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The search for the right web-to-print system
Even though current marketing trends usually only speak before social media, Google and SEO, the everyday life of most companies looks completely different. Although digital advertising media are being implemented more and more, the printed ones are not disappearing from the scene. Flyers, business cards or brochures are still a very important source of information today, which can be given to customers and taken home and thus reminds customers of the company in the long term. However, creating and producing these printed materials is comparatively complex and a challenge, especially for companies with many different sales and distribution partners. In order to make uniform, but individually adapted to the customer, printed matter possible for each partner, companies usually rely on a web-to-print system. This shop software digitally offers the option of simplifying and creating advertising materials and processing them transparently. In this way, the consistently high quality of individual local advertising measures can be guaranteed. In a web-to-print portal, the advertising-relevant data is processed centrally and production is carried out directly and simply, meaning that the entire development process takes place in a central shop system.
Features of a web-to-print portal
A web-to-print portal offers versatile functions that can significantly simplify the workflow in local marketing. Here, the company creates central templates (digitally editable templates) for marketing in order to release them in the shop system for partners. They can now digitally fill the material for their local marketing with their personal contact details and adapt it for local customers, resulting in individual printed matter which, despite the adjustments, meets all requirements for the company's general corporate design. By creating printed matter directly within the web-to-print portal, the products can be forwarded directly to external service providers and printing companies and printing can be carried out. This link to our own service providers enables a particularly fast and effective way of working in the production of print solutions. In addition to editing advertising material, web-to-print shop software, through integrated CRM and DAM systems, offers easy access to all required data and media and also to improve the production workflow. To ensure that all changes comply with the ideas and design of central marketing, additional approval flows can be integrated. Each company decides whether the created advertising material should be checked and approved again in the web-to-print shop, or whether it can be produced immediately after ordering. In addition to approval from headquarters, individual partners have the opportunity to digitally check their products for accuracy and the desired design through preview functions and the check of print files. In order to make approvals as fast and effective as possible, these shops are web-based and can therefore be used online and regardless of location.
Find the right web-to-print shop software
In order to select the right web-to-print shop software, it is important to take a close look at various systems and understand your own requirements. This works best by breaking down the entire process of creating advertising material in local marketing into sub-steps and examining them in more detail. Ideally, this can be combined with accompanying process cost accounting to see exactly where the web-to-print system can provide support not only in terms of time spent, but also financially. (Further information on activity-based costing can be found here.)
This detailed analysis of your own processes and wishes results in the requirements that the Web to Print Portal should meet and on the basis of which the various providers can be evaluated and selected. A checklist for choosing a web-to-print system can also be used for this purpose (here). To make sure that the right choice is made, it is also recommended to test the selected web-to-print system and evaluate the usability. Many partners will use this shop system and should ideally be able to operate it intuitively without lengthy training situations. In addition to the user interface, it is also important to analyze the system structure. Web-to-print shops with an open system structure are particularly recommended, as this allows service providers and other systems (such as DAM, CRM, etc.) to be integrated without problems. Another advantage is to choose a web-to-print system, which can be expanded to include further functions in the future, so that more can be gradually invested in the system as soon as the first positive effects can be identified. Shops that can be accessed online also offer in many cases more flexible solutions for partners' local marketing. In general, however, choosing the right web to print portal depends on the structure, working methods and marketing activities of your own company and local partners.
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