A lot of account managers and sales persons are reluctant to get on board of the ongoing evolution in the direction of web2print solutions. They fear that an online solution for ordering prints might interfere with their contact with the customer. And that contact is needed to guarantee more orders in the future.
Out of the box
Even with out of the box web2print storefronts (of which we offer a few to our customers), we see that these concerns are largely unfounded. In most cases the web2print application results in more efficient and relevant communication. Most of the routine communication is replaced by a web interface, leaving more resources for quality time.
But there might be some reason for concern when going for an out of the box solution. In the old situation, you might have had a synergie going with the customer that was hard to replace. They knew your phone number, they knew when you were available or when not, and they understood how to work with you. It was a long habit of cooperation. But by using an out of the box web2print solution to optimize this communication, the customer has also changed some of their internal processes. And by doing so, it becomes much easier for him to start working with another printing company that happens to use the same out of the box solution.
Customized functionalities
That's why most of our customers tend to go for custom applications. They either start from scratch (using the existing components, of course) or use one of the supplied solutions as a starting point. And all of that results in a new application, with often very unique functionalities.
This approach can be followed once (or a limited number of times) to create a solution specializing in functionalities needed for a large group of customers. A printing company focussing on international organizations will focus on different functionalities than a printing company that mainly works with consumers or small businesses. Different types of output also require different workflows. The printing company can choose to use their own market knowledge to differentiate from all of their competition in a generic way, which requires only a single project of custom development. Afterwards, adding new customers can be a matter of minutes to create a new login (and even a new skin for the storefront).
But the same approach is even more powerful when it is used for individual customers. Rather than working with a web2print interface that is optimized for their type of business, the customer can then work in a solution that is optimized for their exact workflow. There are few ways better than this to guarantee future business. Being replaced by another printing company is much less evident in such a situation.
Increasing the amount of participants
Both out of the box solutions and customized solutions typically result in an increased amount of end users. Rather than having a single contact at your customer's organization, the tool is open to a large number of end users. Personal contact still takes place with the marketing or purchasing departments, but at the same time dozens, hundreds or thousands of end users in the organization can use the tools to create online orders in the web2print storefront.
And this is not limited to order placement. Printing companies can also offer more database publishing oriented workflow to their customers. A brochure might normally be planned by the marketing department by communicating with purchasing, product management, etc. This results in a briefing file for the printing company. By offering a simple solution which the marketing department can use to create initial PDF files even during the planning stage, more stakeholders are influenced by the output of the printing company's server. And with a bit of luck, this could result in a complete planning, creation and approval workflow where each stakeholder in the customer's organization can easily log in to accomplish their tasks.
Additional communication
Increasing the amount of people who are in direct contact with the printing company has some additional advantages. The web2print or database publishing solution can also be used as a platform for additional communication to all end users. Promotions, new marketing opportunities, temporary offerings can all be communicated in a structured way. This can be done by means of email, but also by incorporating it in the application interface. In most cases the marketing department will be more than happy with this because of the additional promotional activities by their end users.
Becoming indispensible
So while communication with customers definitely changes when starting to use web2print applications, they can easily be created to solidify your position. Whether it is for a single large account or for a large group of customers, you can definitely find a way to become indispensible.