the demand for print is touching sky highs. In such times, only those print businesses will survive and grow who can meet those high demands. And for that, one needs to have automated print workflows. We have already written the advantages that you can have with print workflow automation. I hope this article helps you to understand the importance of having an automated print workflow.

Article Source: https://brushyourideas.wordpress.com/2022/08/22/top-7-reasons-to-automate-your-print-production-workflow/

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Importance of Promotional Products and Tips on How to Make Them More Engaging

Promotional products are one of the most effective advertising products that have still withstood the time. If you look around, you will find at least one product that is a promotional product. American business alone spends around $20 Billion each year on promotional products alone.

Promotional products are the products that are typically free items that have some company brand name, logo, message, and slogan on it. Most of the promotional products include pens, t-shirts, calendars, water bottles, bags, umbrellas, and so on. Anything that is used on a daily basis can be made into a promotional product item. There is no limitation to possibilities to your imagination to what things can be used as a promotional product.

Keep reading further to know the importance and tips on how to make your promotional products more engaging.

Importance of Promotional Products

It is important to know why promotional products are important for your business. It is because of the following reasons listed below:

• Low Cost Marketing Strategy:

There are many enterprises that only dream of advertising on a large scale to have better reach. Also, advertising in divergent media helps a lot to gain your brand more eyes. If you have the product design tool, then it becomes easy for you to build any kind of promotional product. These promotional products can help complete the marketing goals, with low cost promotional product campaigns. It is usually beneficial to startups that lack funding and money for their advertising campaigns.

Low costing marketing strategy, but helps you gain mass customers. Say, personalized coffee mugs help effectively to advertise about 57% of the people recall the advertiser for those mugs. Therefore, a simple product helps you gain a greater value for such a small investment. Also, it helps your customers to win simple giveaways.

• Enhances Brand Recognition:

Brand recognition helps the customer identify the company, its products, and its services. The logo is enough to spot your company. People can easily identify the KFC or McDonald’s logo. Promotional products help customers to remember your brand and also recognize it. Like if you have Web to Print solutions, then it becomes easy for you to print your company logo on different products. About 89% of the people can identify the brand of the product that they received in the past 2 years.

These promotional products remain in the customers’ cars, desks and wherever places for a longer duration of time. If they see your logo for the second time, they tend to recognize it better, because they have used your promotional product in the first place.

• Indirect Works as a Business Card:

Initially, what business cards used to do to your business in the old day, is what promotional products do these days. But it has better results than the business cards. Also, if you have Web to Print solutions, then it helps you design your own promotional products. Which helps your customers to recognize your brand real quick, because it is a daily use product.

You can also make this as a part of the social media campaign and promote via hashtags and scan it through QR codes, to direct more people to your business.

• Tips to Make Promotional Products More Engaging

Promotional products are more engaging to people, since it is cost effective, people love using these kinds of products. If you have a product design tool then, you can design your products and also save the amount.

• Have a Clear Objective in Mind:

Before you start giving your promotional products to your customers, you should be clear with the objective that you need to execute with these products. You should be clear whether you want to increase your brand awareness in the area, or get more people interested in your business, or you just want high value customers in a specific time frame.

You should be clear on how much money and effort you want to devote to such projects. Because designing personalized items that are of daily use have a niche market, costing you low but gaining you high refined customers.

• Target Popular Categories of Products:

After you have a clear objective in mind, you need to target the popular products that are of daily use to your customers. Like a t-shirt, drinkware, pens, bags, calendars, headwear, desk supplies and so much more. This involves a lot of research on what are the daily requirements for your customers. Promotional products should be such that it should add value to your customer’s life. Like if your target audience are teenagers or official employees then the requirements may differ from funky t-shirts to desk supplies.

• Choose Long Lasting Products:

You need to choose your products that last long and add value to your customers’ lives. You need to make your promotional products wearable like a watch or a fit bit. You need to make sure that it matches the environment for your customers. Like a calendar cannot be used after 12 months, or the shell life of a t-shirt or a mug is much smaller than that.

Just providing your customers with products does not make any value. The product should try to solve a problem. Like a water bottle is used to store water and can be used by employees as well as by your customers. Pens, USBs, wearables, and many other things last long and also help people as well.

Conclusion:

Promotional products have the capacity to drive you to a larger customer base. It is beneficial to your business, and it is a cost-effective way to instantly increase your brand awareness. If you want to expand your reach to your customers, promotional products help build an excellent bond with your customers, and also helps you with customer loyalty. It also helps you measure your progress, take feedback from your customers, and improve on it.

People will be motivated as long as they use your promotional product. Which helps your brand gain more eyes, and you might also gain a few leads resulting you more revenue, and ultimately the growth of your business.

Source: https://brushyourideas.wordpress.com/2022/07/15/importance-of-promotional-products-and-tips-on-how-to-make-them-more-engaging/

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5 Ways Your Customer Can Benefit From Web to Print Technology

Web to Print Technology is here to stay. It is what has revolutionized the printing industry and conquered the hearts of the customers. Customization helps increase the value of daily used products like t-shirts, mugs, calendars, book covers and so on.

Web to Print solutions helps manage the printing industry across the world. It allows today’s generation to order a product from the comfort of their homes through online platforms that generate a print ready file that you can print for them on your products.

Keep reading further to explore 5 different ways your customers can benefit from Web to Print Solutions.

• Custom Print Jobs of Different Quantities:

Web to Print solutions help your customers to place different orders at any point in time. No interaction is required between you and the customer. As a business owner, you can place your design decision with multiple orders. You can give options to your customers like, if they want a customized t-shirt, then you can make it available in major colors like navy blue, black and white. Mostly, these types of colored t-shirts are sold. The customer can design their t-shirt through your Shopify Product Designer tool. It also helps them visualize it in a better way, like not only in 2D, but also in 3D preview available.

• Secure Your Printing Environment:

This is a very sensitive industry, because designs get copied easily. But you also need to build your brand identity, so you need to be careful about unauthorized access.

Designer tools like a Shopify designer tool helps you to secure your customers data securely. It also helps protect your marketing strategies, reports and research data that needs to be protected from your competitors. You surely do not want your data as well as your customers data to reach the wrong hands. Web2print solutions provides a better way to secure this data and only showcase it to the authorized users itself.

• Make Your Customers In charge:

If you have Shopify product designer tools, then you need to have an in-house printing department. It helps you to integrate printing services to your company. It also helps reduce the total cost and cut down on overheads. Also, there is hardly any human resource required if you have a Web to print solution like a Shopify product designer tool.

A web to Print technology is way different from the conventional printing industry. It helps prioritize the printing process, and not the people that do the process. The printers can now execute the printing process and also deliver to the customer’s address safely. Making an in-house printing department customer become in charge of their designs as well as other activities.

• Strong Customer Relationship:

If you deliver the exact order. with quality, your customers are happy and satisfied. It helps you build a stone and a long-lasting relationship with your customers. You do not even have to waste your time and money in impressing them even further. They are already in charge of their work from designing products to pricing as well as quoting.

Your customers feel happy as they have the control over their design printing decision. Because they know their requirements, and they do not want it to get lost in the process.  It is a win-win situation for both you as well as for your customers.

• Saves Time and Money:

Say, if one of your customers requires you to print 1000s of flyers for an event. Then the customer can just demand for it, and you should be able to provide your customers with its requirements, because a Web to Print business is an on-demand process, and you should be able to provide what is demanded from your customers. You need not worry about your material getting out of stock, because you can set a limit in a Web to Print Platform. Like you can set the highest limit that a customer can order. Say 250 flyers at a time. Then, the customer needs to reorder it say 4 times to make it to a 1000 count. This helps you save as well as the customer a lot of time.

Conclusion:

Web to Print solutions are beneficial to you as a business owner as well as to your customers. It helps them save their time and money, and also helps them visualize their product better even before ordering it. It makes your customers in charge of their own designs and also secure their designs safely. It helps you as a brand to build a strong relationship with your customers as well as you can print it for multiple orders at a time.

Source: https://brushyourideas.wordpress.com/2022/07/12/5-ways-your-customer-can-benefit-from-web-to-print-technology/

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5 Web to Print Trends for 2022

When we talk about the strategies to grow the printing business, web-to-print is the#1 on the list. With this incredible technology, you don’t have to follow the complex process of developing a website. Instead, you can directly implement it on your eStores.

These ready-to-use stores have all the necessary features that printing businesses require to start selling custom printing products online.

Web to Print Design Solutions has dynamic options to implement in their stores and assist customers with all the editing features they require to customize the products.

To get all the benefits of this versatile technology, you need to stay updated with its latest trends. Only this way can you cater to your customers with the latest updates and fulfill their demands. To help you out, I have listed some of the ongoing Web-to-print trends of 2022 below:

Print Automation

You might have already heard of automation in previous years’ W2P trends too. The only difference is that at that time, automation was just a luxury, but in 2022 it’s mandatory to save time and effort.

There are multiple things you need to handle, like on-time shipment, quality check, sending delivery updates, etc. With Web-to-print automation, you can automate the majority of printing workflow. To optimize the business processes. With automation, you can reduce potential errors and repetitive tasks. You and your employees get additional time to focus on other printing tasks rather than doing the repetitive chores every day. This way, you can increase productivity and save labor charges too.

Start with automating your production line. Automation can do wonders for you if you use it in the right places, like artwork proofing. Tell me, honestly, how much back and forth do you have on a daily basis to finalize an artwork with customers? It is time and effort-consuming. Handle this task with automation technology. Invest in a Web to Print Solutions that offers an artwork proofing tool with it to increase efficiency and have a quality outcome.

You can have Print ERP software that automates all the vital business operations like print job, order management, inventory management, etc. This is all from a single interface.

The 3D Trend

3D printing is an ongoing trend and is not expected to fade any soon. 3D printing creates three-dimensional objects of a predesigned digital model. In 3D technology, you can print multiple layers on each other while manufacturing products to form the final product. This printing method is useful when you want to offer customizations from scratch.

The most significant advantage of 3D technology is that it saves extra effort & time and offers quality. Let your customers add as much precision as they want to add and make the product as per their requirements. For example: if you offer 3D customization on shirts, then your customers can design their shirts from scratch, deciding its sleeve size, style, collar color, button designs, etc. This will attract the maximum audience for you because who doesn’t want to design the shirt of their dreams?

The Tremendous Rise Of Product Customization

Providing generic designs will take you no farther than minimum orders, and that too for a limited time. What after you get out of design? That’s when you offer your customers canvas and editing tools to personalize their own products. Product customization is the magnet for attracting more customers and conversions. Let customers put their own ideas into their products and ship them with nothing but satisfaction.

Both B2B and B2C business owners can implement the online product design tool in their printing business and offer customizable products with its help. Just ensure that the tool you choose provides necessary features like a user-friendly interface, attractive UI/UX, clip art, templates, fonts, artwork, colors, etc. This will enable advanced and smooth customization for your customers.

The Fourth Revolution

With technology 4.0, you can enable technologies like Cloud Computing, AI (Artificial Intelligence), IoT (Internet of Things), ML (Machine Learning), etc. These are the revolutionary technologies that are changing how businesses manufacture and distribute their products and engage their customers, including the printing industry.

How?

Printing devices like printing presses can be connected to the internet for the best outcome. They can transmit data that can automatically be analyzed by cloud technology. With this, you can have a look at the insights of predictive maintenance. You can combine 3D printing with the Internet of Things to build custom-made products by analyzing the collected data from connecting devices.

Packaging is the New Opportunity

We all know how packaging impacts the brand. That is why businesses should leave the packaging to the customers. Businesses are offering personalized packaging to engage more audiences and catering to customizations in all ways possible. With the help of an online product designer tool, you can provide customized packaging for your business, and as a printing business owner, you can also allow people to print their packaging papers with your service. This way, you will gain customers and revenue both.

Final Words

All the above trends can help you to make your mark in the printing market. Competition is everywhere; you just need to find ways to make out through it. Keep a check on the latest on-going printing trends in the market. Print automation is growing at lightning speed.

Don’t miss the technology that helps you streamline and optimize your business operations.

Customization Is a mandatory service to have in order to make up for the customer’s demands and serve them what they want.

3D Printing is the bright future of the printing industry; avail of it as soon as possible.

IoT and other technologies help in gaining the momentum of your business.

Ensure you are implementing trends while keeping your audience in mind. This will enhance the outcome of the trends. Tailor your printing store according to your customer demands, and you will never fail! One of the best ways to introduce new trends to your store is by integrating web2print solutions in your business. Having a website, a designer tool can extend the capabilities of your e-store and let your customers create products they love.

Source: https://brushyourideas.wordpress.com/2022/06/27/5-web-to-print-trends-for-2022/

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How to Choose a Web to Print Storefront?

If you're looking for a web to print storefront, you must first be clear with your business requirements and the tools available in the market. We shall discuss it in detail.

However, the point here is that only when you're aware of the web to print solutions you can decide which would be compatible with your platform. See, we know the importance of product personalization and digitalization in today's era. A full-fledged store can help customers customize their designs and send out prints within minutes or hours. You can fulfill all the orders on time. There's a lot more to the web to print technology.

But just because it's a necessity doesn't mean you should go for the one you find first. You need to ask a few questions: Does the software work seamlessly with the platform? Is it compatible with my current workflow? Does the product design tool help with designs and get prints ready?

If the answer is yes, then move ahead. If it's no, then stop. Reanalyze, discuss, and then take a step.

Meanwhile, read this article. Here we've discussed a few steps that can help you on your journey.

• Know your Requirements

As we discussed, web2print has different uses. You must know the role you want the software to play for your business. Whether you want the solution to help your customers design other products, you want to handle the printing orders or enable you to print.

Therefore, while researching, keep the three parameters in mind:

1. the purpose of establishing a storefront
2. features that the solution provides
3. whether the developer can customize the store according to your requirements

List down everything and discuss it with your solution provider. Ask about features and customization. It will help you be on the right path.

• Learn about Different Web to Print Solutions

This step is part of the research, but it's necessary to emphasize it. Because we come to a conclusion based on 2-3 options that we explore. And often, we regret it later. Therefore, to avoid this in later stages, you must learn about the web to print solutions: what they are, what features they have, different platforms they are compatible with, and so on.

It's like how your customers look at your business - What kind of products do they provide? What are the delivery options?

The idea here is to learn, list down the best ones (you find compatible), and talk to the solution providers. (Unless you have shortened 100 solution providers and are planning to speak to all of them.)

• Ask for Explanation and Diagrams

Approach a web to print storefront provider, and they would talk about their print solution, print production workflow, features, web to print ERP, print MIS, CRM, and more. And there you're nodding with a smile, a continuous yes for every feature that developers talk about.

Of course, words do mean something, but sometimes you need action to understand them.

In this scenario, the action would be to ask developers about the flowcharts and a demo to explain the functioning. You're investing your time and money, and you must know how the tool works. If I said, "Buy this solution. It has all the features. It would triple your sales." Would you believe me? No, unless you see the results.

• List Down your Queries

It's generally after post-installation that the setbacks arrive. You have questions; you are facing roadblocks while implementing the tool with the website. Asking providers for help is out of the league.  Overall, you’re stuck, and you don’t know how to get out of it.

If you don’t want this situation to arrive, think about all the challenges you might face and list them according to priority.

When you sit down with your provider, know about the solution. Share your concerns, and ask about suitable options. Even if they don't have a ready answer, this approach will help you both in the journey.

• Ask for Customization

The fact is that one size doesn't fit all. So, whether your website platform is Magento, Shopify, or WordPress, your solution provider must be open to customization. They must even build the tool from scratch if required.

Also, ensure that the web2print storefront is compatible with different platforms. If not, make sure that the developer is ready to move accordingly.

Along with these, consider the future scope and marketing of your business too. Try to know if your web to print storefront is dynamic and flexible to adapt to the latest trends.

Summing Up

The Web to print solutions is considered best for increasing revenue. Therefore, choosing the right one is imperative.

Try to follow these steps. They won’t guarantee you the right solution. However, they can lead you in the right direction. For example, you won't miss asking whether they would provide the domain name and server for hosting, offer different templates, or so on.

Source: https://brushyourideas.wordpress.com/2021/08/27/how-to-choose-a-web-to-print-storefront/

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