Are You Using A Customer Portal?

[Dave Thornton]

I'm on the hunt for a web portal solution for our customers to use, and have looked at a lot of different offerings and still am having a tough time finding a good fit. I'm the IT guy for a small label printing operation that specializes in expanded content labels, and we're getting requests from customers to be able to view some pertinent info and submit order information online, and submit new art files when necessary.

From checking with our internal users, what I've determined we as a group wants is something that will allow customers (and internal users) to log in, see a list of items they have previously approved and ordered, along with pertinent info on each of those items (part number, past PO numbers & job numbers, thumbnail image, link to approved pdf, etc...). Being able to submit info to initiate a reorder of that item if they so choose is also important, as is being able to initiate a new item by submitting order information and art files. The solutions I've seen offered by vendors that cater to our industry (Esko's Web Center, Hybrid Software's GoPrint/GoProof) do more than what we're looking for -- our internal users don't necessarily need or want the online proofing bit. Our current approval system is somewhat flexible and allows our customers to do what's most comfortable for them. Most choose to use PDF files, and that works well for much of the work we do (mostly text and spot colors) so the ideal solution would feature some way to share those pdf files and allow commented files to be uploaded.

We've also looked into systems that could be integrated into our MIS system, but we're about a year or so away from changing to a different (as yet undetermined) system, so that's not a hugely critical part of the equation right now. Some of the possible systems have similar functionality built in, so part of me would like to wait, but the boss doesn't want to wait.

Any recommendations for solution that might do all that for us?

Thanks!
--
Dave

 

[Wheels]

We use Printer Presence for exactly this. Simple to set up and maintain, not expensive. You can find more info here:
PrinterPresence : Product Information : Product Features : Customer Portals

 

[B.Vespa]

I agree with Wheels. We are also using Printer Presence.

Bill

 

[Dave Thornton]

Thanks, Bill & Wheels. I had looked briefly at Printer Presence (along with a dozen or so others) and it looked promising. Hearing from others using it helps!

One question: Did you go with a package that includes Adobe PDF Ready? If so, has that worked well for you?

Thanks again!

 

[Wheels]

We don't use PDF Ready. Didn't make sense for our operation, so I can't tell you anything about it.

 

[B.Vespa]

We did go with Adobe JobReady. Most of the time we request that the customers send a PDF. So, it has been helpful, when the customer doesn't have Acrobat, especially when they are working in Publisher, PrintShop, Word, Excel or similar programs. The only issue that we have had is making sure that the customer understands that when they download and install JobReady that it will appear as a printer in their application. On occasion, customers expect it to show as an installed application and when they don't see it in their program list, they think the installation didn't work.

 

[PrintMaster]

We use Printer Presence for exactly this. Simple to set up and maintain, not expensive. You can find more info here:
PrinterPresence : Product Information : Product Features : Customer Portals

Nice! Thanks, i will try them out. I want to see how their backend looks like for the customers) ! All I see is website designs on there webpage

 

[michaelejahn]

Hi Dave,

I am biased as I work for SmartSoft - have you had someone demonstrate PressWise to you ?

 

[txcynna]

We actually use 2 customer portal outfits that offer variable data output as well as static items that just get ordered over and over with no changes. We have been slowly transferring our clients from PageDNA to Printer's Presence. When I say slowly I mean I started working here 2 years ago and they were doing it then.... We've been changing them over when a customer make a significant amount of changes to their files, such as logo redesigns and such. They don't like having to learn a new system unless they have to.

We started with PageDNA which allows for us to create the variable documents for ordering things like business cards as well as catalogs of approved files to be reordered by customer. In general PageDNA involves a lot more learning, but I think it's a fair trade for what you can do with it. Customer service is kind of lacking IMHO, I get the feeling that whoever is answering my questions is rolling their eyes and muttering under their email breath. That might be me though because I have, in the past, asked some really stupid questions with obvious answers.
Variable documents: If we need to create a new variable doc, change and existing one, or need to change how the print ready doc is imposed, we have control and can do it ourselves on our time frame.
Catalog: ridiculous easy to set up. Also you only need one jpg image for the preview and it creates the thumbnail for you with a click of a button. This may not seem like much, but when you have a catalog with more than 30 items in it, this is a heck of a timesaver. When reorders come in, the print ready file is emailed directly to the csr (or whoever you want) and prepress never sees it. As THE pre press department I really appreciate this aspect. LOL!


Printer's Presence is much prettier, the portals are much more customizable. Learning how to use it is substantially easier than PageDNA, but I think that is because of what you can't do for yourself here. Excellent customer service, always quick to answer questions and/or point you in the direction of online learning tools.
Variable documents: Anytime you want to create a new variable doc, make a change to one and/or change how the print ready comes to you, you have to fill out a form so that THEY can do it for you. The work gets done on their time so something that I can change on PageDNA in about 10 minutes will be at least a business day at PP.
Catalogs: You create BOTH the catalog image AND the thumbnail image to be uploaded which increases the amount of time you need to allow for setting up catalogs. It IS really easy to use though.

If you just want catalogs for frequent flier files they are very much similar, except for the thumbnail image generator that is available on PageDNA, which really isn't an issue unless you have TONS of catalog items to add.

So basically, PageDNA more editability. Printer's Presence Super easy to learn and use.

That's my opinion on these two and probably more than you ever wanted to know, huh? On the upside, it's useful information. to someone...

 

[Dave Thornton]

More than I wanted to know? Nope. Exactly the kind of input I was looking for, txcynna!

I went through a demo session with a rep from PrinterPresence yesterday, and was pretty impressed. I doubt the variable document thing will ever be used by us, so that's a non-issue, but it's good to hear a positive report about their customer service, and the easy to use part as well.

I hadn't looked at PageDNA before; seems to be priced similarly to PrinterPresence. Are there others that compete directly with PrinterPresence and PageDNA that haven't been mentioned in this thread?

Thanks again for sharing your experiences! Very helpful information.