Is there a revival in print-based marketing?

[prwhite]

Over the past decade, there has been a broad swing in marketing as we transitioned through direct mail, telemarketing, TV, radio, social media, SEO, etc. In the online world, content is king because of its ability to drive SEO results and educate unknown buyers. Xerox is offering suggestions for getting on-board this revival by mixing traditional with digital marketing.

Targeted Marketing Pieces
Ubiquitous content creates significant background noise for buyers, sellers and marketers, no matter which stage of the funnel they’re in. This manifests itself in the search for a perfect hybrid tool, recreating the re-entry point for print to filter & deliver.

Printed Catalogues
In 2007, snail-mail delivered retail & wholesale catalogues peaked at 19.6 billion. Now, a decade later, when the volume of mailed catalogues has dwindled to roughly half of that, some marketers see it as a revived & less cluttered channel that stands out from the pack. I see this happening daily.

Direct Mail
Similar to catalogues, direct mail also took a nosedive and later resurfaced as a competitive marketing channel with a significant rise between 2013 and 2016. The resurgence of direct mail is heavily attributed to the tangibility of holding an item versus simply viewing it on-screen. Direct mail is also easier to track and has a higher conversion rate for monitoring ROI.

 

[TheProcessIStheproduct]

It is a wheel or pendulum, marketers are big on “me too”, so they pushed hard digital, but at the end of the day it comes down to ROI, so I think we will see some of the all digital resellers pushing out printed direct mail and small calalogs to keep customers engaged (don’t look for the resurgence of the j.c. Penny’s type catalog)

 

[MailGuru]

It is a wheel or pendulum, marketers are big on “me too”, so they pushed hard digital, but at the end of the day it comes down to ROI, so I think we will see some of the all digital resellers pushing out printed direct mail and small calalogs to keep customers engaged (don’t look for the resurgence of the j.c. Penny’s type catalog)

What's not mentioned is, that in 2007, the USPS basically shut down all the "big" catalogs (JC Penny's, Sears, etc.) by assessing a price increase of around 300%. The big chains could no longer afford to mail out the big catalogs as the postage cost was way above budget. Interesting to note, however, that those same "big" retailers have been shutting down stores ever since, and, are constantly on the verge of bankruptcy.

Sometimes I wonder, did that choice to not pay the higher postage and just stop mailing the big catalogs contribute to their extreme loss of sales? Maybe their businesses would be much better off had they just bitten the bullet and paid the higher postage cost.

Some will answer, "No, it's the big internet companies such as Amazon that was the final blow".

Still, that Sears & Roebuck catalog sat on our coffee table throughout the whole year. And when something needed to be bought, or, even just putting together a wish list that would turn in to purchases when we had a little extra money, that thing came out and pages were turned like mad.

 

[David Singletary]

Very much agreed with this concept, ie mixing traditional and digital marketing metohd in print industry. This is proven facts that surely enhance print industry growth and ROI. For best result in print industry, first of all research the type of platform you are using for print commerce, their benefits, advantage disadvantage and many more.