Are You Ready?

As I got ready for a run this morning, I was reminded how prepared you have to be each time you head out the door. Since I was getting up early, I even laid out my running gear last night, so I could quickly get ready and be on my way without delay. Shoes: check. Running attire: check. Hat: check. Windbreaker: check. iPhone case for arm: check. Water: check. Running buddy: check. Even though I use the same type of gear every time I run, there have been improvements in gear, shoes, and even technology with all the super-cool running apps out there to track your run with maps, time, calories, etc.

As a marketer, are you ready to help your company grow its sales? BPI Media Group has the "gear" to help you get out the door and capture those sales. If you need the help of a "buddy," BPI would gladly help. We can help you choose the gear that you need whether it's deciding if print on demand with digital printing could help you save cost and provide an efficient solution for your distribution channels or aid in creating design or even just templates for personalized options. Our technology with Kodak Insite proofing system can help you shave time off your production schedule, and our cross media campaigns (including purls, sms text, email, direct mail and QR codes) can help you track the results of your campaign in real time.

So as you plan your next marketing campaign, let us help you with get prepared. Working together, we can help you have a better campaign or project to execute and assist your company in boosting sales.

Until next time...Elizabeth

BPI's Ladies of Print

Tuesday, October 9, 2012 was National Girls Who Print Day! I'd like to take this opportunity to recognize the other ladies of print at BPI Media Group who I work alongside.

My long-time friend and mentor, Wendy Sherrod, has been with BPI Media Group for 22 years.

She is fiercely driven and takes excellent care of her customers. This shows by how many of her customers have been loyal for such a long time. Wendy's experience at BPI transcends that of most as she has gone through the changes in technology seeing film fall by the way side as the digital world of printing closes the gap on traditional printing methods. Her knowledge of "how things work" in print bring something special to client meetings because she sees things from a start-to-finish perspective and offers good insight when planning a project.

One of our newest additions to the team at BPI, Ann Dunaway, has been with us a few months, but she is very eager to help our sales team reach new heights! Ann's positive attitude and sales & marketing experience give her insight into her customers' plans for a campaign or strategy.

Ann says, "I am still fairly new to the industry, but I thoroughly enjoy learning everything that our company is able to do! We have many different services to offer that can truly help our customers be successful. It is a great feeling to know that you were able to help someone in their success!"

Other ladies who rock at BPI are our customer service team of Pam, Jolie and Angie--without them, we would be lost. We have several other awesome ladies on our team at BPI who help us make things happen: Renee (specialty products), Susan (accounting), Jan (prepress), Leisa (creative design team), Doris (mail and fulfillment) and Judy (shipping). Don't get me wrong, we have some great guys working with us at BPI to make it happen, so take a look at our staff page to learn about all of the team members.

Just a shout-out to all the ladies of BPI who are seldom recognized for all their hard work! They have each taught me so much over the past eleven+ years, and I'm sure the learning will continue as we learn and grow together in the print industry. Celebrate Girls Who Print every day!

Until next time...Elizabeth

What Does BPI Stand For?

One of the biggest questions we were asked yesterday at the Greenville Business Expo was "what does BPI stand for?" Well, here's our version of what it means and what we have to offer.

B-BRANDING. We can help maintain your corporate branding through templated print on demand and an image library.

P-PERSONALIZATION. Creating 1:1 communications with your customers and prospects can lift your response rates.

I-INTEGRATION. We have the tools to create integrated campaigns, so you can use multiple channels within a campaign to reach your customers and prospects.

M-MOBILE MESSAGING. We can help with sms and mobile messaging to create contests, sign-ups, etc with your customers who are mobile savvy (and who isn't these days?).

E-EMAIL BLASTS. Using complementary graphics as your printed pieces, we can set up email marketing messages to your customers and prospects and even version them, so that they receive unique messages and offers based on their buying patterns.

D-DIRECT MAIL. With two mail machines in house and trained staff on how to manage lists to get the best postage rates, we can process your mail quickly to get it in the mailboxes of your customers.

I-INVENTORY MANAGEMENT. With our online storefront, managing inventory of your collateral, stationery, promo items, etc is easier than ever. Reports keep track of real-time inventory.

A-ANALYTICS (data). Need to mail to a very, very specific demographic? We can analyze your current data to determine the criteria of those who buy from you to get a "good list" for you to target.

G-GENERATE sales. With print and other forms of media, we can help you create campaigns that will not only improve your ROI but also boost more sales from qualified leads.

R-REPORTING. Our storefront system has reports available 24/7, so you and your team can view order history, inventory levels and user groups.

O-ONLINE and web marketing. Our web development team can help with your website to make it fully optimized to boost your online traffic and sales.

U-UNBELIEVABLE customer service. Our CSR team are there to help answer questions, troubleshoot, track and manage each project from start to finish.

P-PRINTING. The premise of BPI Media Group is our flexibility of printing services ranging from long runs on our offset presses to shorter, personalized runs on our digital device.

I look forward to hearing form you to see how BPI can help you! Until next time...Elizabeth

Keep Your Eye on the Prize

What exactly is the prize? The customer or prospect to gain, retain, persuade or thank, that's who is the prize. We each have these prizes in our scopes on a daily basis (I know I sure do!), so how do you keep the focus on them and market to them in the way that will be most rewarding? We at BPI Media Group have a few tips on how to stay focused on the customer and learn which channels they use and which ones are used for various things.

So, you know your customers are on facebook, twitter, shop online and have email accounts and mailboxes. How do you know which messages or offers to send through which channels? Here's a short list of 5 ways to help with this marketer's pain point and keep your eyes on the prize(s) of customers and making them happy and engaged customers.

1. Do your homework. You've got to research to find out who is your target or idea customer. You can do this by creating a customer profile and then break that down into segments. Doing so provides valuable insight into how to reach them and what types of messages and offers work best for each segment. For example, when I'm calling on prospective customers, I break them into vertical markets (manufacturers, education, banking, service, etc). This helps me know what has worked well in the past for reaching out to customers who are in these vertical markets. BPI's data mining services can be a real asset in lead generation and conversion once you've identified your ideal customer.

2. Customize your strategy. Of course you wouldn't want to send out mass mailers to all customers and hope for the best, so you come up with a marketing strategy that involves several channels using the channel for each message and prospect that seems best based on your homework. Carefully consider which channel is best for the segments of prospects and which digital printing method would best fit. Segmentation and personalizing your messages are key to keep the communication strong with your customers and prospects. Click here for some of the benefits of personalized print and how relevant and engaging messaging can help boost your ROI.

3. Break the mold. Don't just do what's comfortable and what has always been done. Sometimes it is a good thing to change up your messaging as well as the channels in which they are delivered. When you review your customers buying patterns, you'll most likely be able to tie the actions to some sort of message or offer. When did mail work best? Email? Social media? Landing pages? By reviewing customer history, you learn more than just how many orders were placed in a time frame, this info can serve as a valuable tool in planning your marketing.

4. Shhh...and Listen to the data. Were the responses to your messaging and channels in which they were delivered well received, opened, responded to? If the answer is yes, then do more of the same to that segment; if the answer is no, are there similar segments who responded better to direct mail or email messaging? With BPI's integrated marketing campaigns, you can alter your messaging on the fly. Need to change the art because it's just not working? No problem. Need to add an email blast to accompany the direct mailer? No problem. That's one of the biggest benefits of digital printing with BPI.

5. Measure! This last step is just as crucial as any of the previous four steps, if not even more so. By tracking what works, you can keep up with the evolving way your messages need to go out and to whom. Since there's no one sure-fire way to reach ALL customers and prospects, we have to mix it up and measure what works best and alter the plan from time to time. Tracking the ROI for each campaign and its channels are key in knowing not only how, but when to deliver your messages and offers. BPI's online dashboard even has a built-in ROI calculator. I'd be glad to show you how this works!

Using these steps can help in creating your content, timing, frequency, channel, etc. of your marketing messages. Please give me a call or leave a message here if you would like to know more about how BPI Media Group can help utilize our solutions to yield a better ROI for your company. To read more on 5 Ways to Focus on the Customer, click here.

Until next time...Elizabeth

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