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Communicating the right way
On Twitter, Linkedin or Facebook, many print shops and media companies can be found taking advantage of these social media platforms, marketing to a pre-selected target audience their range of services in addition to actively nurturing and strengthening professional relationships with existing and prospective customers. Meanwhile, countless groups and communities are springing up on the net for one purpose only: the printing industry and its market.
The approximately 65 million members currently participating in Linkedin have formed 590,000 interest groups. Of these, 1,060 deal directly with “Print”. The largest of all groups promoting the interests of the printing industry was founded by an entrepreneur in India, Harish Jain. At the time of this writing, “Media Professionals Worldwide” is already counting more than 75,000 members. Harish Jain, based in Mumbai, describes the purpose and benefits of the group as follows: “Being a part of the group not just lets you connect with professionals from similar backgrounds, but also helps you become aware of global developments, its impact on your business, through discussion forum you keep yourself abreast of latest technologies, you get to initiate business relationships and generate business with companies across the globe.”
Other communities on Linkedin are, for instance, “Print Industry Networking Group“ (about 16,000 members), “Digital Printing” (about 9,000 members), “Dream Designers” (about 5,000 members) or “Web2Print” (about 2,100 members).
Being a part of the group initiate business relationships and generate business with companies across the globe.“
Harish Jain, Founder of „Media Professionals Worldwide“
Benefitting from all channels
Linkedin is a worldwide business and career platform while Facebook and Twitter find their popularity in interpersonal use. It does not deter some companies, though, to set up an account or group on Facebok or other platform in order to project a commanding presence to their customers. Take Reneé M. Berger, creative director at Western States Envelope & Label, Wisconsin: “Social media has been a great benefit to Western States because it has allowed us to communicate with customers and prospects in the printing industry on a more personal level.”
As creative director, she especially values multi-channel communication a great deal: “It’s been fun and exciting to see all the additional benefits that we have also received. Western States has improved its brand recognition, and we are able to get our product information out more quickly, efficiently and effectively to a broader audience. It has also been a plus to share relevant, current and up-to-date information with our customers’ and prospects’. Elevating our company’s web site with the SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is just another plus.”
Western States is currently active on these social media sites: Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin, YouTube, Print Junkie, Flickr, Wikipedia and Digg. Reneé M. Berger: “We have also encouraged many of our employees and sales representatives to become more involved in social sites in an effort to become even more helpful and available for our community to request assistance, information and samples.”
