The Most Important Way to Build Relationships with Print Communications

7/31/2018

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Every company, regardless of the products sold or services performed, is in the relationship business – with customers, employees, business partners and the communities where they’re located. Marketing efforts across multiple channels, including print communications, to your target markets are necessary to drive sales.

But what about the relationships you have with existing customers? How can you influence preference for and loyalty to your company through typical, day-to-day interactions that in many cases, rely on the power of print communications?

The most important thing you can do to build relationships is simple, though it challenges many organizations to get it right: Be consistent.

Having formal identity standards or design guidelines can help to keep everyone in your organization to maintain proper usage of logos and taglines, fonts and graphics. This is especially difficult, though essential, if you have multiple offices or locations.

Here are three areas in which consistency pays off:

1. Identity materials – Your company letterhead, envelopes, forms and invoices, and shipping boxes should all present a unified look. Consider that every time someone is exposed to your brand it makes an impression and builds a connection to your organization.

2. Notecards – Always thoughtful and often unexpected, a word of thanks is nice after a first, large or repeat purchase, or in appreciation of a referral. While email may be efficient and easy for broad-reaching acknowledgements, nothing tops the touch and feel of a personalized, handwritten note on high-quality stationery or a notecard with your logo embossed or foil-stamped logo on the front.

3. Newsletters – In a digital age, a printed and mailed newsletter will never be lost in inboxes that are teeming with emails. Consumers recognize the impact of print communications, saying that they are more likely to notice and read direct mail (53%) than email (26%) because it’s more tangible, they receive too many emails, and they simply prefer to read print after spending the day on a computer at work.

Bonus Tip: Pay particular attention to your tone. Whether you and your employees interact with customers on the telephone, at a counter, in person during sales calls or deliveries, or through print communications, the tone should be consistent across-the-board. Helpful and caring? Professional and trusted? Positive and supportive? A verbal and written tone that matches your company’s value proposition (What makes you, you!) helps to drive greater recognition of what you do.

Print communications are our business. Let’s talk about the many ways American Speedy Printing can assist you with elevating yours!

Joe is passionate about helping SMBs. He’s spent the last 25+ years building the American Speedy Printing Marketing • Print • Mail brand – and sharing best practices and marketing trends with his customers. Through research, in-person visits and this blog, he hopes to engage with and empower local business owners and marketing professionals.