Digital Printing's "Energy" and "Can't"

    Since its debut 10 years ago, digital printing has been a stable growth market. Some experts predict that as the technology advances and opportunities increase, the digital printing market will continue to grow steadily.

With the growing demand for digital printing and variable data printing, Team Concept Printing & Thermography , based in Illinois, USA, installed a Xerox 3 digital press last year . The company's owner Tony Rouse and four-color printing supervisor Laurie Kaminski said that operators who are accustomed to using offset presses often set black in the CMYK color separation mode, and the digital press only works when the density of black reaches 100% . It performs the best parsing.

　　 Kaminski points out: "Even if you have a very saturated CMYK black, it will look slightly less than 100% black, and it will look less than vivid. If you just want to establish a solid black background in CMYK mode , then in 99% of cases, we will change this background to 100% black, but if you have a TIFF file created in PhotoShop and it adds another CMYK black on a black background Background, then you can't change another background without changing one of the backgrounds. And, in most cases, we can't change them at the same time." Kaminski also warned people to plan When dealing with digital presses, try to avoid the use of faint, solid colors on a large scale because they are very difficult to control.

Image and data can create high profits for printing companies

Many printing companies that are just beginning to resist digital printing are now aware that they can use this technology to increase their own revenue in the market. Rouse pointed out: "Not only digital printing, but also the variable part of digital printing - especially the core variable content, such as images and data, can create high profits for printing companies. This market is very large, and It will continue to expand. A seemingly simple project may involve different images of different regions. For example, if you want to design promotional materials for travel companies based on the age of the customers, then you should aim to have older people and The child's family. Next, you have to write your plans and let people know which pictures should be put together with specific names."

One problem that often arises now is that when dealers and their customers create documents, they are not sure whether to send the job to offset or digital presses for printing. Rouse said: "Now our customers all know that their jobs will be printed on 'Love 3 ', so they will generally create documents for this press. Some customers are used to creating templates and putting them The output file is sent to us after being integrated into a postscript file, and all we need to do is print. We are a printer, so we like to accept customer-supplied documents and are trying hard to guide customers to do so. When customers need us to create documents, we also need a certain amount of time. We have installed a software program specifically for variable data printing that can greatly simplify the production process."

A time when a middleman will get everything done is gone

When working with customers to complete a variable data printing project, distributors need to be clear about what steps the press needs to take and what they want to achieve. Doug Rosen , education and technology manager at Markzware , Calif., said: "The days when a middleman can get everything done are gone forever. The margins for printing companies are shrinking and the production cycle is being shortened. Problematic jobs will exacerbate the development of this trend and cause harm to all participants."

He continued: “The format of data that the printer can accept is also a very critical issue. Many programs allow people to insert variable data into printed documents, but the format of these data must be correct, otherwise they will not work. Another question is what actual data needs to be printed. If I design a page with variable data and leave space for printing names and addresses, then this space must be able to accommodate the longest name and address. If the printed content goes beyond a specific space and extends to another area, the integrity of the file will disappear."

Real-time reporting and analysis related to customers through PURL

　　 Jeff Prettyman , executive vice president of Wise Business Forms , said that the company changed the name of the digital color printing department to NextWave Digital Marketing. Its purpose is to reflect its ability in variable data printing, email marketing, and providing personalized URLs . Ability.

In addition, the company's NextMail is an integrated direct marketing solution that measures the effectiveness of promotions in real time. Jeff Prettyman commented: "This is very important, because the senior management of the company will always exert great pressure on the marketing department and ask them to calculate the return on investment for each promotion. Our NextMail is a very comprehensive function. The solutions can provide users with many functions from conception, design, activity implementation to performance management."

　　 Prettyman explained that his design templates can be used for both print and email. He said: "Based on the business principles of database and data collection, we added PURL to the printed page and added this PURL link to the email. PURL can be connected to multiple pages, including landing pages, surveys, and updates. Promotional advertisements, thank-you messages, etc. Once someone has logged in to PURL , an email / SMS message will be sent to the designated sales person to make it immediately track the PURL . This is a magical solution for the sales representative. The program, when someone fills in the information on the PURL , their mobile phone will be immediately notified. In addition, they will also receive real-time reports and analysis related to the customer.”