All posts by Caroline

Caroline is a Director at Digital Print Management, a leading print management company specialising in providing print and mailing solutions. Having spent 25 years in the transpromo industry she is one of the UK's leading expert's in print and mail solutions.

At some point in our business lives we will have to deal with complaints from customers.

How we respond differentiates us from the competition and ensures that our reputation remains in tact.

It also is a great way to test out your process for managing customer issues and ensures that the necessary procedures are in place.

This means they are tested and evaluated to see if they worked or failed and then changed, if necessary and reinforced.

The way we manage customer issues can and does have a huge impact on customer retention and acquisition.

Research has shown that on average an unhappy customer tells ten people about their experience, these ten people then tell a further five.

A total of 50 people will hear about a single bad experience they’ve had with you whether it’s service, company or a person they’ve dealt with.

Factor in social media and the internet and this figure can rocket skywards.

There are more ways to communicate with customers – email, mobile, internet and social media making a customer issue or complaint global.

A customer complaint usually heralds an anxiety attack, the hands sweat and the mind slips into child like psychology ‘what have I/we done wrong now’ and it can often result in it being costly to resolve, time consuming or worse, more trouble.

I admit that the challenge of resolving a customer problem whether it is of their making or ours causes knee shakes but at the same time, I relish working with the customer to find out why and how it happened and implementing a more improved fail-safe procedure to minimise the likelihood of it happening again.

Last week, Digital Print Management’s customer complaint procedure was tested.

Why would I want to share the fact that we made an error?

Simple. We make errors, mistakes, call them what you like, they do happen and the key to success is how you put them right making the customer feel important and secure. It also demonstrates how committed you are in resolving the problem for the customer.

The success of resolving a customer service problem strengthens the relationship between provider and customer deepening loyalty and commitment.

Here are DPMs 10 top tips to give great customer service.

1. Customer service is instilled in ‘all of us’ not just down to one individual whose sole responsibility it is to sort out customer problems.

Customer service should never be departmentalised what it should be is common practice for all employees who are made accountable to ensure the customer has a great experience working or buying from you.

Whatever the role in the company from Managing Director, sales to admin clerks, we are all ‘in customer service.’ We are in business to provide great customer service and satisfaction.

As a print management and outsourcing consultancy Digital Print Management work in partnership with various suppliers and vendors, we work together not individually.

If there is a problem it is ‘our’ problem not yours or mine. If DPM loses a client we all lose a client. Everyone owns the ‘problem’ until it is resolved.

2. Apologise – Yes I said say ‘sorry.’

It is not an admission of guilt or liability. By apologising for what has happened or for any inconvenience caused is telling the customer that you acknowledge the problem and that you intend to resolve it.

Owning up to a mistake immediately takes the wind out of someone’s sails and allows you to work with the customer to resolve the problem.

There are times when it is the customers mistake and you can demonstrate why it happened but by investing in goodwill and even replacing or offering the service at a reduced rate or free of charge makes the customer feel valued and upholds your reputation.

The freedom of the internet means that customers can comment without saying it to your face.

3. Keep your promises – if I say I’ll get back to the customer by 4PM I do. There may not be any additional information I can offer for the reason the problem occurred but by communicating with the customer they know you are taking their issue seriously.

4. Don’t lie – never short route the process. You may think it is better to hold back important information but at some point it will end up by biting you. Tell the truth, as you understand it, what has been found during your investigation and report back. By keeping the information brief and not overly technical will help the customer understand the reason(s) behind the problem.

5. Treat people as you would expect to be treated – when faced with a customer complaint from the outset I try to put myself in the customer’s shoes.

What does this problem mean for them, who do they have to report to, will they be reprimanded by their boss, how far up the chain will the issue go?

6. Maintain a professional manner – don’t joke with the customer about the problem or make it seem trivial. A handful of incorrectly printed documents or downtime in your service may seem trivial and insignificant but for the customer you’ve just created a big headache.

7. Listen up – When we get presented with a problem talking through the customer as though it’s not a real problem and assuming you know what the causes are only serves to ‘up’ the issue.

By listening and understanding what the customer is saying helps identify where the fault occurred and ensures we don’t fall into the trap of guessing.

By focusing less on what went wrong and more on fixing the problem makes it less of an issue for the customer.

The customer isn’t always right and if you can prove that this is the case don’t be confrontational. Understand their issues only then offer your viewpoint. You may have to agree to disagree but always ask ‘how can I make this better for you, tell me what you need me to do so you are left feeling a happy customer?’

8. Never promise what you can’t deliver – I couldn’t get back to my customer by the close of business with the details of why the problem happened but during the call I promised I’d call him back the next day with an update.

9. It’s about the customer not sales – I hate the word sales, or selling probably because I’m not very good at it. I prefer to work at keeping the customers business, minimising potential complaints or problems, rather than seeing them as £ signs.

10. Make sure you have a customer complaints management system and communications process in place so complaints don’t happen. Good communication management is key to long-term customer retention.

There you have our 10 commandments for great customer service.

As for the customer issue we had last week well:-

The contract has been extended for a further 2 years
We were thanked for our follow up and quick response with calls, emails and information.
Attention to detail meant that our investigation resulted in no stone was left unturned and the client thanked us for making a big problem appear small.
The customers problem and subsequent resolution has resulted in a revised process being updated this will now follow through to other clients who will benefit. This made the customer feel he had contributed greatly to resolving the problem in collaboration with DPM.

Blog

What does your content marketing say about you?

July 27, 2014 Caroline 2 Comments

Last week’s post aimed to show how to engage with customers across multi-media channels by creating an identity and personality and using consistent branding.

I’m having a bit of moan. I’ve been inundated with pushy sales emails and I was going to add some screenshots of what I mean by overbearing pretentious marketing, but thought better of it.

What is it about that pushy salesman or woman that make us run for the nearest exit?

How many times do you go to a networking meeting and end up being sold to death by an over zealous person?

SMEs and small organisations may not have a budget for outsourcing their marketing or hiring a digital creative to manage it internally.

Companies feel uncomfortable, almost shy when it comes to demonstrating the merits of their company services.

Marketing your brand can sometimes feel like you are committing a serial act of selling.

There are differences between the two and most of us don’t like to be ‘sold to’ by pushy marketers, cold callers, spam emails, one time only offers and deals that end up in our inbox again tomorrow.

Yet most of us don’t want to be that pushy sales person either, making us feel uncomfortable under the collar when it comes to our own marketing content.

Marketing doesn’t have to be pushy and solely about selling.

Good marketing is about creating informative content that helps the customer make a buying decision. If they have the information and they trust in your brand then when they are ready to buy they will remember you.

If your message ‘sells’ then it is off putting, people switch off and the message gets deleted, thrown away, spammed or ‘unsubscribed’.

It’s not so easy for your audience to switch off from a marketing message that answers a question in an informed and authoritative way.

Creating punchy marketing content that is genuine, helpful and informative takes time to craft.

Businesses are realising that good content marketing is insightful and is a great way of attracting leads and converting them to customers but getting it right is another thing entirely.

There are five key points that I ask my customers to think about when they consider print and content marketing to make sure it works successfully.

Here are five ways to make sure your content marketing is not ‘pushy’

1. Plan, analyse, execute – if you don’t have a strategy how can you produce great content.

You might be producing lots of good stuff and sending it here, there and everywhere but having a ‘throw the mud at the wall and hope it sticks approach’ wont work. Building a library of great content suited to your audiences and niche markets with clear aims and objectives demonstrates expertise and knowledge. This will develop brand awareness and build trust in you and your company or brand. Your library will have a story to tell.

2. By listening to your audience you can start to address their problems – creating irrelevant content will only get lost in space. By acknowledging unique or specific problems associated with your industry or niche and writing content that demonstrates a case study on how a company benefited from your help is golden egg stuff. If the customer doesn’t know they have the problem in the first place how will they find the answer?

3. Don’t write low quality content – regurgitating old content or poorly written marketing is not acceptable anymore. Content marketing is important and reflects on you and your company.

A badly written marketing piece or blog shows that either you don’t care or you haven’t given enough thought to your audience.

Quality does matter and content must be well designed, thought out and written well with no obvious errors.

4. Be interesting – attention grabbing headlines are a sure fire way to get people to engage with your content but not pushy salesy sign up now headlines.

Brilliant content wont be found or read if it is presented like war and peace. If you want to make sure your content isn’t read don’t use images, change the typeface every paragraph, don’t check for spelling and write it like an A-level science project.

5. Don’t be afraid – write blogs, try podcasting, Youtube, use infograhics, slideshare mix it up a bit by making your content more consumable using different platforms. It is a great way to get your content picked up and shared across different devices.

There you have it a simple but effective five-point plan for your social media marketing content and direct mail.

Are there any other points to add or work for you? Please do share.

Blog

How to engage your customers across multi-media channels

July 21, 2014 Caroline Leave a comment

Customers are demanding faster and better information which has traditionally been delivered by direct sales and marketing planning.

Being able to interact with customers through multi-media channels is necessary for brands, companies and organisations to get their message out there by developing strong personal relationships with long term customers.

Creating a successful multi-media channel experience can seem beyond the capabilities of most organisations not only in time and internal resources but also cost and ROI.

Creating your own brand or imagery and being able to interact on a variety of multi-media channels is key to long term success.

A brand is not just the name of a business, a product or service it’s about establishing an emotional connection with the customer.

Your company or persona is more than just a company name on the top of your letter-heading it is about the identity of the people in your organisation and it’s personality.

The old adage that people buy people rings true. People buy your services based on emotion and the honesty they perceive in your brand or company.

By creating an identity and personality for your company the customers buying decision is easier because they are able to identify with the company, product, or service through association.

Increasing recognition by building an online presence are integral to making your brand and organisation credible.

How do I build my brand identity using multi-media channels?

Brand awareness is built through print media advertising, social media and multi-media channel touch points.

Whether you use the more traditional methods of marketing like direct mail, emailing, product launch events, blogs and video campaigns.

Whatever strategies your business employs says a lot about you and the personality of the organisation or brand.

The key is making sure you stay in front of your audience so that when they are ready to buy they call or contact you.

Multi-media channel interaction is pretty much expected through all types of customer interactions including communication.

Customers want to be able to view documents on different media, from email, mobile, online and print depending on context and convenience.

This makes it impossible to predict which media channel will be used when, where and by whom, content has to be available on all platforms.

Organisations need to be transparent, honest and flexible so that the customer sees similar information on all media platforms this in turn creates consistency and continuity and creates familiarity which the prospective customer can identify with when they are ready to buy.

In the world of online, choice is easier for customers and an organisation that gives customers easy access to a variety of channels can differentiate itself.

Knowing your audience and interpreting the data from the various multi-media channel touch points provides more opportunity to gather information about customers.

Complicated registration web forms which look more like A-level science questions than the simple sign up forms enable your customers to sign up and register easily without the customer being made to feel they are giving too much away and makes the process easier to collate information.

Using a sign up form that is connected to anyone of their social media accounts identifies the registrant with a social profile. They are more likely to enter their personal information onto an online registration form than offering it to a call centre.

By having that information available across all the platforms the organisation has more opportunities to capture the information making it more effective and usable when identifying niche audiences.

If an organisation can track how a customer is consuming information on what device and where, will make targeted marketing messages easier.

As long as all channels are communicating than a customer should only have to enter their data once.

Every social media channel has its own unique set of challenges but there are some best practices that should be observed:

Be consistent, by this I mean any information, documentation and communication across all the multi-media channels should have the same imagery, look and feel so the customer is familiar with your brand or company.
Creating a single document that has the same imagery, logos, branding like an online marketing piece, advert etc. make sure there is an individual strategy to deploy it across all channels. The message doesn’t have to be identical but it does need to relate to the other marketing messages on other channels.
Provide a value-add on by making sure that at each touch point the customer can engage. Make an offer, provide useful information, offer a benefit.
Security – consumers are well aware of issues of data security and misused information. They are also aware that to receive something they need to sign up or fill in a web form for accessibility. The customer wants to know how the information is collected and how it will be used so tell them. In return, the customer expects to receive value. They’ve parted with their personal details and expect something useful in return, in other words there has to be a benefit.
Engagement on multi-media channel platforms requires commitment, time, money and resources. A clear defined strategy for each platform will help determine ROI and profitability.
All stakeholders have to be involved in the overall strategy for future customer acquisition and retention with clearly defined marketing plans for each bit of communication across each platform.

Multi-media channel engagement is a long haul process, in much the same way as when you started promoting on social media platforms. A little bit like firing in the dark, until you can measure which platform works best for your audience.

It requires much needed thought and a set of measurable objectives – and an end plan, what is/are your main goal(s).

The most important aspect is to take into account the needs and expectations of your audience.

Setting key objectives will determine the success of your brand and organisation.

Blog

Print marketing. 10 ways to get your marketing messages read.

July 14, 2014 Caroline Leave a comment

White space, blank, unused and discarded space.

White space is one of the things I see most in the various customer applications Digital Print Management process, print and electronically send out from payslips, invoices through to marketing and direct mail.

You name it there is often a great big white space on the document which isn’t being used either for company messages, promotions, new products or services.

Why spend time designing and investing time in a marketing campaign if you don’t capitalise on the space you have available which is where print marketing comes in.

I’m not suggesting you fill your page with information that bears no resemblance to the product or service you are selling but used wisely that white space can be a great print marketing opportunity to say something.

Every transactional document including bills, statements and customer communications are central to the customer experience and every document represents an opportunity to communicate to your customer.

Marketers are missing a great opportunity by not maximising the space they have available through print marketing.

Why limit it to ‘marketing’ only? Any customer communication requires the same carefully thought out message.

Targeting of the message can be achieved in the same print run and the use of multi-channel print, mobile and online content can all be linked to provide a unique customer experience.

Here are 10 ways to make print more effective.

Make sure your printed message endures – if your marketing looks cheap then the chances are it will be discarded. Cheaply produced items are more likely to be viewed as ‘throwaway’ and have little value.
For your printed message to get maximum exposure choose quality material and if the the marketing message is well designed it’s likely that the item will be kept as reference at a later date.
Designing an overtly funky or trendy marketing item will get plenty of attention on initial opening but unless it has something positive to say or serves a specific purpose is unlikely to serve any practical use.
In a multi-channel market place print still retains a highly respected and effective way of promoting your brand and getting your message out there to your audience so make sure what you have to say is relevant and timely.
The digital overload that at times threatens to lose your audience’s attention and the ROI guaranteed from a direct mail marketing campaign makes print an ideal alternative.
Print helps you stay on top of a person’s mind and a well written print piece can reach people who have specific interests or needs especially if it is a well placed advertisement in a magazine next to a business article or print ads, brochures, postcards and printed promotional products that ensure your business is kept visible.
Print is a great way to build your brand using business cards, envelopes, direct mail, presentation kits promotional items like pens and mugs. These items are useful, serve a practical purpose and last a long time.
Post cards are a great way of saying thank you to your customers for the recent new business they placed with you or for a marketing message designed to encourage your customers to take up a promotion you might be running.
Print supports a multi-channel strategy and customers are more likely to be responsive if they are reached both offline and online.
Envelopes – use them don’t leave white space, fill it with colour, brand and personalise them with your company details and logos and don’t forget a QR code to drive traffic to your website. It costs next to nothing to have envelopes with colour printed on them. There are some limitations laid down by the royal mail but as long as your mailing house conforms with the requirements there is a lot of white space you can use to promote your message. Envelopes are always the last thing you think about but the first thing you open to see what’s inside. If an envelope goes out without any branding it is a misused white space opportunity.

Optimising white space can turn even the mundane of documents into a more powerful and effective means of communicating with the customer.

Blog

EPayslips. To E or not to E that is the question

July 7, 2014 Caroline Leave a comment

As a solution provider it is our aim to provide customers the right solutions that best fit with the strategy of the organisation.

In this post, Print, digital and the environment I discussed the importance of consultation with customers and employees when it comes to considering electronic methods of communication rather than simply dismissing paper as a means of communications.

Where can epayslips fit in and should I be considering them as an alternative to paper slips?

E-solutions and e-comms are developing at a fast rate and at some point during our working day we are likely to receive some form of e-communications whether it is a reminder that our mobile bill is ready for collection to a newsletter or an electronic invoice sent from one of our suppliers.

Online accessibility of information through the use of tablets to iphones has made it significantly easier to view your payslips or any other document online. The widespread availability of apps means that often there is a mobile version available to view.

Part of Digital Print Management’s services are outsourced payroll printing.

Some companies outsource their payroll functions and manage the distribution of payslips internally, others outsource the complete payroll process but retain control of a portion of their payroll processing like their pensioners.

Epayslips aren’t for everyone and there is a certain degree of comfort in receiving that monthly piece of paper that says I’ve been paid.

In this example paper slips are generated monthly and posted out, epayslips would not work for the simple reason the company knows its aged employees well has surveyed them regarding migration to epayslips and the overwhelming response was a preference for a paper payslip.

Old dogs die hard – old habits are difficult to change.

What options are there for epayslips?

Standard online epayslips have low adoption rates. In comparison ‘push’ delivery of epayslips increases the recipients adoption of paperless documents.

Emailing payslips (or using a push service whereby the payslip information is pushed to the employee via the sender, sent either as an encrypted PDF attached to an email or embedded within the email) you can read more about pull e-services here.

The traditional ‘pull’ process is convenient for the sending organisation but cumbersome for most recipients. Senders ‘deliver’ their epayslips electronically by loading them on a website and then sending an email notification to recipients.

What are the advantages of ‘push’ and ‘pull’ epayslips

If you take a look at my slides and they highlight the advantages and disadvantages of the options available.

[slideshare id=36673825&doc=e-payslips-140706103558-phpapp01]

Many of Digital Print Management’s customers use a combined print, push/pull distribution of payslips which works very effectively.

Every organisation is unique and is restricted or enhanced by its payroll software.

Ultimately the epayslip model chosen is often determined by the strategy of the HR and/or Payroll department, the types of employees from weekly, monthly and from young to old will also determine the successful take up of epayslips.

But, there is no reason why the use of paper payslips and epayslips can’t co-exist in our working environment.

Whether it is E-statements, E-billing the same process detailed above can be applied. The key to successful uptake is understanding your employees and customers to ensure a timely and effective transition to E-documents.

Content marketing and strategy, Cross media personalisation and marketing

Content personalisation. Get your message heard.

June 30, 2014 Caroline Leave a comment

In last week’s post I talked about why I love print.

In past posts I’ve focussed on content personalisation and where it fits into your marketing efforts.

Content personalisation is important, it isn’t about getting the recipients name right but making sure you are targeting your niche audience with the right information and content.

Social media platforms are a great place to find your audiences and engage with but they can also be a great time waster and an even greater distraction and they aren’t the only place you should be broadcasting your messages.

Telesales, emailing, tweeting, blogging, advertising are also part of the process of getting your message heard. But you, your brand, your company, services and products are just another load of noise that disappear into the social void.

The marketplace is noisy with your competitors trying to get their message heard too and your potential customers are having trouble hearing your message let alone finding and engaging with your marketing efforts.

Shouting loudly and sending the same marketing collateral into the social media world hoping that some of it will resonate with a few might work, the only problem with that approach is that people will tune out very quickly or throw your marketing collateral in the bin.

I’ve said in the past that direct mail or a personalised marketing piece can be a great way to start the conversation going and get the prospect started on the journey to purchasing.

89% of consumers get their ideas from a print advert or a direct mail piece I should know I’m one of them so I know it works.

Transactional and marketing mail is a huge market, in 2012-13 Royal Mail handled 58 million items of addressed mail everyday and supplementing your social media marketing efforts with print and mailing services is a natural starting point for multi-channel marketing messages which includes digital and paper based communications.

With economies of scale, savings on printed collateral, postal discounts either via the Royal Mail or DSA (downstream access providers), short lead times and sophisticated highly personalised targeted marketing using digital colour makes print and mailing fulfilment a great place to start the process toward customer engagement.

How do you deliver the right messages to your audience?

Aim to provide unique and valuable information and content on your brand, service or products. Make a strategic plan for developing your audiences’ engagement through a planned process for example – a blog – email campaign – direct mail – promotion on social media. If you know where you are going you can make sure your marketing efforts aren’t wasted.
Focus on one simple message not lots of different messages or content so it becomes distracting for the customer.
Use the power of pictures with words, the old adage a picture paints a thousand words rings true. We associate images with brands and we want our customers to remember us the next time they need our product or services. We also want them to associate any imagery we use with our company so it reinforces the message.
Using more words wont convey the message using the right words in a more vivid and simple way are more likely to be remembered.

Steve Jobs once commented that his most hated words were branding and marketing. He went onto say that “people associate brands with television advertising and commercials and artificial things. The most important thing was people’s relationship to the product.

Marketing is when you have to sell to somebody. If you aren’t providing value, if you’re not educating them about the product, if you’re not helping them get the most out of the product, you’re selling. And you shouldn’t be in that mode.”

If Apple is right then we shouldn’t be in the business of selling but rather educating our customers, telling them they have a problem long before they know they have one.

Getting to a position where your audience see your marketing and recognise your brand gives them confidence in you because they see the information that you are providing as useful and is helping them in the buying process by adding value to their lives.

The are interested in hearing from you because they’ve become accustomed to receiving excellent information and expect it. It will excite them enough to start the buying process with your brand or company when they are ready.

Whether your marketing is driven solely into the social media stratosphere or you use the ubiquitous bit of paper to get your message out there your content and your message must be unique, original and consistent.

What do you think?

Print Management, Short Run Printing

Ten reasons why I love print.

June 23, 2014 Caroline 4 Comments

I’m a walking contradiction. I’m a big advocate of print and paper but I love the digital world too. In fact I live in both worlds for a large part of my time.

I’m a digital subscriber to The Times but I love the touch and feel of my monthly glossy fashion magazines and just for good measure I also take two digital magazine subscriptions I know I can’t help myself.

The ongoing print vs digital debate has been done to death, a long debated subject about it’s place in the order of things. You would think people would stop perpetuating the myth that all things electronic are marvellous and that the utopian ideal is a paperless office, worse, a national paper free day.

What harm has paper or print ever done. It is the first medium that children come into contact with as babies and when learning to read because they can see the words and pictures.

89% of consumers get their ideas from a print ad, which starts them on a journey toward purchasing. Paper volumes have dropped and print is likely to be a secondary or tertiary medium but used in conjunction with cross media marketing it is extremely effective.

What does it feel like to pick up a hard back book? (my preference over paper back) I love it, I love smelling old books there is a sense of history to it, I’m a bit anal about print.
Print really gets to me in a different way than screen viewing. Paper doesn’t contain hyperlinks whereas interactive screens are full of distractions with online ads which often annoy and distract my viewing. You can google a search term and end up never going back to the original text. Screens are more taxing mentally, it’s hard work navigating around a screen than a piece of paper because you are having to navigate from one screen to another to find information.
Books, magazines, catalogues, any paper medium gives you a sense of progression as you turn the page but with a screen once you have read it, it’s gone and it feels never ending.
Finding typing or spelling errors on screen is far harder than if you print out the manuscript and then the errors appear as if by magic.
Good design grabs your attention and communicates the idea, an advert can take advantage of a full page and is very effective, it has no distracting links, pop up ads or videos.
Print is everywhere – newspapers, magazines, outdoor billboards it touches you on a deeper level often unconsciously. Digital is very different. People try to work out the differences between print and digital, which one is better or more effective, why bother? The reality is each one is very effective if employed in an intelligent and thought provoking way ultimately engaging with the reader.
Fashion brands use visual imagery to promote and define their brand through fashion magazines. But they use digital channels to really engage with their target audience by telling their story, showing the personality and style of the brand and what their values are. But print is the first point of engagement that consumers have with a brand.
Multi-channel campaigns start with print then move to the digital channels. Print is a great starting point when coming up with a new idea, concept or design. When that is done it’s easier to adapt it for multi-channel campaigns.
When I think of an idea I drop it down in my evernote moleskin notebook because it’s easier and quicker than opening my iPad, by which time I’ve forgotten the thing I was suppose to remember to write down.
I love my workflowy (quick notes) and smartsheet (project task management) but by the time I’ve opened the blasted applications I’ve forgotten why I was opening it in the first place so guess what I use my tasks in my filofax, yes that ever wonderful paper based filing and index system. Isn’t it fab when you strike through a to do when you’ve completed it you just don’t get the same feeling when you do it digitally. Works for me.

Research has shown that reading from a screen is 20-30% slower than reading from paper.

Ink on paper is an enduring technology. The only thing you need is the human eye to read it.

There you have it that is why I love print and why it has such an enduring quality for me.

Tell me what you think? Are you like me or are you a complete convert to digital versions only?

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Content marketing and strategy, Cross media personalisation and marketing

Content personalisation. Call me Christine

June 16, 2014 Caroline 4 Comments

I was at a networking event recently and after many conversations and exchanging of business cards I found myself on the end of an email and direct mail marketing campaign by one of the companies who had taken my business card.

Several innovative and interesting direct mail pieces and many emails later I was amused how the company on each and every occasion got my name wrong, no, not spelt wrong, completely the wrong name.

It started with Carolyn, then we had Carol, then I became a Catherine to Christine then Carla followed by Cara and my favourite Cassie.

I may have at some point in our conversation alluded to the fact that my nick name is indeed Caz (my german friends like to call me Cazzie because they can’t pronounce the Z so I get called Cassie)

I’ve written about the benefits of content and marketing personalisation, targeting the right information to your niche audience which includes making sure you have the name of the person(s) who will be reading it.

The marketing message and content from the company was excellent it was sadly let down by poor attention to personal details which is the essence of any good marketing. We all know that the more personalised the content the more likely we journey toward making the purchase.

Amazon and Netflix are major players in customising our browsing experiences and attributing recommendations based on purchase history. By customising the experience for shoppers consumers are more likely to start down the journey of purchasing.

Although the company in question included personalisation in their marketing pieces they forgot to make sure the name was correct and therefore the impact was lost especially when I’d received several emails and three direct mail pieces.

What is the point of putting all the effort into marketing if one simple error minimises the impact of the message?

Personalisation comes from accurate data, accurate data comes from a customer database that should be updated regularly. Incorrect personalisation means the company hasn’t paid enough attention to the details, they don’t see the person, someone who might be interested in buying their service but a commodity in other words where the next sales is coming from.

Bad personalisation = bad quality = questionable data?

In my example the data management was questionable. Data had been incorrectly entered onto their CRM. If the company had bought in a list from a data management company then I’d have to question the quality, data policies, systems used to maintain these lists by the data management company.

If the personalisation in incorrect then the whole marketing campaign is jeopardised. What is a silly mistake like my example can undermine the customer impact, at worse they’ll delete the email or throw the mailpiece in the bin = lost sale = no engagement.

Just call me Catherine

Content personalisation is getting bigger making it more challenging to personalise for an audience that is also growing and changing its habits.

People aren’t robots and are likely to access content from multiples devices and visit from many social channels, they expect to be treated as individuals much like visiting a shop in person.

The rewards of personalisation are an important part of your marketing efforts. A personalised email is likely to see click through rates upwards of 14%, the addition of a name makes the customer feel more important and is likely to increase engagement as though the email is for them and only them.

How do you optimise personalisation?

Make sure you check your customer database and that all the fields are correct and in the right place e.g Name, Surname, Title, Job Title
Ensure you have a quality check process
Take a sample of your proposed data and make sure it sits in the corresponding fields
Make sure you check every data variable by running random checks
If you are unsure managing your data then find a company who has the expertise in data management and outsource the process but choose carefully

Finally keep calling me Christine and see what your response rates are like.

How does personalisation add value to my marketing?

Finally 49% of UK consumers think personalisation is important in their marketing messages.

Managing Print Costs, Print and Mail Services, Print Management

Mobile Printing. How does it fit in with BYOD?

June 9, 2014 Caroline Leave a comment

In last week’s blog I talked about the rise of the use of BYOD in the workplace.

With the massive adoption of BYOD (bring your own device) and a major shift in how and where students and employees work, an enterprise mobile printing solution has to be part of an organisation’s strategy to offset the increasing demands for on-the-go printing from your BYOD.

Users will at some point have a requirement to print certain documents from their iPads, tablets and smartphones and any other device and, organisations will need to be able to provide an enterprise mobile printing solution that is both secure and effective.

Enterprise printing gives employees and students the ability to be productive whether they are on the road, at home or in the office.

Employees or visitors can print to corporate printers without having to connect to a corporate network and it supports a BYOD printing environment.

Printing can then be enabled from any smartphone, tablet, laptop or PC by emailing documents to a PrinterOn enterprise-enabled printer or by using one of the mobile printing apps available for blackberry, iOS and android devices.

How does it work?

With a plethora of networks a PrinterOn enterprise solution connects all your corporate networks and allows users at remote offices to print to all locations.
Automatic printer discovery enables employees and guests to find all printers that are online and available instantly by using the PrinterOn mobile apps.
Mobile employees can print while at the office by printing to one of the PrinterOn public printing locations or print at home using the same secure printing service.
Corporate print solutions for SAP and Oracle –print from within SAP or Oracle connecting users with enterprise bar code, RFID and document printers globally

What are the benefits?

BYOD users can be authenticated and print from any device
PrinterOn discovery automatically discovers available enterprise printers through mobile apps
Print anywhere – mobile employees can print from home, office, public location back to the enterprise print infrastructure
Flexible – users can choose how they want to print – web upload, email, mobile apps or driver
Citrix® users can print from devices like iPads, android tablets to any enterprise printer using standard file>print
Mobile printing apps for iOS, android and blackberry devices
PrinterOn will work with most print management systems
All documents are encrypted with unique AES encryption
PrinterOn is designed for growth and scalability and as printing increases and mobile users are added PrinterOn enterprise can accommodate thousands of users and print devices within a single deployment
Secure – all documents are encrypted with unique AES encryption
PrinterOn enterprise can easily be integrated into existing corporate management systems such as Active Directory or LDAP based services
PrinterOn enterprise will also integrate the mobile print workflow into existing print management tracking or auditing services, allowing mobile users to access and print jobs using existing tools and services available from third 3rd party print management or print vendors.

Embracing the freedom to print from any device and from any location ensures that employees benefit from a fully integrated secure mobile print solution, printing what they want when they need it.

Blog

What is BYOD?

June 2, 2014 Caroline Leave a comment

Have you noticed how many of us in the workplace are using our own tablets, phablets and smart devices to manage our day to day work loads?

Meeting with a client recently, I was knocked out by the sheer numbers of employees working on tablets, iPads and smartphone devices as we passed through the various departments en route to the customer’s office.

When we sat down I couldn’t help but ask the question, ‘do you have a BYOD policy in place?’

He looked at me puzzled, ‘what do you mean, like an I.T. systems processes and security document or policy? I don’t think so came the reply, why would we need that for people who bring their own gizmos in to the office?’

Which lead me very nicely to this week’s article.

What is BYOD?

Bring your own device, (BYOT) bring your own technology, (BYOP) bring your own phone and (BYOPC) bring your own pc refers to the policy of allowing employees to bring their own personal mobile devices – laptops, tablets and smart phones to the work place and use them to access privileged company information and applications.

BYOD is having a significant impact in the business world and in countries like Brazil and Russia 75% and 44% in developed countries are already using their own devices in the workplace.

BYOD became prominent in 2009 when Intel commercially recognised the rise of employees bringing their own devices into work and connecting to their corporate network. BYOD gained momentum in 2011 when I.T. services provider Unisys and software vendors VMware and Citrix Systems shared their understanding of the future impact of the BYOD trend.

With emerging technologies and the growth trend in smart phone and mobile devices, I.T. departments have their hands full trying to keep on top of technology changes let alone implementing a BYOD security policy.

Employees are increasingly wanting to use their own devices to access corporate data in the work and at home empowering workforces to work on any device of their choosing accessing corporate emails from iPhones or view and edit documents on a tablet.

Organisations view this as part of the evolution of their workforce allowing employees to infuse their work load with their own technology.

What about security and the very infrastructure of an organisation’s I.T.?

BYOD is ‘enabling’ employees but this flexibility could jeopardise a company’s I.T. security if it is not regulated.

Why has BYOD risen to prominence?

Many of us already own a laptop, a smartphone or tablet. We use this technology readily in our homes whether it is accessing work related documents or for our own pleasure and we use it socially, it seems only natural to take our own devices into the workplace and use them there as well.

Familiarity with the device makes it easier to access and retrieve information and with time constraints speed and efficiency is key to our work-life balance.

These devices are newer and more advanced than those deployed by I.T. departments and the adoption of ultra lightweight notebooks, chrome books, iPads and large screen phones are having a major effect on the way people work.

Isn’t it safe for I.T. departments to refuse the use of BYOD?

What are the advantages of BYOD?

The advantages of a BYOD strategy include employee satisfaction enabling employees to work more flexibly.

There are also the cost savings for the company by not having to provide hardware, software licensing and device maintenance or funding a second device.

Employees are happier and and work faster because they are familiar with their device and are more likely to up date their device more frequently than those funded by a company.

Employees have invested in technology they want to use, it also means that employees don’t have to look after two devices increasing the risk of security mishaps.

Cost savings are negligible because the cost of purchasing the device has shifted to the employee who is also likely to be responsible for data service charges as well.

What are the disadvantages of BYOD?

Businesses need to consider the wider picture of allowing employees access to corporate data on personal devices where they have little or no control.

BYOD raises these issues like what data can employees access and what security measures are in place if an employee’s own device is lost or stolen?

Security and the loss of devices with limited password protection can increase the risk of threats from unauthorised intrusion from hackers and viruses.

Some employees will be unwilling to use their own devices or invest their own money in technology. With mobile devices replacing company provided laptops employees will expect their employer to bear the cost of the new devices.

Companies need to be able to have the resources in place to support BYOD safely and operate a meaningful BYOD security policy.

They may even have to support a private appstore for maximum control.

Although some of the costs are negated by hardware spend being reduced, it could end up costing more for a company to integrate and support too diverse a range of devices – think IOS and Android operating systems, the latter having a number of different versions of the operating system.

Companies will have little say over what and how employees will use their own devices.

Whether a company plans for it or not the best scenario is the implementation of approved hardware and software applications giving I.T. retention over how and what gets printed or accessed from personally owned devices.

How we respond differentiates us from the competition and ensures that our reputation remains in tact.

The way we manage customer issues can and does have a huge impact on customer retention and acquisition.

Factor in social media and the internet and this figure can rocket skywards.

A customer complaint usually heralds an anxiety attack, the hands sweat and the mind slips into child like psychology ‘what have I/we done wrong now’ and it can often result in it being costly to resolve, time consuming or worse, more trouble.

Here are DPMs 10 top tips to give great customer service.

I’m having a bit of moan. I’ve been inundated with pushy sales emails and I was going to add some screenshots of what I mean by overbearing pretentious marketing, but thought better of it.

Marketing your brand can sometimes feel like you are committing a serial act of selling.

Creating punchy marketing content that is genuine, helpful and informative takes time to craft.

Here are five ways to make sure your content marketing is not ‘pushy’

Being able to interact with customers through multi-media channels is necessary for brands, companies and organisations to get their message out there by developing strong personal relationships with long term customers.

A brand is not just the name of a business, a product or service it’s about establishing an emotional connection with the customer.

By creating an identity and personality for your company the customers buying decision is easier because they are able to identify with the company, product, or service through association.

How do I build my brand identity using multi-media channels?

The key is making sure you stay in front of your audience so that when they are ready to buy they call or contact you.

Knowing your audience and interpreting the data from the various multi-media channel touch points provides more opportunity to gather information about customers.

Using a sign up form that is connected to anyone of their social media accounts identifies the registrant with a social profile. They are more likely to enter their personal information onto an online registration form than offering it to a call centre.

Be consistent, by this I mean any information, documentation and communication across all the multi-media channels should have the same imagery, look and feel so the customer is familiar with your brand or company.

Provide a value-add on by making sure that at each touch point the customer can engage. Make an offer, provide useful information, offer a benefit.

Engagement on multi-media channel platforms requires commitment, time, money and resources. A clear defined strategy for each platform will help determine ROI and profitability.

The most important aspect is to take into account the needs and expectations of your audience.

Setting key objectives will determine the success of your brand and organisation.

Related posts:

You name it there is often a great big white space on the document which isn’t being used either for company messages, promotions, new products or services.

Marketers are missing a great opportunity by not maximising the space they have available through print marketing.

Why limit it to ‘marketing’ only? Any customer communication requires the same carefully thought out message.

Related posts:

Where can epayslips fit in and should I be considering them as an alternative to paper slips?

Epayslips aren’t for everyone and there is a certain degree of comfort in receiving that monthly piece of paper that says I’ve been paid.

What options are there for epayslips?

What are the advantages of ‘push’ and ‘pull’ epayslips

Related posts:

How do you deliver the right messages to your audience?

What do you think?

Related posts:

89% of consumers get their ideas from a print ad, which starts them on a journey toward purchasing. Paper volumes have dropped and print is likely to be a secondary or tertiary medium but used in conjunction with cross media marketing it is extremely effective.

Research has shown that reading from a screen is 20-30% slower than reading from paper.

There you have it that is why I love print and why it has such an enduring quality for me.

It started with Carolyn, then we had Carol, then I became a Catherine to Christine then Carla followed by Cara and my favourite Cassie.

Although the company in question included personalisation in their marketing pieces they forgot to make sure the name was correct and therefore the impact was lost especially when I’d received several emails and three direct mail pieces.

What is the point of putting all the effort into marketing if one simple error minimises the impact of the message?

Bad personalisation = bad quality = questionable data?

If the personalisation in incorrect then the whole marketing campaign is jeopardised. What is a silly mistake like my example can undermine the customer impact, at worse they’ll delete the email or throw the mailpiece in the bin = lost sale = no engagement.

Just call me Catherine

The rewards of personalisation are an important part of your marketing efforts. A personalised email is likely to see click through rates upwards of 14%, the addition of a name makes the customer feel more important and is likely to increase engagement as though the email is for them and only them.

How do you optimise personalisation?

Finally keep calling me Christine and see what your response rates are like.

Finally 49% of UK consumers think personalisation is important in their marketing messages.

How does it work?

What are the benefits?

Embracing the freedom to print from any device and from any location ensures that employees benefit from a fully integrated secure mobile print solution, printing what they want when they need it.

Related posts:

What is BYOD?

Why has BYOD risen to prominence?

What are the advantages of BYOD?

What are the disadvantages of BYOD?

The finance printing specialists