April 20, 2007 -- OK, so it wasn't springtime, as I suggested in one of my pre-show articles. So sue me. Instead we got lots of rain, plenty of wind and being inside at the shiny new Boston Convention Center definitely beat being outdoors. There was a lot to see, and after a string of back-to-back meetings I'm not sure quite where to begin.

There were several new print engines to look at, and I'll get to those, but what I think is a lot more important for most print providers is how you make money with whatever flavor of machine you happen to have. Speeds and feeds, features and finishing, workflow and productivity don't mean a thing if you aren't keeping jobs flowing to those fancy boxes. And that requires sales and marketing.

HP, Kodak and Xerox have all invested substantial resources in creating, developing, producing and making available an incredible array of resources designed to help the owners of iGens, Indigos and NexPresses be more successful in driving business to those machines. They have different approaches and tools, but all are readily available to any customer who has the good sense to take advantage of them.

Targeting Customers

For example, Kodak's Bob Barbera showed me the new Targeted Sales Module (TSM) that's part of the company's MarketMover program. Everyone who wants to sell anything and plans to do some direct marketing needs to know who to reach out to with their message. So if you're selling marketing communications services (including printing), how do you identify the companies and individuals you need to reach? The TSM is designed to help. Say you want to reach manufacturing companies within a given radius of your facility. That can be a pretty wide net, so break it down to smaller parts, such as electronic components, engineered plastics, or metal fabrication. This is what TSM helps you do. It gives access (in one year increments) to databases of companies in a myriad of industries and categories that can be sorted at the zip code level or within a user specified radius of a zip code. Point, click, and up come all the companies that  match the criteria you selected--names, addresses, phone numbers. A few more clicks and you also get all the publications and trade shows in that industry. The pubs you can use for advertising (or to buy names) and trade shows are terrific lead generators for your company.

So what can a printer  do with this newfound info? Barbera showed me. There are an assortment of marketing templates, from brochures, to postcards, to open house and trade show graphics, all designed with a given industry in mind. And don't worry if you  aren't familiar with the nuances of a given industry. As you peruse the different vertical markets included in the TSM module (manufacturing, healthcare, education, finance and insurance, and several others), you quickly find a primer on that industry, its challenges, its printing needs and more, so your sales team can go in armed and ready with questions, ideas and more to aid in doing the type of consultative sales that bring in new digital print business.

Knowing which companies to call on and having insights into the typical needs of their industry gives any sales person an edge, either on a cold call or in developing a direct mail campaign. This module of MarketMover is worth a closer look for any print provider who is looking for a way to identify new prospects--and who want an edge in turning them into customers.

Identifying the Profits

I also checked in with Gina Testa, the diva of business development tools at Xerox, who gave me a quick rundown on several new resources the company has added to its ProfitAccelerator program. One of the foundations of this program was a tool called ProfitQuick, originally in the form of a Excel spreadsheet, into which data could be entered and calculations made that showed not only whether a given job would be profitable, and if it was not, how it could possibly be modified to produce acceptable revenue. The tool was well thought out, but could be complex to use as jobs became more involved. No more. A new version of ProfitQuick was shown in Boston as a technology demo, but it will soon to land on a computer screen near you, should you wish to take advantage of it. ProfitQuick is a financial modeling tool that assists customers better understand the return on their digital investment and now focuses on the complete workflow, not just the pages that come off an iGen or Nuvera. This is an important shift in  an age where print is may be only one part of the job.

The demo in Boston showed a simplified process of creating job estimates, reporting of output for individual jobs and then digs deeper to provide an "Impact Assessment" of a new workflow in executive-level financial reports. This enables business owners, operations managers and other executives to see just how efficient changes made to their operations really are--and where any weak points might be. And it shows it not just in numbers but in easy to understand graphics. In a time when saving (or not saving) increments of time in multiple places in an operation can show up on the bottom line, this is a valuable tool have at hand.

But this is not a cold, one-size-fits-all module. To fine tune it, a Xerox workflow and operations expert visits a customer's location and walks key jobs through the shop as a way of analyzing the workflow. They then recommend a digital workflow that should reduce costs and save time. Real world performance is then measured, based on inputs to the module, to show just how well the new processes work, and they can be tweaked as needed to achieve the desired results. The key idea behind this, says Testa, is that Xerox understands customers' workflows and can help them increase productivity and realize savings in costs and operational efficiency.

That's part of the latest ProfitAccelerator story for business owners. For the sales animals there's a new audio course that introduces, explains and reinforces five key areas for successfully selling digital print. These include: Organizing a Sales Territory, Prospecting for new Customers, Making the Approach Call, Gaining the Appointment, and Handling Objections and Concerns. These are all recorded on a PlayAway audio device that sales people can listen to at their convenience, and at their own pace, as they apply what they've learned to their territories.

Capturing the Customer

I also talked with Francis McMahon from HP-Indigo about that company's Capture program, which he says has so far been used to train nearly a third of the sales people of all HP customers that have Indigo presses. According to McMahon, the program has also increased membership in Dscoop (the Indigo owner user association) by an astonishing 400 percent in the past few months.

Some of the tools include open house kits, sales training tools on a variety of levels, ways of accessing vertical markets, and more interestingly, create what McMahon refers to as "communities" of people and businesses who share certain interests. For example, creative professionals, such as photographers, graphic designers, ad agency art directors and the like have many common interests with print providers. Elements of the Capture program bring the "creatives" together with the print providers so they can share ideas, best practices, or just get acquainted, with the ultimate goal of driving the work of the creative pros to the presses of the print providers. For a company like HP, with products that span proofing (using its inkjet products) to high end print production, this enables the company to reach out to these distinct audiences in ways that promote brand awareness and give print providers an entrée to these users.

To help the printers in their own marketing, Capture has a business development kit with specific tools for effectively communicating with creatives: what to do, how to call on them, applications they are interested in , and how digital printing can help them.

Telling the Digital Story

As you can see, the biggest players are actively working to help customers build their businesses. It's all part of their recognition that telling the digital print story is critical to the success of customers and vendors alike. Executive from all these firms have told me on several occasions that while they obviously build these program to drive more impressions to their equipment, the broader mission is to drive digital print overall. They all recognize that it's too big a job to be left to print providers alone, is one that needs the financial clout and resources of the leading vendors, and that no matter which type of press a job may run on, it helps "raise the water" for every print provider and every vendor.

Yet despite the quality of these tools and the others in the Capture, MarketMover and ProfitAccelerator programs, I've still had printers complain--whine even-- that they are still not enough. Maybe those doing the complaining aren't looking closely enough at the depth of what these types of programs offer. Could they be better? You bet, and they will be. But any print provider who isn't taking advantage of tools like these today is doing a disservice to their business.

There's more to follow, so stay tuned.

Please offer your feedback to Noel. He can be reached at noel@ondemandpublishing.com.

Noel Ward is a consultant, speaker and writer focusing on digital printing strategies and content development for print and electronic media. He conducts technology audits, market research, and competitive analyses to build strategies companies use to optimize their document creation, production and distribution processes.

One of the best-known writers in the industry, Noel creates and produces white papers, case studies, speeches, presentations, marketing materials, and electronic newsletters for several industry-leading companies. He is editor and publisher of the electronic newsletter Digital Asset Directions, Executive Editor of OnDemandJournal.com, Director of RealTime Trade Show Coverage for WhatTheyThink.com, and Editor of The LeadINg Edge, the newsletter of the Imaging Network Group.

A believer in using technology to gain efficiencies and competitive advantages, Noel's business motto is "If you're not the lead sled dog, the view doesn't change."