Print Media is not dead
There is a great deal of talk about Print Media being dead. To a great marketing agency, these mumblings can be advantageous to a Print Marketing campaign. There are a number of tools and good deal of sentiment available to an underdog.
Regardless of the critic’s prognosis, 56% of all consumers still trust print marketing more than any other advertising method.
The overlooked reality is that print sources have loyal followings. Print media can reach a demographic that still doesn’t interact with the online realm. And print media is no longer relegated to unengaged paper campaigns alone.
Make It Personal: Variable Data Printing (or Variable Information Printing)
Advancements in printing technologies have allowed for cheap solutions to personalization in print marketing. It’s easy to personalize items online – people expect this level of engagement from an internet that they know is tracking a great deal of their personal information. But when the public sees on-point personalization in a print campaign, they can’t helped but be intrigued.
Audiences are surprised that this stone-aged medium has upped its game to interact with them in a more intuitive and modern manner. Feeling even a tinge of the unexpected is often enough to intrigue the public, which translates to being more engaged with the marketing.
There have been significant improvements to Variable Data Printing/Variable Information Printing (VDP/VIP) since Mail Merge broke out on the scene. Some minor, but effective changes include:
addressing consumers by name in ad content, or otherwise referencing aspects relevant to each recipient
uniquely tagged coupon codes/pins to track which customers used them alterable imagery to suite different demographics or to build a series motif campaign
Make An Impression: Printing On New Mediums
Print Marketing has a tactile advantage over its digital counterparts. There is a brevity and oversaturation online that can prevent your message from sticking or from being noticed in the first place. And while print mediums are becoming more scarce, a number of benefits from the strategy remain relevant.
Placing logos and business information on real world materials other than paper has proven extremely effective. Brand and logo recognition spreads visually in the same manner as word of mouth. The idea is to make your company as visible as possible for as long as possible to penetrate potential customers conscious and subconscious.
Whereas digital marketing passes quickly and becomes lost in an endless archive of information, and where paper campaigns are held only until the recycling goes out, printing on merchandise drastically ups the odds that your company’s vital information will stick around for a while. If you select merchandise items that are beneficial to the recipient, it has the added effect of associating your company with helpfulness. Potential customers will think of your services whenever they use that pen, or lend out that flashdrive. They will associate your company with extra effort and usefulness.
Make New Friends: Combining Print With Other Marketing Strategies
Print, because of its real world presence and tactile benefits, continues to serve a complementary function to other branches of your business’s marketing strategy. Having printed materials accompany online campaigns and promotions provides an enticing form of augmented reality for the consumer. People like to hold information in their hands. They like the option of referencing things by touching them. And often, tacticity aids in learning, which is helpful when asking people to recall your product and remember your company.
Since the internet allows for ample advertising space, drawing a customer online will expose them to more of your services. Space is limited in print media, but because of it’s staying power it can continually advertise a cross-section of company information and platforms with single pieces of vital information all in one place: URLs, contact info, physical address, profile specs. Print media cheaply and effectively casts a net for maximum amount of potential audiences and interconnected platforms. It has a tendency to linger in both private and public spaces, staying around as long as the information is relevant.
Make Use Of The Underdog Status: Using Print’s Unique Benefits To Your Advantage
We are inundated with online marketing materials for hours out of the day. Such saturation makes it easy to overlook a company’s online campaign. People check emails repeatedly, ads flash by newsfeeds like background noise. But only once a day do people retrieve their snail mail. Posters and other print media are usually positioned in front of the public in situations where they are made to wait and look around – reception areas, lineups, bus stops. Print marketing stands out in situations where the public has reason to linger on it longer.
There’s a versatility available to print media marketing that’s hard to obtain through any other medium. And it no longer has to take the shape of paper and ink alone.The effects of touching something, of storing it in drawer for easy reference, of reading it in an established and trustworthy magazine should not be ignored. Print mediums may be on the decline, but the effectiveness of Print Media Marketing is certainly not following suit.
Knowing the history of Print Marketing, the demographic of recipients, and its current pros and pitfalls is a marketing agency’s job. CM2 Media understands that businesses need to match their marketing campaigns to their business size and to their industry trends. There is ample experience and information at our fingertips to tailor your company a strategy that keeps you on the proverbial (and literal!) front page.
Contact us today if you would like to find out how we can help with your print marketing needs:
Care to read more about print marketing? Read this blog: Print Marketing: The Relevancy of a Relic.