Using Variable Data Printing To Tailor Material To Different Demographics

By Author: For instance, it is hard to run a direct marketing
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For instance, it is hard to run a direct marketing campaign without addressing the customer directly. In this regard you will need to change the name and address of the recipient to match that of who the material is for. It actually personalises the material to the specific person.
For example, you may have a database of one thousand people - you have a letter that you need to send to every person in the database. If your database is any good then you are likely to have a field that holds the name of the person that the entry is relevant to. You can essentially pull the name out of the database for every single person as the material is printed so the name matches the entry each time the letter is printed. The only difference with each letter is going to be the name. You can take this one step further - you are probably going to have their address too. To make it easier to address each envelope you can have the address printed on the letter and then pop the letter into an envelope with a clear pane of plastic (much in the same way you receive government letters). This can be a great time saver - especially if your database ...
... of clients, suppliers or employees is quite large.
It doesn't stop there either. Consider the imagery that you are putting onto your promotional material. You aren't going to include a graphic of a modern trend that is used by the younger generation on material that is going out to elderly people if your product is something that is able to be utilised by both generations. The same applies when you advertising the product to specific cultures or races. Variable data printing services allows you to tailor the graphics for the right demographic. The graphics may be directly relevant to colour schemes or iconography - it is hardly a direct marketing campaign if you don't tailor the material to directly appeal to the potential customer.
Variable data printing is a powerful tool at your disposal when and should be considered when developing your marketing plan. You will often find that the turnaround of the material is quite quick because various printing facilities allow you to tailor the material based on database input, localisation and a variety of other factors. You will not have to reset the material depending on small details such as the name of the recipient because the software side of printing process tells the hardware what to print and where. It is the perfect tool for direct marketing.