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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How to Start a Print-On-Demand Business

Big companies produce tons of stock and store them forever. However, such is not the case with small company owners and new startups as they can’t risk wastage of product stocks due to low sales.

Is there any solution to it?

Yes, Print-on-Demand is the one.

One more luxury big companies enjoy is that they can innovate new designs and imprint them on their products. Unfortunately, this luxury is again out of the reach of small business owners. They can’t risk investing big sums into printing new designs and facing rejections of those designs by customers. Again, is there a solution to it? Yes, Web-to-Print Software is the one.

If you see, these two solutions combinedly can help new businesses grow sales exponentially with minimal risk.

What is Print-on-Demand and How It Works?

‘Print-on-Demand’ method is a printing technology or business method to sell custom products. However, unlike in the traditional method, the business owner does not need to stock custom products and wait for customers to buy them. Rather, they can easily tie-up with a manufacturer or distributor to print products as per the orders.

After receiving the request, it becomes the responsibility of that manufacturer or distributor to take care of everything from printing, shipping, and handling product returns.

All you need is to market your products through the right channels.

Who All Can Benefit from Print-on-Demand Method?

Entrepreneur

A business-minded person can always make the best use of this method to analyze the response of their new launches. It is especially useful for companies that deal in print products and items.

Graphic Designers/Illustrators

They are already well-equipped with knowledge of the latest design trends in the market. All they need to do is sell those designs to their audience and followers through various sites.

Artists

Their artistic approach to different things and a huge fanbase can help artists notch up their sales.

Writers

Writers can get their quotes, excerpts from their popular books, novels, or poems printed on different products. Such custom products are in high demand nowadays and can bring in huge returns on investments for writers.

Gift Shop Owners

Offline gift shop owners can cash in on this business method. All they need is to launch an online gift store with web-to-print software. Letting customers design and order their custom designs can help them stay on top of customers’ satisfaction always. For that, they can choose a suitable manufacturer or distributor who can fulfill order requirements.

Steps to Start the Print-on-Demand Business

Research Designs

If you are an artist, this step is not that important for you. Because you are already well-acquainted with what designs are trending. However, if you are an entrepreneur, you need to collaborate with good designers and artists to get the hang of current trends.

It is better to test a sample of each design for your product before bringing out the other. This way, you, as an entrepreneur will get the hang of what designs people like more.

Accordingly, you can plan further designs and release them.

Research Products

Besides researching designs, researching products is also essential. A few products popular these days to print your designs on are notebooks, mugs, t-shirts, hoodies, pillows, etc.

However, you still need to research and find out what product(s) has the highest profit-giving potential.

Use Google trends to understand customers’ behavioral patterns. Also ask your friends to form a general opinion of which custom item they like to buy the most.

Conducting a small survey can also help you decide on the product(s) to customize for your business.

Tie Up with a Manufacturer/Distributor/Printer

Now that you already have your product and design ready, find a competent manufacturer/distributor to print your custom orders. Always try to build a long-lasting bond with your manufacturing or distributing partner to succeed.

Prepare a Catalogue of Items to Sell

This step is crucial as it involves clicking photos of all products to go for sale. You can either click photos of your products yourself using a decent camera. If you aren’t sure of your photography skills, try to find a friend good at photography to do it for you.

The last resort is to hire a professional photographer to click snaps for your product catalogue.

Pro Tip: It is recommendable to not invest much and use a high-quality digital camera to click photos yourself. Or else, you’ll have to shell out a significant sum of money in hiring a photographer.

Register on Different Sites

The next step is to create a seller account on different sites like AliExpress, eBay, Amazon, etc. These sites give more visibility to your products and people start acknowledging your products more. So, conduct proper research to find out the best possible site for your product.

Upload Your Catalogue

After registering as a seller, upload your products on the site. Also, some keyword research is foremost to get customers to notice your products. Adding USPs of your products would also be a good idea.

Start Marketing on Social Media

Social media marketing is a great marketing tool today. Set up your Facebook account and Instagram account. Remember that these accounts must be business accounts and not personal accounts with all creator tools. Setting up a respective ads account for each social media channel is also recommendable.

See to it that your logo goes with the product(s) you deal in.

Fulfill Your Orders Timely

In the beginning while testing your samples, you can try fulfilling orders by partnering with a delivery service. But as the orders start inpouring in large numbers, it is better to switch to print-on-demand sites. Various sites like Zazzle, Printify, Printful, etc. take care of everything from taking orders, shipping them and handling their returns.

Launch Your Own E-Store

Once you get along with suppliers, a big audience, and profits from orders; you can launch your own e-store. The challenges still don’t end.

The biggest challenge is competing with the leading brands in this industry like Hallmark, Archies, etc. As they already have a huge audience, they can produce products in large stocks. Despite knowing your products have succeeded, you can’t go for inventory management straight away.

So, it is better to integrate web-to-print software with your e-store. This software will let your customers customize your products themselves by using creator tools. This will save you from risks of loss wastage in bulk production of custom products. As customers will create only what they intend to buy.

Once you get enough popularity, you may venture into producing products with custom designs in huge stocks.

In a Nutshell

Starting a new business is never a cakewalk. You have to surmount so many hurdles to eventually ace the business. The same goes with this print-on-demand business. Right from producing and testing custom designs to launching your own e-store with web-to-print software, every step poses new challenges.

Nevertheless, stay calm and be patient. Take every step judiciously throughout your journey. Success will eventually knock on your door.

Original Source: https://whattheythink.com/news/99825-how-start-print-demand-business/

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Brush Your Ideas will Exhibit At Screen Print India. Are you coming?

Announcement time!

Brush Your Ideas will be exhibiting at Screen Print India 2020 Event. It is an International trade fair for screen printing, textile printing, and digital printing.

Here are all the details you would need to make sure you don’t miss out on important points:

Event Name: Screen Print India

Date: 24 - 26 April 2020

Place: Bombay Exhibition Centre, Off Western Express Highway, Goregaon (East), 400063 Mumbai, India

What we would be doing there?

This event will take place on 24-26th April. During these three days, all our delegates would get the opportunity to interact with different enterprises, manufacturers, entrepreneurs coming from all over the world.

Our team is eager to meet exhibitors that will be presenting their innovations as well. It will be a perfect opportunity for us to educate users about our offerings and how our solutions will be useful for their users.

What would make us stand out?

Providing web to print services in 70+ countries for almost 12+ years has given us experience and understanding of what else we can bring to this industry. We always listen to our client’s feedback and include points when further shaping our products. If you are also someone wanting to step into the personalization industry, at this event, you would learn its importance, how you can get started, and some other ways to spruce up your business.

So if summarised, here are the points you have to look forward to:

- Overview of the web to print industry

- Why you should think of something else outside of your shell?

- Personalization: Need for the hour

- Who we are?

- How we collaborate with you?

- Highlights of our product

If you are keen to learn more about web-to-print technology, then Brush Your Ideas will love to have a chat with you at the event, and even provide a demo if required.

To set up a meeting with us, drop an email at sales@brushyourideas.com.

We look forward to meeting you!

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