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Print veterans weigh in on web-to-print technology
By LaShell Stratton
Print providers interviewed for the web-to-print issue share observations and helpful hints on how to build effective platforms for customers.
"Printers now know that they don't have to take on the marketing arm. The agencies and firms can do it for themselves. Each of us can focus on our core competencies." |
Embracing Web-to-Print Does Not Mean You Have to Embrace a “Marketing” Identity
Dave Minnick, chief technology officer at Consolidated Graphics Group Inc., Houston, says that “printers are becoming something that they weren’t before,” because of web-to-print applications. “They are turning into marketing firms.” Minnick realizes that 1-to-1 marketing and VDP applications have to follow a complete cycle. “It has to be recorded and tracked through coupons and barcodes,” he says. “It’s very high-level in the way that customers traditionally think about direct mail. Some marketing firms have even started to buy digital equipment in order to offer clients the all-in-one solution.” But now things are changing. “It’s almost come full circle,” Minnick says. “Printers now know that they don’t have to take on the marketing arm. The agencies and firms can do it for themselves. Each of us can focus on our core competencies.”
"If the web site looks like their intraweb, people find it more comfortable. It promotes a friendlier end user experience." |
A Web-to-Print Site Identical to Your Customer’s Site Is More Effective
Some companies that offer web-to-print solutions offer a stock web site that looks the same to all of its end users. Other print providers try to create web portals that look like each of its clients’ web sites. Sometimes they do it because the customer doesn’t want anyone to know which vendor is hosting the site or the customer wants to protect its brand identity. Eric DelColle, director of technology at Modern International Graphics, Eastlake, Ohio, finds the “one size fits all” approach to web-to-print site building less effective. For that reason, Modern International makes the portals of its web-to-print sites look almost identical to its star clients’ websites, keeping even the color and toggle buttons consistent. “If the web site looks like their intraweb, people find it more comfortable,” he says. “It promotes a friendlier end user experience.”
“I think predictions of the demise of offset are like the predictions that we’ll one day be a paperless society: it’s never going to happen.” |
Web-to-Print Does Not Spell the End of Offset Printing
Many print providers envision web-to-print going hand-and-hand with digital printing. But several companies still use their offset presses for web-to-print applications. VistaPrint CEO Robert Keane says his company uses its offset presses for 80 percent of the thousands of orders that come through the company’s web site. Other companies create shells of pieces on offset presses and add the variable information later on their digital presses to save money.
Brian Frank, executive vice president of PrintManagement in Cincinnati, says the likelihood of web-to-print leading to the end of offset is farfetched. “Personally, I think predictions of the demise of offset are like the predictions that we’ll one day be a paperless society: it’s never going to happen,” Frank says. “Whether you use digital or offset in web-to-print completely depends on the application. We still see a lot of letterhead and business cards produced on offsets. And in some cases you have to use an offset because companies can’t use something digitally produced in their laser printers. The great thing about digital equipment is that it can get rid of obsolescence and you can insert more variables, but there will always be a place for offset.”
LaShell Stratton is assistant editor at Print Solutions magazine. Email comments to lstratton@PSDA.org.