A Tale of Variable Data: Preparing the Next Generation Part 2

By Cary Sherburne, Senior Editor

Part 1

April 26, 2005

RIT College of Imaging Art and Sciences

RIT’s College of Imaging Art and Sciences graduates about 600 students per year with design, print and photography majors. According to Frank Cost, Professor, Associate Dean of the College of Imaging Arts & Sciences, and Co-Director of the Sloane Printing Industry Center, students take a course sequence in digital printing that gives them exposure to variable data printing technology. Cost indicates that RIT has spent a significant amount of time and effort learning what the real applications for variable data are, including a strand of research available through its Sloane Printing Industry Center. He says, “We have done research into the tie-in to customer relationship management (CRM) and customized marketing programs that makes variable data printing of value. Our faculty is well informed about the challenges, current capabilities, what people have done in the marketplace—and what has been successful. They also understand what kinds of changes have to occur in the macro economy before variable data really takes off.”

Cost reports that RIT’s previous focus was almost entirely on the technologies for print and related fields, but they now realize that technology is only meaningful when people pick it up and do something with it. He says, “All of the promise of variable data was built on a premise that may or may not have been valid—these capabilities were offered to a market that didn’t ask for it. The same thing happened at the birth of digital printing. People weren’t asking for that either.”

Cost and his team believe that the growth of variable data has been hampered by market perceptions. “The term ‘variable data’ has been associated with personalizing junk mail,” he says. “I have never believed that will have the kind of impact a lot of people have projected. The market doesn’t sit still. Consumers are not out there being the same year after year, and everyone knows a sales play when they see it. The impact of being able to dazzle me with the fact that you know about me—I don’t think that will be the key driver. What I do think is that the technology will be used to meet my needs without being obvious, because I have expressed an interest, a desire, or asked for something. Developing sophisticated ways of communicating is not simply a matter of having the technology.”

Cost points out that it is rare that the developer of a technology will understand how it is ultimately going to be used. He says, “Whoever developed instant messaging technology could never have dreamed of the way my 14-year-old daughter is using it. Most of the prognostication, largely by vendors, about the way a technology is going to be used is pretty unrealistic. That is not the way life evolves.”

Cost agreed with Josefowicz’ position relative to the importance of having trained communicators making an effort to build community, with variable data printing as one of the tools available to them. Under Cost’s leadership, RIT is working on building case studies that are grounded in research as opposed to marketing case studies promoting a product or service. He admits that this type of data is hard to come by, with companies often reluctant to disclose what they consider as proprietary results.

Cost also expressed concern about vendor reaction if we don’t see the anticipated growth in volumes for digital print that variable data appears to enable. He said, “With something like digital print, you have companies that have plowed billions into the technology. But to get where we need to be, they have to stay in the game. The big question is whether the timing is right from an infrastructure perspective.” He also points out that intelligent targeting with one-to-many customized communications might be a better short-term bet than pure personalization for many applications.

Translating this into how the next generation of graphic arts professionals is being educated, Cost said, “We want our students to have a very broad view of the world of communications—to understand what the driving forces are, what people are trying to accomplish, and then to have a good understanding of the capabilities of the various technologies for connecting organizations with audiences. We also want them to be able to think intelligently about the selection process—how does one choose the appropriate mix of approaches, how do they work together, and how do they reinforce one another in a cohesive media mix. We want our students to be good at acquiring knowledge about technology and to be able to quickly learn what the capabilities of any one technology are, but to be more focused on what people are trying to accomplish.

As Cost explains it, technology in the past was so challenging and difficult that you could spend all of your time trying to solve problems. RIT turned out students that were competent in dealing with the difficult issues of putting technologies together and making them work. “In the last decade,” he says, “those issues have become less challenging. Our students will have enough exposure to technology to have the full palette in front of them. But their focus will be on the problem—what are you trying to accomplish and how can you apply technology to do so. It is a much more intelligent program today than it was a decade ago.”

RIT uses XMPie software in its teaching labs, as well as Atlas PrintShop Mail as an entry level solution; and Yours Truly from HP Indigo in the Printing Applications Lab.

Cost shared with us that he is in the final stages of publishing a book designed to paint a picture of what print might look like as our industry moves into and beyond the second decade of the Internet Age. Titled The New Medium of Print: Material Communication in the Internet Age, and due out in May 2005, the book presents his perspective on the new medium of print and will provide good insight to an industry that is not used to questioning its inherent value, as well as act as a print primer for people who know nothing about the printing industry.

Clemson University Department of Graphic Communications

Clemson is also working to put more grounded, relevant and quantified research results into the marketplace but takes a different approach in its teaching methodology. To wrap up this series, we spoke with John Leininger, a Professor in the Department of Graphic Communications at Clemson University and named by the Electronic Document Sciences Foundation (EDSF) as 2004’s Educator of the Year for Higher Education. Clemson graduates 100-125 students per year from its program.

Leininger indicates that Clemson had been studying and teach variable data without access to the actual tools. A vendor donated a variable data application to the school about three years ago, and Leininger realized how much more learning took place with the hands-on experience, including the fact that the software at the time was not particularly easy to learn. He says, “I went to every conference, every seminar, and I really thought I understood it. I always thought of it as glorified mail merge, but when they came to train us, I found out how complex the process truly can be.”

Leininger set about developing a traveling training program, based in large part on the generosity of 20 sponsors that have invested in the program by contributing funds, donating software and purchasing computers. The program has been presented nearly 40 times. He felt a program of this nature was critical to expanding the knowledge about 1:1 communications throughout the industry. At the same time, students participating in these programs learn first-hand—not only about variable data software and how it is used in the field, but also some basic life skills they may not have had experience with before, like the process involved with renting a car. Leininger says, “Our mission at Clemson is to develop practical, problem solving people for the printing, imaging, packaging and affiliated industries in the graphic arts. We have learned how important it is to be hands-on. Every one of my students has to travel with me to one or more of these sessions as part of gaining that hands-on experience.”

Through this program, students and those attending field programs have access to a broad array of variable data packages, including software from XMPie’s uDirect and Personal Effects, Atlas PrintShop Mail, Meadows DesignMerge, PageFlex MPower, Creo Darwin, Datalogics, Group One’s Doc1, PDF Express from LexGraph and BCC Software’s Mail Manager 2010. Students come in to the variable data experience with an academic background in communications design.

Leininger sees variable data tools falling into three general categories, each of which requires different skills. The first category is the entry-level package that incorporates its own artboard, such as PrintShop Mail; the second works in the PDF medium; and the third works within native applications such as Quark or InDesign. Leininger is a strong believer in the importance of students learning through the development of real jobs. For his students, there are three types of jobs they must complete. The first job is a mailer; the second is a piece of marketing collateral that would be created to go along with a mailing, such as thank you cards for people that have helped at a conference. And third, they must create some type of communication using variable data that would be used inside a corporate structure, like a benefits package. He says, “Not everything is marketing or mailing oriented.” He also points out that workflow and scripting are important in the production of variable data and are explicitly included in the curriculum.

In terms of improving research availability on the effects of using variable data, a Clemson doctoral student has conducted what Leininger believes is the only statistically controlled study on this subject, and plans to conduct the research in a bigger group this summer.

Leininger is teaching is students that in most companies that start to work with variable data, particularly smaller quick and commercial printers, there is one person that is usually driving the effort. That person is innovative and wants do something new to make a mark. He says, “Within the variable data effort, there are four distinct job tasks: database management, design, print production and marketing/sales of the services. We are trying to turn out students that can be that innovator, are not afraid to try something new, and can competently perform all four tasks. We tell them, when the operation is big enough to add another person, they should pick the task they like least and add someone who can do that.”

The New Generation

These three institutions provide good insight into what is happening in the world of graphic arts education with respect to the variable data challenge. They represent three different approaches, but all have the same end goal: They want to develop communications professionals who understand how to apply technology to build community and improve communications. They are a performing an important service for our industry, which desperately needs bright, new talent to carry us successfully into a future that will be dramatically different from the past we are used to and in which variable data is likely to play an increasing role as the variable data Perfect Storm continues its ripple effect on the field of communications.

This report was written by Cary Sherburne. She can be reached via email at cary@sherburneassociates.com, online at www.sherburneassociates.com and by telephone at 603-430-5463.

-- Click here to tell us what you think about this premium feature
-- Click here to read recent comments from our readers