Key Takeaways from the 2016 Inkjet Summit

Elizabeth Gooding
Gooding Communications Group

Elizabeth Gooding of Gooding Communications Group and Brett Birky with Urban Fulfillment Services address the transaction market segment during a breakout session. Birky talks about his in-plant’s success with inkjet printing.

Transaction printers feel that investing in inkjet will allow them to take on new business, create new offerings and branch out into new areas. According to 2015 and 2016 data on Inkjet Summit attendees, only 10% of transaction printing companies with inkjet offer transaction printing exclusively; 60% are doing at least 35% non-transaction print work.

Allstate Insurance, for example, purchased inkjet to streamline its in-plant’s transaction printing operations, yet more than half of its inkjet production volume now comes from insourced direct mail.

There are challenges to taking on new types of work, however: ensuring compatible workflows, creating the in-house knowledge base on new applications, and the potential need for new software or technology. Many Inkjet Summit attendees also felt that legacy business models and selling approaches were a barrier to creating new offers.

Attendees were pleased with how much they learned at the Summit, yet many were concerned about how much they still needed to learn in order to make an informed purchase decision and justify it to management. The number of options for output devices, front ends, ink, paper, finishing and software are exploding. Finding the right combination of components to handle current volumes, while forging a path to an even better business model, is a daunting challenge. Yet at the Inkjet Summit, attendees learned from inkjet adopters who have done just that.

Marco Boer
IT Strategies

Marco Boer at the opening session.

In North America, printed books have faced challenges, resulting in a 25%+ decline in printed book pages during the past decade. But as overall run lengths have declined, more titles now “fit” with digital print run capabilities, especially with the adoption of production inkjet printers. Printing books digitally, just in time, has allowed a dramatic reduction in waste and inventory, freeing up cash for publishers to promote new titles and authors, resulting in a resurgence of sales. In 2015, several major publishers saw an increase in printed book sales.

IT Strategies estimates about 6% of all book pages were printed digitally worldwide, with digital print’s share projected to double by 2019. Any book printer/manufacturer considering deploying production inkjet printing needs to take a hard look at their infrastructure before taking the leap.

The focus should not initially be on the technology but rather the benefits that it will enable. To successfully and profitably deploy production inkjet technology, one needs to take a hard look at the existing workflow and infrastructure.

How will you handle significantly more orders (i.e., order entry, finishing, shipping) consisting of smaller runs? What is the best way to get your existing customers to recognize the benefits of a change in workflow and infrastructure — especially when the cost per book is likely to increase in exchange for greater overall efficiency and profits?

Barb Pellow
InfoTrends

At the 2016 Inkjet Summit, the importance of data was a key area of focus. Data-driven marketers want to get the right message in front of the right audience, at the right time, to drive the right (desired) consumer behavior. It’s not about obtaining more data, but about capturing data that can drive business decisions.

Rick Kegley, senior VP and GM of Harte Hanks, discussed how good data capabilities were integral to effectively leveraging advanced digital printing capabilities. Data analysis, he said, fuels growth.

“It identifies the things that motivate current customers to act, while also pinpointing where and how to reach new ones,” he noted. “To be effective, though, the data must be cleansed, enriched and translated into actionable insights that drive customers to click, call, buy or otherwise act. You must work with the customer to capture their data, understand it, augment it with additional lists and then apply it.

“If you want to be truly successful in this market, you must have good data skills and understand how to map that data,” he continued. “You need to be prepared to educate your customers on the value of variability rather than placing a very strict focus on color. Be mindful that effective campaigns integrate all channels, and make sure you’re able to deal with the digital dynamics. Most importantly, find a way to deliver ROI to your clients.”

For direct mail service providers, the most important takeaway from the Inkjet Summit was the need to help marketers embrace data to deliver a relevant message. 

Skip Henk
Xplor International

Inkjet technology, from a hardware and software standpoint, has matured during the past four years and will continue to evolve. Improvements in inkjet technology, inks and papers have taken the question of print quality off the table. Quality and print head reliability are not the prevalent issues they once were, and adding inkjet has become a strategic necessity for many.

But inkjet represents a major business shift for printers. It changes their business model. Digital workflow and data formatting represent the biggest changes.

Though ROI and cost savings remain a big part of justifying inkjet technology, the revenue opportunity opportunity inkjet represents in terms of application flexibility continues to become more relevant.