Graphic Services Score 4.2 of 5

We recently conducted our annual survey of graphic services customers. First of all, my sincere thanks to everyone who participated: nearly 300 of you took the time to answer our questions and we are grateful. We have pored through the results and read through every single word of your comments. Thanks to everyone who wrote critical feedback: we want to solve the issues you have had with using our services and make it easier and better for you. Our team is also responding to individual respondents with any concerns or issues.

And of course, every word of positive feedback encourages our team and makes us happy, and we’re grateful for your appreciation.

So, how did we fare?

Retail Client Achieves 65% Lower Costs and Half the Turn Time

A design our team created for this client

We support several retail clients and their print design needs: in-store signage, flyers and image editing for product images on their websites are some typical products we work on. One of our clients is a leading grocery and pharmacy retailer with 2,500 stores, 140,000 employees and several well-known brands. In addition, the client also provides supply chain and business services to another 2,200 independent retailers. 

Cost Pressure and Inefficiency

In an innovative move designed to reduce costs, our client centralized production for the retail chains so all requests would come through corporate headquarters for better control and standardization. Yet they still needed a better way to provide support, reduce turn times and improve communication with external customers and internal design functions.

The company was outsourcing to a U.S.-based company, but the service was expensive and not meeting all their needs in the creative services segment. The company needed more productivity, lower costs and greater value for their investment.

As a result, the retailer made another breakthrough and decided to become one of the early adopters in the retail industry of business process outsourcing for advertising and media. The company selected Affinity Express, based on our reputation for transforming production for our clients, to build and operate an optimized onsite, onshore and offshore delivery platform, customized to meet the requirements of the client.

Recreating A Printed Document

From time to time we are sent scans of printed documents and asked to make changes. This may seem like a simple thing to do, but it can actually be quite challenging. Even changing a phone number can lead to a great deal of work and take many hours depending on what is provided.

Here’s an example of an order we received recently that will help me illustrate this point.

This is the front side of the postcard (I blacked out the company details)

Eight Tips on Organizing a Great Event

Event planning often falls under marketing, whether that means trade shows, client visits or corporate meetings. And if you are a small- to medium-sized business, the chances are you don’t have a budget to hire an outside firm or a consultant. We’re just back from the Affinity Express annual strategy workshop and I’m glad to say that it went quite well, from the hotel to the meals to the events. Based on this recent experience, here are some suggestions to increase the likelihood of success for your event, regardless of the type of meeting or the industry you are in.

1. Visualize the Details

This is probably the tactic that has helped me the most, especially when it comes to large events. You have to know the venues, details and agenda better than anyone. Plus, you should see them from the perspective of your participants. When you envision through how guests will enter, what they will see, what they will need and what they will expect, you can effectively cover all of the details. Your goal is to have the attendees relax and feel completely taken care of, even when you’re having a straightforward business meeting.

This is one reason why you see signs with group names and directions in hotels when there are events. Having people wander around aimlessly, wondering where they are supposed to go, is not the best start to a gathering. The annual event for the Chicago chapter of Go Red For Women was a great example of effective signage. It was a large hotel and there was no doubt where to report, check your coat, find the ballroom, etc. They answered all the questions before they could be asked (and we were proud to have helped design the signage).

Dinner was a time to relax and have more informal conversations

For our dinners around the strategy meeting, I had perused the menus and arranged for special requirements in advance. Each day, I arrived early to meet the servers, select wine and appetizers, discuss the approach with the staff and ensure everything was set up the way I wanted. Over the course of four days, my boss never started a question with, “Did you . . .?” When our guests arrived, they didn’t have to think, just enjoy themselves, which they certainly did. I’m not naming names but there was spontaneous karaoke at one point!

Coupons, Print and Online

September is National Coupon Month. Coupons have traditionally been a common and effective sales promotion technique. At Affinity Express, we often create coupons for our clients, for print or for online use.

Some coupons are handed out to the customer at the checkout counter, to encourage future visits

Companies often put in a coupon within another piece of communication, like an ad, a flyer, or a mass-mailed letter, to encourage you to take that final step and buy the product(s) that is the subject of the communication.

Working with Linked Files in an InDesign Document

What do you do when a customer provides an InDesign document for which the linked files are either missing or need to be re-linked to the document? Here are some tips.

Modified Links

If you open an InDesign file that contains linked files that were changed since the last time the InDesign file was saved, you’ll see this message.

Generating New Ideas for Blog Posts

It is blog publishing day and you are staring at a blank screen but your to-do list has reached epic proportions. All of your contributors are mysteriously offline. What can you do to get the creative juices flowing so you can post something other than a blog about writer’s block?

Here is the list I run through when all else fails.

1.     Interview Someone

I know from experience that it is almost impossible to push someone (especially someone who isn’t a professional writer or marketer) into sitting down and quickly turning out an insightful post. Instead, schedule a 15-minute call and submit questions in advance. Then take notes on the conversation. You’ll be able to ask follow-up and clarifying questions much easier this way. Then you can get some supporting research and other opinions while your subject scurries off to other tasks. You can also interview outside contacts, customers, analysts, etc. Just decide in advance what you want to know so your conversation has focus.

Learn Marketing from the Competition

How much time and effort you need to spend on marketing depends partly on what your competitors are doing. Are they doing something that you aren’t, and that might work for you? Are they getting a lot of visibility online, and you need to catch up fast? Or are they relatively clueless, and you just need to keep on doing what you’re doing?

Here are some areas you can easily look at and see how your competitors fare. All you spend is some time at your computer.

1. Website

How effective is your website versus your competitors? It’s time to find out.

The 6 Most Essential Marketing Activities

You’re a small or medium business, and your marketing team’s really small (or you don’t have one). You see so much advice around, so many things you need to do: SEO, email marketing, PR . . . where do you even start?

Believe me, I feel your pain. Always having worked in small marketing teams with a very limited budget, I know you’re expected to do a lot with next to nothing. How do you prioritize?

Below are the six most essential marketing activities that I believe every business should work on, in order of priority. So if you’re just starting out, you can start with #1 and work your way down.