Remember the days when the economy was really slow? There has been a slow progression, and most of us 
are getting back to business. Customers are starting to figure out how to best use printed material to market themselves. There is a convergence of digital and print. While one is on screens, the other still has merit. Are you doing enough to continue to set yourself apart from your competition? Are you doing enough to make sure you’re winning the quotes to stay lucrative? UV Coating? Business Cards? What can you make?
What is your value to customers?
The first thing you should be asking yourself is “What are my tiebreakers?” Basically, what value do you offer that is better than the print shop down the street? Do you offer environmentally-friendly printing? Can you do UV-printing and UV Coating? Are you locally owned?
Today, prospects can get piles of quotes and estimates from all over the Internet. Price is a driver, but is it the only driver? What is it you do that sets you apart from your competition? The definition of value is what unique skills, experience, and recommendations can you make to help your prospect’s business. Tiebreakers and value ensure they pick you and not your competition.
So, what value do you bring? Is it an ability to deliver state of the art print finishing? Is your operation automated to help reduce overhead and add profit margin? Small UV Coating Systems open numerous possibilities for producing a new product from business cards, postcards, direct mail pieces and more.
Are you on top of your sales stats?
Here at Lloyds, we used to measure our sales success on a month-to-month basis. That was okay, but then we started measuring our success on a day-by-day basis and guess what? A lot of winning days add up to one great month.
You know what else? It’s a lot easier to track changes and stay motivated when you’re watching totals every day compared to month-by-month. In today’s competitive markets, taking 30 days to notice a downturn could be too late.
Are you learning from your mistakes?
What happens when you put in a quote? Do you have a sales process with your prospects and customers to ensure you are closing your deals? Every good organization has a sales process in place with prospects and customers. The process is an agreement between you and your customer. After you give a quote, there should be a scheduled call or meeting to go over it. Each step should have a go/no-go decision so no one’s time is wasted.
Offering services like UV Coating, Laminating, or UV Printing can certainly help you with your offerings in terms of costs and solutions for your customers.
