The Power of Print in Omnichannel Marketing Communications

Thanks to mechanisms such as programmatic print, printed marketing materials can now deliver the emotional impact of personalised print with the immediacy of digital marketing.

Every day, as consumers receive hundreds of digital ads and marketing emails, it’s becoming increasingly harder for brands to stand out and cut through the ‘digital noise’. This is where print can make a real difference in your multichannel marketing strategy. A 2023 study by JICMAIL has shown that the average piece of direct mail is looked at for 108 seconds over the course of a month and that mail that prompts advertiser website visits does so for five minutes a session on average.¹

Programmatic print links online marketing with highly automated, digital print workflows, enabling trigger-based, personalised print marketing. And with advances in digital printing technology and automated web-to-print production workflows, programmatic print can be closely integrated into the omnichannel marketing campaign, combining real-time, targeted messages with the impact of a printed asset.

This means that, by using the existing consumer data from brands and marketers, everything that can be customised online can now also be personalised in print and delivered to customers within a 48-hour timeframe. And thanks to QR and trackable discount codes, augmented reality and hyperlocal marketing, the impact of a print campaign can now be easily measured.

A study by IPA² showed that printed mail made 25% of adult recipients take action, so it’s clear that there’s a strong case to include print in the marketing mix. But how can marketers make the most of these value-added communications and increase their ROMI (Return On Marketing Investment)? We’ve created this video example to show how easy and impactful programmatic print can be.

Programmatic print allows marketers to create a unique user experience and use different touchpoints in the customer journey to trigger personalised, targeted print marketing materials that can be sent within 48 hours. This means print service providers (PSPs) can help marketers quickly reach customers with the right content when they’re most receptive, and maximise marketing ROI.

With new print-on-demand business models and data-driven workflows, personalised marketing campaigns don’t have to incur storage costs because you can print the exact amount of copies needed, cutting warehouse costs and eliminating wasted print. In addition, today’s workflows can be fully automated, lowering labour costs as well as minimising errors and subsequent waste.

As shown in the Mirasphere example, print can work hand-in-hand with digital. Print can be very fast and very effective thanks to the latest advances in digital print technology and digital workflows, so choosing the right technology provider is key.

The right technology solutions provider will give you access to in-depth knowledge of what’s happening in the wider market, from application ideas and execution to the data analytics, workflow and software solutions needed to make digital print technology solutions work for your needs.

At Canon we talk about a ‘Triangle of Expertise’. In one corner sits the PSP, in the second the print buyer (in this case marketers) and in the third corner is us, the technology solutions provider. Our role is to bring PSPs and print buyers/marketers together to identify such opportunities as Programmatic Print, and create a plan to help them make the most of those opportunities.