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Is Indigo the Island's new spam killer?
THERE is certainly a lot of excitement around internet-based technologies and communications as the turnout for the Chartered Management Institute event at the Hilton proved.
I have been so focused on this that I kind of lost track of what is happening in more traditional areas.
But, back in the mid-90s, I bought a load of print for clients and was involved in Royal Mail's publicity campaign to promote direct mail as a communication medium.
It is safe to say that I knew a fair amount about these subjects. But then the commercialisation of the internet came about and my career took another direction. I had not given the subject much thought in years — until last week that is.
I sat down for a chat with Bridson and Horrox's Darren Horrox to talk about the Isle of Man's latest printing innovation — the HP Indigo Digital press. I guess I shouldn't be surprised at how much printing technology has come along in 10 years, but I was still impressed.
There were no muddy colours here, which was reassuring as I still shudder at the memory of a 'stop the presses' colour crisis back in 1997. Yikes!
Indigo apparently uses special liquid ink technology to make sure that colour is accurate.
I saw a couple of samples and couldn't see any difference between the Indigo's output and things printing on an offset press. No laser printer I've seen can touch it in terms of production quality.
This degree of accuracy is down to the folks at HP working very closely with Pantone — owners of the global industry standard colour palette.
In addition, Indigo has a unique adaptive technology that can analyse text to fill in gaps at the edges and produces crisp, sharp text and images. Photographs have always been a bit of a problem for most laser printers, so this is a real improvement.
Offset printing is all about the economies of scale — the more you print, the cheaper it is. For a lot of print jobs, that is a viable proposition. But the key thing about the Indigo is that it can do very short print runs economically.
Most small and medium-sized enterprises do not need 50,000 postcards and the chances of a one-man-band company handing out 500 business cards a year will also be pretty slim.
Until now, those falling into these categories had to choose between wasting money and trees or making do with lesser quality laser printing or even colour photocopying. Indigo keeps everything affordable, avoids wastage and I defy anyone to see the difference in production quality.
But the really cool aspect of the Indigo, in my opinion, is that it lets you personalise each item. So every single brochure could have a customer's name on it.
Or, you could even insert a photograph of the relevant service representative for each of your accounts. So if you have a hundred names to hit, you can have 100 variants of the item. Now that is targeted marketing!
I think my email box is probably typical. Despite having more than one level of protection against spam, I still manage to get about 20 offers of loans, 'quality' software, lottery wins, diet pills and of course all those lovely enhancement solutions every day.
Hidden among these are various newsletters and information bulletins sent by companies I know or have done business with in the past. Clearly, email marketing has lost a lot of its impact.
So perhaps we should now revisit the merits of direct mail marketing, the traditional way — ink on paper through the letter slot. It has always been a marketing method respected for its measurability, flexibility and precision targeting.
With the Indigo we can add to the list personalisation and affordability. Perhaps direct mail has come of age. Again.
>>Sherrilynne Starkie is the managing partner of Strive Public Relations, a communications consultancy in the Isle of Man. She provides her views on business and technology each week in Tech Talk. Visit her business blog Strive Notes for frequent updates.
www.strivepr.com
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Weather for Isle of Man
Saturday 04 February 2012
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