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For most print service providers running on a 12-month year, this is the time for reconciliation of year-end books. The question is, how did the book fare compared to your planned outlook. Did you make or lose money? And the real question to be answered is where will you make your income this year? What services will you offer to your customers?
The beginning of a new calendar year should be the time of assessment, and creating and implementing a plan for the upcoming year. It is the contention of many business development managers and consultants to our industry that printers should look at adding new revenue streams. Offering new solutions to your customers often strengthens and solidifies relationships, while at the same time attracts new customers to your business.
Perceived Value
Developing additional revenue streams involves taking a realistic look at how your customers perceive your identity. What is your value proposition—that is, what are you going to do to obtain new customers, and then retain them? Ask yourselves which of these statements you identify with:
- Offering the basics—speed in turnaround time, high quality, and service with reliability, and solid customer relationships.
- The single-source provider of services, ranging from creation to distribution. Offering production system equipment with supply chain management to make your clients' lives easier.
- Offering marketing or communication solutions, with options ranging from lithographic, to digital, to web-based equipment. You expand your customers' options, and help them find the best solutions for their problems.
- Helping client's reach their goals, and succeed with their own customers. You help them determine if the solutions they are looking at will really halp them grow their business, and then you monitor and improve results.
There is no correct or incorrect answer to the question. You can indentify as some or all of the above, depending on the customer market, customer type, and job application. Also, the type and size of shop you have plays a role. A print service provider can be all of these at one time or another.
If you identify with the later two statements, you are leaning toward a solutions provider, perceived as a strategic partner rather than just another service vendor.
A Good Offer
What makes these establishments different compared to a run-of-the-mill printer? The answer is in the offerings and how they are positioned. Every print service provider places a mark on a piece of paper and sells it for a price. From the customers' eyes, this is a commodity; how that mark is positioned and sold makes all the difference. If it solves a customer's problem and produces high revenue, you've sold a solution, not a mark on paper.
Variable-data printing is still growing strong, and offers a powerful solution to your customers. This involves not just the printing, but working with and managing customer databases. Many print service providers are beginning to offer variable-data, but few offer full database management services.
Looking for the Mail
Mailing services are becoming another popular addition to the printers' revenue stream. There is more of a need now than ever to bring mailing services under the printers' roof due to the one-stop shopping concept. If the print service provider can do it all, why go anywhere else? This business model has a strong attraction to the print buyer. By offering mailing you can save your customer money.
Today's mail is not tomorrow's mail. There are new postal regulations, and your staff has to understand them. The USPS has account managers to train your personnel in all the new rules, and keep you updated on all the mail equipment and processes.
Fulfilling a Need
Another great revenue stream to investigate this year is fulfillment. Many projects have multiple pieces that combine to make up the finished package. Binding, pick and pack, and distribution are all elements that can bring in huge revenue. Again, the idea is to handle and control the whole job, beginning to end.
Printing may only be a small component of the larger piece. Warehouse the rest, and fulfill as needed. And don't give the warehousing space away—it should be a chargeable item passed on the customer within the project price. This is a value-added pricing model, which we will discuss in detail next month.
Other new revenue streams are emerging in non-print offerings—CD burning and replication, digital photography, bookbinding, and Web site design. All these are elevating the traditional printer to be perceived as a solutions provider and strategic partner.
Another good place to look for new potential revenue streams is at the giant trade show drupa in Germany this coming May-June. Trade vendors will be announcing new product solutions, and print service providers can get a peek into the future of printing by viewing prototypes of what may come to market in the next four or five years.
Source: NAPL 2006 State of the Industry Report
Ed Bokuniewicz has 27 years in the graphic arts industry. Currently, he is a Business Development Specialist for Eastman Kodak Co., and an Adjunct Professor at the New York City College of Technology (CUNY), teaching a Print on Demand Class.
author: By Ed Bokuniewicz