2015 was my first Graph Expo
So how would I find the show? Would I find myself in a strange parallel print world, where nothing was quite as I was used to? How would things compare to the UK? Would I understand your American accents?!
The sign of a good print show is that you feel you could have spent a lot longer there. That was certainly the case with Graph Expo! I met a lot of great people and came away feeling very inspired.
Here are five trends that I identified at Graph Expo:
- Workflow is as important as the press
To be efficient, printing companies are really going to have to focus on workflow. Print runs are continuing to fall. I read a piece recently which suggested that, as a result, some printers will have to print ten times as many jobs to achieve the same turnover.
Graph Expo exhibitors have really understood this. There were a whole range of solutions that allow printers to make their processes more efficient. May focused particularly on making dealing with customers more efficient.
- The industry needs to learn more about its customers
I was honoured to be included in some of the excellent panels at The Printerverse. What struck me here is the industry is starting to focus more on customers than on technology. What is particularly striking about this is that many of the press manufacturers want to lead this conversation. They want to educate today’s buyers on how to get the most out of print.
- We have to learn how to sell to Millenials
This focus on customers is particularly centred on the younger buyer. People are realising that they require a very different set of sales tactics. There is no longer a one size fits all approach to customers. At least one company I spoke to is beginning to profile customers by age for how they deal with them. Look out for more blogs from me soon on dealing with Millenials.
- It’s about marketing, not just sales
More companies are focusing on how they create a relationship with prospects and customers that is not sales-based. The traditional sales approach is no longer working. People expect a more valuable relationship with their suppliers. This was reflected in both the content from speakers at the show and a range of marketing services for printers being exhibited.
- America needs to think about the impact of print management
In the UK there has been a massive impact on the print industry as a result of the rise of print management. In the US, buying is still often behind the UK development curve. However, the rise of print management has started in America. Graph Expo had some useful debates on how different companies thought that they might deal with this.
So is there a huge difference between the US and the UK?
I certainly didn’t find myself in a strange parallel print world, where nothing was quite as I was used to. I ran a workshop at the show: “How To Stop Buyers Choosing On Price”. My big learning from this was that most American printers are facing exactly the same issues as over here in the UK. We covered why traditional messaging fails, how to building a compelling sales message on the TPD Principle and new ways to use this message. And I found the dialogue to be almost exactly the same as the UK.
Even the accents didn’t stop us from understanding each other!
I would like to thank Graph Expo for inviting me over to the show and for their excellent support in helping me market the workshop so successfully. If you missed it this year, I will be running the How To Stop Print Buyers Choosing On Price workshop again in Orlando, so mark September 25-28 for Graph Expo 2016 in your diary now!
Matthew Parker
is the Champion of Print at Profitable Print Relationships. Matthew bought print for over 20 years and received sales approaches from over 1,400 printing companies. He now works with printing companies to tell them what it’s like from the customer’s side. He is a well-known industry keynote speaker, runs a series of popular sales, marketing and social media workshops for printers and mentors individuals in the printing industry. He has also written “How To Stop Print Buyers Choosing On Price”.
Connect with Matthew: print@profitableprintrelationships.com or @PrintChampion and download his free e-book Ten Common Print Selling Errors And What To Do About Them at http://profitableprintrelationships.com/e-book/
