Hello Marketing Issue 06

Allistair Hunter Managing Director allistair@thedsgroup.co.uk

It’s been an eventful few months here at The DS Group!

Our staff summer party was a great event; it was lovely to see the team have such a great time and I look forward to next year’s party. It’s always a pleasure to welcome new faces to the team, and I’m sure, John, David and Lauren will make a valuable contribution to the DS Group.

With the hot summer behind us, we’re now deep into the autumn season. We hosted our masterclass for clients that would like to use Direct Mail more effectively and get the best from online marketing, which you can read about on page 6.

The Designer Awards is well on its way to being ready to welcome winners and guests in November. We also start the push for the busy Christmas period (an important time for many of our clients), so please remember to get your festive orders in early.

Finally, many of you know that we support various charities. One of these is Colchester-based MS UK, my two sons ran the London Marathon, and one of our directors, Clara, has even agreed to jump out of a plane! More details, as well as information about how you can donate, can be found on page 33.

I hope you enjoy this issue - happy reading.

Allistair Hunter Managing Director

We are The DS Group, a full-service print, marketing, direct mail and media company based in Essex.

For over 20 years, we have helped companies, large and small, reach their customers and prospects. We deliver an in-house, integrated approach to get your sales, marketing and branding messages directly to your audience.

From initial concept and design to print and the delivery straight into your customers’ hands.

We offer a professional, friendly and go-getting service that provides you with the best value possible. And ensures you get the results your business truly deserves.

Hello Marketing is the magazine of The DS Group and is published four times a year: Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter.

All enquiries to: The DS Group The Nexus Systematic Business Park Old Ipswich Road Colchester Essex CO7 7QL

T: 01206 585 280 E: hello@thedsgroup.co.uk

Hello Marketing magazine is our in-house magazine for our team and customers, all editorial, design, production, print and fulfilment has been carried out by our in-house team as a showcase of our services.

We really hope you enjoy receiving your copy of Hello Marketing. If, however, you would prefer not to hear from us in this way, please contact us on 01255 221322 or by email at hello@thedsgroup.co.uk and we would be delighted to help you manage how we communicate with you.

THEDSGROUPHQ

THEDSGROUP.CO.UK

CONTENTS

FEATURES

Cover Story: The DS Group Masterclass

Using Print and Digital Marketing Together

Case Study: Networking in South Essex

SEO-crets to Success

FACT FILE

Powerful, Prosperous, Capable Campaigns

Our Contract Publishing Service

Taking Stock of Your Options

Laser-Focused Printing Precision

INSIGHT

Meet John

Meet Dave

Our Summer Soirée

Meet the Team

Sharing the Love

FINAL WORD

Cool Marketing Campaign of the Season

Pages 6 - 9

Pages 10 - 13

Pages 16 & 17

Pages 18 & 19

Pages 20 & 21

Pages 22 & 23

Pages 24 & 25

Pages 26 & 27

Page 14

Page 15

Pages 28 & 29

Pages 30 – 32

Page 33

Page 34

THE DS GROUP MASTERCLASS

We hosted a DS Group Masterclass on the 6th of October! The exciting event took place at the Dragonfly Hotel in Colchester, located just down the road from our new Colchester premises.

At the event, our very own managing director, Allistair Hunter, spoke to the assembled crowd about all things marketing and print.

We thought the event was a great chance for us to connect with our existing clients. At the DS Group, we love to talk about how we’re print, media and marketing specialists with over 20 years of experience, so this was a fantastic chance for us to speak with our customers directly in more detail than we’re normally used to.

The masterclass was open to all of our existing clients, and had a specific focus on business marketing, with Allistair taking it as an opportunity to discuss online and offline marketing strategies, as well as how they can benefit customer-facing businesses.

Although we specialise in the production of print and media products, marketing knowledge is becoming more and more of a necessity in the modern business world. Given the role that print marketing has played in our company’s history, Allistair had been looking forward to sharing our hard-earned wisdom with our beloved repeat customers.

Allistair’s speech went into the logistics of direct mail marketing and how we can give our clients the

tools they need to create offline marketing. He also examined how to use offline marketing in conjunction with online marketing, so that businesses can have the greatest chance of success in reaching their markets.

The discussion also tackled the ever-popular subject of online marketing, with Allistair exploring how businesses can create online content by using the curated branding produced for their offline marketing campaigns.

Moving away slightly from the marketing theme, he also made time to focus on lead sourcing, as well as how businesses can understand who their clients are, and how to use this information in their marketing.

Following the success of the event, Allistair said:

As experts in what we do, putting on our masterclass seemed an ideal opportunity to communicate with our customers. We can help businesses with all aspects of marketing and in the economic climate, we understand how important it is for companies to promote their own services or products through a successful campaign. Our masterclass allowed us to educate the attendees with how effective campaigns can really benefit their businesses as well as offering them a full understanding of the print vs digital mix.

After the primary discussion event was finished, Allistair opened the floor to a Q&A session hosted by members of the DS Group. This part of the masterclass was especially fun, because it let us engage with our clients themselves, but then also listen to their concerns and individual questions.

At the DS Group, we like to pride ourselves on our reputation for customer service, so we loved getting to help our clients in a slightly different way than we

usually would. Plus, we love connecting with our customers, and the masterclass event let us do that in a way that’s outside of our usual business settings.

Some people pointed out how the masterclass also worked as a great networking event for local business owners, and we like to think we’ve had a hand in forging some brand new business connections amongst some of our most valued customers!

Listening to some of the feedback we had after the event, our customers seemed to have a really good time (especially considering the fact we also had pastries on offer for the attendees), and we’d like to consider the event as a fantastic success! We had a lot of fun hosting our masterclass seminar, and hopefully one day in the future we’d like to host another one!

USING PRINT AND DIGITAL MARKETING TOGETHER

There are many reasons you’d want to use either print or digital marketing in your campaigns, but we’re here to discuss how you can use them both together to achieve the best results.

The world of marketing has undeniably undergone a shakeup in the past few decades. Once upon a time, marketing teams had to work with print media like flyers, direct mail, newsletters and posters to capture their audience’s attention. However, things have gotten much more complicated now considering the rise in digital marketing. Some wellestablished businesses struggle to understand how to effectively use digital marketing, which they view as too complicated and unpredictable. On the other hand, many newer businesses that have relied solely on digital marketing are unaware of print marketing’s benefits, and view print as oldfashioned and ineffective.

In reality, both views are wrong: print and digital marketing each have their own advantages and shortcomings. In the areas where print marketing is lacking, digital marketing solves its problems, and in areas where digital marketing could work better, print marketing already has the problem

covered. What businesses need to understand isn’t which form of marketing is better over the other, but how to effectively use them both in tandem for best results.

The first thing to understand is that both print and digital marketing have different audiences, processes, and in some cases, goals. There are times where businesses should invest more resources into one than another considering the nature of their business. For example, older generations are typically less active on most social media channels than younger ones, so some digital marketing methods (like Instagram live) won’t work as well with that demographic. Another example is how print marketing strategies like direct mail marketing might not always be effective, such as in cases where people have no one single address, or live in places such as apartment buildings where they may not check their mail as much as others.

PRINT AND DIGITAL: THE PROS AND CONS

Traditionally, print marketing is seen as having a longer “shelf life” compared to its digital counterpart. This is because people have a tendency to keep it within the home until they choose to dispose of it. Most digital marketing methods, on the other hand, are forgotten by your audience the second they stop paying attention to them. Paradoxically, it’s becoming harder and harder for some forms of digital marketing to be as effective the more that they’re getting used, as consumers’ attention is becoming diluted given how many marketing messages they’re seeing in a single day.

However, well-crafted digital advertising campaigns are easily much more immersive than print marketing. Marketing teams can include dynamic elements such as videos or rolling banners via email marketing, as well as the functionality to link easily to websites and products.

The use of marketing via social media channels is also one of the most valuable engagement tools of the 21st century, as it allows consumers to engage with your business regularly in an organic way, and even share your content with others. Social media marketing is also totally free to use, and many businesses prefer this over print due to the cost-effective benefits alone.

Because of the differences in market and objective, using both print and digital marketing strategies affords you more chances to catch your audience’s attention in general. It definitely doesn’t hurt your chances to send out similar marketing messages through both print and digital channels. This way, you’ll capture different audiences through the different mediums, and for any customers that receive marketing through both channels, it simply increases their awareness of you and your products.

COMBINING THE TWO FOR BEST EFFECT CASE STUDIES OF DIGITAL AND PRINT MARKETING WORKING TOGETHER WELL

Considering that each method has benefits and drawbacks, it’s clear that businesses can achieve the best results by using both print and digital marketing methods together. One example of a great way to do that is through the use of QR codes. By including a QR code on your packaging or leaflets, you can have all the eye-catching benefits of print marketing, combined with the ease of access that comes with marketing through digital means. Your customers simply have to scan the code to be directed immediately to your website.

QR codes can also be used in print marketing campaigns to track how many engagements your marketing materials receive, allowing the analogue form of marketing to reap similar benefits of the digital form.

At the DS Group, we also offer a unique form of print marketing that lends itself especially well to digital marketing: our contract publishing service (which you can read more about on page 22. As part of our service, the articles produced for our clients’ contract magazines make fantastic content to be included within social media posts, newsletters and blog posts. This means that the print content can be recycled for digital marketing purposes, and reach different customers each time. The physical copies can drive engagements and marketing, and once you’ve got your customer’s attention, you can use it to promote your business’s social media channels so they’ll receive marketing messages in the future.

Though companies working in the physical space often utilise digital marketing methods, some companies that only operate in the digital space have also been known to use print marketing effectively.

In a particularly famous instance, the short-term lettings company Airbnb used to offer their own print magazine that was distributed to their customers. It was a fantastic way to join the two kinds of marketing together, as Airbnb’s customers are primarily travellers, so their marketing team produced a regular magazine to serve as a travel guide, which featured some of their most interesting properties.

Arguably the most famous example of combining the two forms of marketing was Coca-Cola’s nowlegendary campaign to print personalised names on bottles of their drink. The campaign was an instant viral hit online, primarily through social media, as consumers were hunting down bottles which had their own names on the labels, and then sharing them online. It was a fantastic way to drive sales, as people were eagerly hunting down bottles with their own names on to share with their friends and family. Coca-cola took this further later into the campaign, as they let customers personalise their own labels and order drinks to be delivered. It was a fantastic online marketing campaign, but driven entirely through physical print marketing.

UNDERSTANDING HOW THE TWO CAN WORK TOGETHER

At the DS Group, we’re no strangers to the concepts of both print and digital marketing. As print specialists for over 20 years, we definitely recognise the effectiveness of printed marketing, and we also use digital marketing to boost our sales and get our message out to new and existing clients.

It’s clear that both forms of marketing have incredible benefits, as well as some drawbacks that keep either one from being a catch-all solution for all of your marketing needs. In the modern world, businesses need to be effective at using both to capture the attention of their clients. Using both in tandem with each other is the key to securing the most out of your marketing, which in turn, should capture more attention, increase engagement, and boost your sales.

5 Benefits of Print Marketing:

•

• •

Offers a personal touch that digital doesn’t have

Statistically, people trust printed advertisements more than online alternatives.

You can make more of an impression through paper stocks and interesting designs

• •

Direct mail marketing traditionally has a longer lifespan than digital marketing because it stays within the home until disposed of

Can be personalised easily depending on recipient

5 Benefits of Digital Marketing:

•

• • •

Social media campaigns are cheaper than print marketing

More easily accessible to customers, because they can click on links and access your services easily

Allows for one-on-one engagement with customers

Can be much more immersive, as you can use dynamic graphics and videos

Regularly updated, well-curated marketing tools such as a website or social media accounts can make you look very professional, and give your customers insight

MEET JOHN!

Meet John Price, who joins us as our new Head of Business Development! John aids our business growth across our direct mail and print sectors, and helps source new business leads. We asked John some questions about his career path so far, as well as what he gets up to in his spare time.

What has your career path looked like?

I started in a family-run building company working in the office and then after a while ended up working in sales for a variety of companies from Industrial Cleaning to Data Management and Financial Services. I then found myself in the world of advertising and stayed there for a period of 22 years working within the regional press side of the industry for 2 separate companies – and having a lot of fun doing so! After coming out of the industry, I have been with a marketing agency and a logistics / distribution company, working across many different clients and services including parcel delivery, direct mail, fulfilment and print services.

What advice would you give to your younger self?

Be patient! Believe in yourself and what you can achieve and don’t always rush to see the final goal, but enjoy the journey on the way! Most importantly enjoy what you do and trust in yourself.

A typical weekend for me is…

Doing what I am told to do by the wife! Aside from that, spending time with the family, our house is like Monica’s in Friends, where everyone congregates for food and drink – I do like to cook! Playing a round of golf and spoiling a good walk and hopefully watching some sport and Liverpool win!

Tell us one thing that people don’t know about you

Bit grim I know – but I was once clinically dead for 10 seconds, before being given the kiss of life!

What do you find most rewarding about your role?

I still get a buzz about working in sales and developing new relationships with clients, working with them and being a strategic partner to their business – I don’t think that will ever leave me to be honest.

MEET DAVE!

Meet David Wallace, our new Portfolio Manager, who brings a wealth of sales and marketing experience to his new role. He’s helping us develop the Designer brand and secure sales for Designer magazine, as well as across designerati and the Designerati Podcast. We caught up with Dave to ask him a few questions about his time with us so far.

What has your career path looked like?

My career path has always followed a sales and marketing theme, although when I left school (many moons ago!) it wasn’t a conscious decision. The past 20+ years of my day-to-day life has revolved around publishing – everything from fortnightly to quarterly titles, as well as digital, data and events. I also ran my own small publishing business, which was an unfortunate casualty of the dreaded Covid!

What makes The DS Group different from other places you’ve worked?

I’ve mainly worked for PLCs or large limited companies with hundreds of employees. The DS Group is more like a family; I find it quite refreshing as there’s very much a ‘we’re in it together’ mentality, which isn’t always the case in large corporates.

What is your secret to making progress each day?

For me it’s about making a positive impact. In an ideal world that’s making a sale, but it could be providing great service to a customer, making changes to working processes or our products to improve them, or perhaps helping or inspiring a colleague. There are lots of ways to make progress.

What things do you enjoy out of work?

Well I have three children aged 18, 14 and 10 – so it doesn’t leave a lot of time for much, although we do spend a fair amount of time in Norfolk as we are lucky enough to own a static caravan! However, I really enjoy cycling and I’ve taken part in some fantastic events in the UK such as the Birmingham & West Midlands velo, the Tour de Broads, the Southwold Roubaix, the Dragon Ride (I managed to raise £6.5k for the Teenage Cancer Trust on this ride), the London to Brighton (too many times to count), and I’ve even raced two years in a row at the Le Mans 24hr velo!

If you won £2 million on the lottery, what would you do with it?

Upgrade my current road bike, without having to hide the bills from my wife! Seriously though, I would share it with immediate family, buy a nice house in Norfolk and spend some time travelling!

NETWORKING IN SOUTH ESSEX

Another successful expo hosted by Essex Chambers of Commerce!

As industry specialists, we relish getting the chance to show off our talented expertise, whilst also connecting with others who do the same. That’s why we were proud to be the official print partners for the Basildon Business Expo!

The event took place on the 28th of September, and featured businesspeople from all over the Essex area gathering at Basildon’s Sporting Village. This year’s event was particularly special, because this is the first Basildon Business Expo that’s been run since 2019. The event was paused in previous years due to health and safety concerns, but now it’s back and better than ever!

Acting as the event’s print partners, we printed all of the event’s guides, as well as several large outdoor banners.

Aside from just completing production work for the event, The DS Group are proud members of Essex Chambers of Commerce. As such, we hosted our own official DS Group exhibition stand at the expo, which was managed by our Head of Business Development, John Price.

The event was a great chance to network with other local companies in the area, as well as shape new and meaningful business connections with prospective new clients.

The DS Group stand was well attended, which gave us lots of chances to meet with new customers who hadn’t heard of us before, as well as catching up with other local business owners at the event.

At the DS Group, fantastic customer service is at the heart of every single job we fulfil. Our perfect customer service record comes from a love of supporting and pairing with local businesses, so business exhibitions like this one are incredibly important to us. Most of our clients are repeat customers, and many of them have been coming to us for all of their print and production needs for many years. Our business wouldn’t be able to function without these key business contacts, so we’re proud to be members of the Chambers of Commerce, and always look forward to events like these.

If you’re looking to add to the list of our latest business contacts, or if you’re a company we’ve worked with before who’d like to use our services again, please get in touch!

www.essexchambers.co.uk

As proud members of Essex Chambers of Commerce, we were honoured to work as print partners at the Chelmsford festival earlier in the year, and now the Basildon expo. As a Clactonbased business, branching out to Basildon gave us the opportunity to network and meet many new businesses, and the expo provided us with the ideal platform to showcase our service to a new audience.

Clara Perry - Commercial Director - The DS Group

SEO-CRETS TO SUCCESS

We take a look at an online marketing process that many are still unfamiliar with.

Although we’ve always specialised in print and mail marketing, we also recognise the importance of digital marketing too. Many people know about traditional forms of online marketing, like social media, email newsletters, and banner advertising, but you can’t afford to ignore some of the more technical forms of online marketing, such as using SEO.

SEO can be a fantastic and effective way for your business content to reach a new audience, and potentially get your message out to individuals that could be prospective customers for your business.

There are hundreds of elements of SEO criteria that determine how well a website or piece of content ‘ranks’ online. Marketing experts can dedicate hours to optimising even a single piece of content to guarantee it’s as appealing as possible to search engines. However, there are also some simple tricks that businesses can use to ensure their content is optimised as much as possible.

The first step is to do some SEOfocused research before writing your content. There are tools that can be used to identify exactly what needs to go into your content to ensure that that it has the highest chance of being relevant

to your audience and appealing to search engines. For example, by simply inputting a key word or phrase relating to a specific subject, SEO tools can give content writers a list of specific keywords they can use to inform the nature of their content. Each one of these keywords will contribute to better performance in search engine results pages.

SEO tools can also tell you which keyword topics are likely to perform better than others, which ones have got fewer articles written about them, and which ones represent an oversaturated market. There are also tools that show content writers how to optimise paragraph and sentence lengths within articles, blogs and content, so that they meet optimal SEO conditions.

To help optimise The DS Group’s website, we write informative blog posts, and each one is reviewed and modified by members of our marketing team. This ensures that they meet stringent SEO requirements. The results speak for themselves, because if you search for relevant topics such as “direct mail Essex”, or “Essex contract publishing”, the SEO blogs that we’ve written and posted on our website have landed us on the very first page of search results for those topics.

THE ACRONYM SEO IS SHORT FOR “Search Engine Optimisation”

and in simple terms refers to putting content online that’s been tailored and refined so that it’s easier to get noticed by search engines such as Google or Bing.

Another benefit of SEO content is that it can give you inspiration for marketing you can use on other channels, such as social media or customer newsletters. Each of the blogs we write and publish on our website also get posted about on our social media, and then those posts also form the basis of our newsletter content for existing customers. Although social media posts and email newsletters can’t really reap the rewards of SEO content, it can give your marketing teams successful inspiration to use to structure their upcoming campaigns around.

Marketing is a constantly evolving process, and one that can be difficult to predict, and even harder to take advantage of successfully. However, although SEO content is a relatively new concept to the general public, it’s undoubtedly an influentially powerful tool in any marketer’s toolbox. Given the key role that the internet plays in modern life, it’s also one that won’t be going anywhere anytime soon.

SEO is an imperative component of any successful marketing strategy. It is the technique to help you to rank best on search engines, increasing traffic and conversions, and generating more revenue for your business.

Tyler Chase Senior Marketing Executive The DS Group

POWERFUL, PROSPEROUS, CAPABLE CAMPAIGNS

PPC Campaigns are one of the most effective forms of digital marketing. We take a look at what they are, and why they’re important to use.

Pay-Per-Click (PPC) campaigns are a form of digital marketing, where advertisers pay a fee every time one of their adverts is clicked on. PPC adverts appear on search engines such as Google or Bing, and they’re one of the more popular forms of digital marketing because advertisers only pay advertising fees if and when their advert is clicked on.

The most common platform for PPC adverts is Google Ads. This means that whenever someone searches for a topic that’s related to a specific business, Google will provide a selection of relevant PPC adverts to search-engine users, and if they’re clicked on, Google will charge an advertising fee to the relevant business.

PPC Campaigns are a great way to increase exposure and bring new traffic to your website. At The DS Group, we use adwords to help promote our services and provide new business for our sales team. By using relevant keywords, and the right strategy, PPC campaigns will not only drive traffic to your website but will also eventually bring you higher conversion rates when selling a service or product online.

Dom Littler - Marketing Manager - The DS Group

6 REASONS WHY PPC CAMPAIGNS ARE IMPORTANT

PPC Campaigns are cost effective compared to other methods

Due to the fact that businesses only pay for the clicks that they actually receive, businesses know that all the money they invest into a PPC campaign will actually be used effectively.

They provide instant site traffic

Unlike other forms of advertising that rely on techniques like a “call to action”, PPC campaigns provide instant site traffic. This means that it’s easier for your prospective customers to engage with your business, and you can rest easily knowing exactly how many people are seeing your campaign.

Businesses can run multiple PPC Campaigns for each keyword

By doing proper market research, businesses can figure out what exactly prospective customers are looking for within specific industries or markets. A knowledge-savvy business can effectively corner entire sections of the market through strategic use of multiple PPC adverts, each targeting slightly different keywords.

Awareness that the consumer is interested in the topic they’ve searched for

Due to their nature as search engine-produced advertisements, advertisers can ensure that those seeing their ads are at the very least slightly interested in the services or products that they’re selling. This makes them more likely to be in the market to engage with your business than the average consumer, and therefore, more likely to be interested in your business specifically.

Access to new customers

PPC campaigns aim to bring new customers to your business, this means they have slightly different objectives than some other kinds of digital advertising, such as email newsletters or social media, which are only focused on informing your existing customers about new products or services.

Your advert will be on the first page of search results

This makes your company seem authoritative and industry-leading within that specific topic, which instils confidence in your business, and is more likely to increase sales.

As industry professionals, the team here at the DS Group understands the value in using PPC campaigns to drive advertising to market our services. From direct mail, to print, media, and marketing, we use PPC campaigns covering a wide range of topics to get the word out about how we can help our clients. For all of your print and production needs, get in touch today!

OUR CONTRACT PUBLISHING SERVICE

At the DS Group, we offer a unique contract publishing service which utilises our company’s long history producing print materials for our customers.

The phrase “Contract Publishing” refers to a business arrangement where a company publishes content on behalf of a business or organisation via a contractual relationship. For some businesses, this can mean employing a marketing agency or brand ambassador to handle their social media channels, or creating other forms of content to advertise with.

The DS Group’s contract publishing division is innovative and exciting, as it allows businesses and organisations to receive physical copies of personalised magazines to advertise their brands. One such magazine that we publish is for a popular local zoo, and our contract publishing relationship with that business means that we exclusively produce their quarterly-published magazine. We also have a wide portfolio of other clients, including local attractions, businesses and hospitality venues.

APPLICATIONS OF CONTRACT PUBLISHING

Using contract publishing, business owners are able to take advantage of a really unique marketing method, and it allows them to be creative with the messages they want their clients to hear about, too. For example, you can advertise upcoming business events long in advance, release news about your brand that clients would otherwise be unaware of, and create brand awareness and familiarity with your customers by sharing personal interviews with yourself and your employees in the magazine.

Having a company magazine also means that your readers will likely have to stop what they’re doing and dedicate specific time to reading your content. This is a huge benefit over other forms of marketing, as you’ll have your customers’ total undivided attention whilst they’re engaging with your magazine. Without realising it, most people encounter thousands of branded marketing messages a day that they’re only conscious of for short amounts of time (such as billboards, TV commercials and radio adverts). However, by using a dedicated magazine, you can ensure that you’ll have captured your market’s attention for much longer than if you’d marketed to them via another type of media.

Having a physical magazine can also work similarly to other forms of print marketing, such as leaflets or posters, but can be used in more versatile ways. For instance, if your attraction has its own magazine produced via a contract publishing relationship, having a stand to dispense copies to visitors leaving your attraction will ensure they’ll still be thinking about your brand after their trip. Alternatively, you can enter into an agreement with a local business (such as a supermarket, shop or museum) to stock copies of your magazine, increasing the chance that people will take a copy home with them.

HOW CAN WE HELP?

As part of our publishing agreement service, businesses can have as much or as little input as they’d like in the works published. We handle every element of the magazine’s production inhouse, from content writing, to proofreading, graphic design, printing, and delivery - all within your desired time period and delivery date! Some of our clients choose to supply us with lots of helpful information about what they’d like featured in their upcoming issues, where as some would rather just have final say when the editorial has been written.

Contract publishing is a bold and inventive marketing strategy that can be tailored to virtually any customer-facing business. We’re always more than happy to take on new clients who are ready to take their marketing to the next level by using our contract publishing service. To find out more about how contract publishing could serve your brand, or if you’d like to establish your own contract magazine, get in touch with us today!

TAKING STOCK OF YOUR OPTIONS

How to choose the best paper stock for your campaign.

When it comes to choosing a paper stock for your marketing needs, there are a surprising number of factors that you’ll need to take into consideration. What do you want your paper to physically feel like to the reader? How heavy should your paper be? How thick do you need each individual page? Don’t let all the choices confuse you! We’re here to help you choose the best paper stocks for your campaign.

WHAT IS A PAPER STOCK?

The term “paper stock” refers to the type of paper used for a printing job. Usually, there are 3 major considerations that businesses have to take into account: paper weight, whether the paper is coated, and the paper’s finish.

PAPER WEIGHT AND SIZE

One of the most important attributes when choosing the right paper stock is to decide upon how light or heavy your product needs to be. Most UK businesses use paper sizes that correspond to the ISO 216, which provides a sizing standard that’s easy for everyone to follow. The most well-known type of ISO standardised size paper is an A4 sheet, but there are other sizes too, ranging from A0 to A10.

The weight of this paper is measured in grams per square meter (GSM), so a big sheet of paper like A3 is always going to have a higher GSM than a smaller one, like a size A5.

The unit of measurement for paper thickness is called a “point” (written as pt), and one point is equal to one-thousandth of 0.001 inches. For example, paper with a thickness of 20pt is going to be 0.02 inches thick.

PAPER WEIGHT GUIDE:

75 – 90 GSM

This is usually the standard GSM for things like notebooks

90 – 100 GSM

This is the standard thickness for common printer paper

120 - 140 GSM

This is usually the GSM range for hanging posters

210 – 300 GSM

This is bendable thick paper, used in magazine covers and quality leaflets

350 – 400 GSM

Incredibly stiff paper usually used in business cards for durability

Generally, thicker paper is seen as studier and more dependable, and although this is usually a positive thing, you’ll need to decide upon which paper size and thickness is appropriate for your project.

CHOOSING A FINISH

For coated paper, you also have a chance to decide upon a visual finish. One of the most common is a matte finish, which allows printed paper to have the visual benefit of coated paper, but allows certain pens to be used on them for writing. Another popular finish choice is a glossy effect, which gives paper a slightly reflective sheen. This is often the finish used in marketing materials, because it’s attention-grabbing and visually pleasing.

HOW CAN WE HELP?

Whether you need glossy coated paper leaflets for handing out, or simple and understated letters for door drops, here at the DS Group, we’ve got all the tools necessary for you to create great paper marketing materials for your business!

LASER-FOCUSED PRINTING PRECISION

As print service providers, we’re always getting asked about the difference between digital printing and offset printing, and what advantages one process might have over another.

As a company, printing is at the heart of our business, and our printing presses are running around the clock to expertly complete orders for our clients. However, a lot of our first-time clients have questions about the printing process itself: What exactly is digital printing? Why might you want to use digital printing instead of another process?

WHAT IS DIGITAL PRINTING?

To discuss the advantages of digital printing over other methods, it helps to understand what the printing method actually is. Digital printing doesn’t involve using any printing plates, but instead uses inkjet lasers and toner to digitally print designs and text onto sheets of paper.

THE BENEFITS OF DIGITAL PRINTING

When the technology was first implemented, digital printing wasn’t particularly attractive as a printing method, because it didn’t work well 100% of time. However, the technology that allows digital printing has made significant advances in recent years. Where digital printing used to be seen as slightly less reliable than offset printing, the machinery we have today means that printing jobs can be of an incredibly high-quality standard, and it’s now applicable to many more uses than before.

When using digital printing, there’s no need to replace a printing plate every time. In offset printing, a new plate needs to be created for each individual printing job or design that a client wants, but with digital printing, the process allows for ondemand printing, and is as simple as choosing a design and making sure the printer has the correct ink to complete the job.

Another benefit of digital printing is that it has variable data capability.

This means that whilst printing, you’ve got the option to change certain pieces of information on each individual printed sheet. This has incredibly useful marketing applications, as you can personalise each of your printed items to a targeted individual. For example, when we send out each issue of our Hello Marketing magazine to readers, we print a personalised cover letter to include in each delivery packet. It’s a nice personal touch that we like to think makes all the difference to our clients.

Utilising digital printing also means that you can print out the exact number of pages that you need for a specific order. With other printing methods, the cost and labour involved in creating individual plates for each printing job can be time consuming, especially if a print job only requires a small number of printed items. With digital printing, we can print quantities of items as low or as high as our clients need, as quickly as they need.

WE ARE DIGITAL PRINT EXPERTS

The benefits to using digital print are endless, and it’s easy to see why it’s seen as one of the most effective printing methods in today’s society. If you’re looking for a print specialist to aid your business, then look no further than the DS Group! We’ve got a whole fleet of printing presses and over 20 years of experience as print specialists, and we’d love for you to get in touch!

OUR SUMMER SOIRÉE

At the DS Group, we all tend to get quite excited as August approaches, as this is usually the month that our managing director, Allistair Hunter, throws his annual summer party for the DS Group team!

This year was no different, and on the 5th of August, Allistair generously hosted the 2022 DS

Group Summer Party. The event was a fantastic success, and our DS Group family partied through the night whilst enjoying the music, games, drinks, and BBQ food provided!

As you can see from the pictures, the event was a great chance for everyone to socialise together outside of work, and lots of happy

memories were made on the night. We’ve had an incredibly productive and busy year at The DS Group, so everyone appreciated getting the chance to unwind and have a bit of fun with their friends and colleagues!

HELLO TEAM!

Our people are the bedrock of our business and ensure that we deliver outstanding, effective marketing campaigns for our clients. In the offices, our team of professional marketers, editors, publishers, and designers have a wide range of experience and skills that allow us to offer our customers a truly integrated marketing approach. In our production facility and warehouse, our team of print finishers and warehouse assistants ensure that our customers’ orders are fulfilled with the expertise and care they deserve.

THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Allistair Hunter Managing Director

With a career of proven commercial success across media, print, events and publishing, Clara is responsible for developing and implementing commercial strategies to increase profit.

THE TEAM

Ben Emmerson Graphic Designer

Having joined us back in 2016 as an apprentice, Ben is now responsible for keeping our customers happy with his talented graphic design skills!

Damien Grothier Warehouse & Production Assistant

Damian is keen to give a hand to any task and runs our direct mail machinery.

Working at DS for over 13 years, Tracy runs both the Production and Operations Teams like clockwork, as well as looking after our customers and offering expert advice.

Chantell Keston Media Sales Executive

Chantell is responsible for increasing advertising sales across our contract magazines. She boasts a 20-year career within magazine advertising sales and is a great addition to the sales team.

Dave Wallace Portfolio Manager

Dave manages advertising and sales across the Designer brand portfolio, including Designer Magazine, Designerati, our annual designer Awards event and the Designerati Podcast.

Running the DS Group for over 20 years, Allistair is still involved in the day to day running of the business and is still loving every minute of it!

Chris controls the company’s annual operating budget to ensure that all financial targets are met, as well as providing financial guidance.

Christopher Corke Financial Director

Clara Deeks Commercial/Publishing Director

Tracy Mead Operations Director

Debbie Taylor Media Sales Executive

Following a 20-year career working within newspapers for local businesses in Essex, Debbie has experience working across advertising sales and local business knowledge.

Donna Fennell Production & Data Technician

Donna is the data guru for the company and is adept in her field. She also assists with production and has recently turned her hand to working on the polywrap machine!

Jonathan Gees Warehouse Assistant

Ensuring that all of the warehouses are in order and every box is in its set place is Jonathan’s role. He also assists on the production machines and is a whizz on the forklift.

Lauren Munson Media Sales Executive

Lauren is an integral member of our sales team working across our contract magazines. Having worked at several publishing houses during her career, Lauren brings a wealth of experience and knowledge to the team.

Marion Rotchell Production Assistant

Marion is our longest serving employee working for the DS Group for over 16 years!

Her wealth of proficiency and wisdom is unprecedented and she is an asset to the team.

Dominic Littler Creative Marketing Manager

Specialist in creative marketing campaigns, video content creation, photography, social media management, digital design, SEO, web development and so much more!

George Dean Publishing Assistant

Bringing editorial experience to the team, George assists with all of our publishing work, and his role includes researching, proofreading and writing our content.

John Price Head of Business Development

Aiding our business growth across our direct mail and print sectors, John helps us source fresh new business leads. With a long an illustrious career, we’re very glad to help him us build new relationships with clients.

Lewis Smith Warehouse Assistant

Assisting with direct mail campaigns, Lewis runs a variety of machines and ensures that clients mailings go out the door and hit door steps when required.

Mark Edwards Warehouse Assistant

Making sure that all direct mail campaigns are fulfilled and on time is Mark’s pivotal role within the production team. He also brings cheekiness and fun to the team.

Martin Allen-Smith Editor

With over 20 years’ experience working as a journalist, Martin has been the Editor of our in-house magazine, Designer for over 13 years!

Sean Killen Print Finisher

Sean continuously develops the Print Operations at the DS Group. He is an expert in his field and brings years of valuable knowledge and experience to his role.

Tyler Chase Senior Marketing Executive

Bringing a wealth of marketing experience and an agency background to the team, Tyler looks after our social media platforms for all brands as well as running all marketing campaigns for the group.

STAFF UPDATES THIS ISSUE

Russell Mead Customer Care Advisor

Russell prides himself on handling your job with care, from taking the initial order right through to delivery - ensuring you receive the quality and hands-on care we are known for!

Steve Brogan Assistant Print Finisher

Steve works within the Digital Print team and his finishing skills are second to none. He also maintains and runs various printers and finishing machines, including large format.

Will Cook Warehouse Manager

Will’s heads up the warehouse team and the day to day running of production. He is responsible for running various machinery including the poly-wrap machine and the envelope inserter.

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Mark, Damien, Lewis, Johnathan and Will have completed their Level 2 Warehouse and Storage qualification.

After attending training courses, the DS Group is happy to announce it has several newly qualified first-aiders. In the Clacton warehouse, the first-aiders are Donna and Mark, and in our Colchester office, George and Tyler are new first-aiders.

Within our sales department, several members of our sales team have been promoted. Dave is now officially the Portfolio Manager for the Designer brand, and Chantell is now our Senior Sales Executive for Designer content.

MS UK MARATHON

Allistair Hunter - Managing Director

This year, Allistair’s chosen charity is MS UK, the nationally-leading charity aiming to support those diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. To show his support to MS UK, Allistair has previously run the London Marathon several times, but this year, his two sons will be running in his stead, and all of the money they raise will be going to the charity.

BROOKLANDS FC Chris Corke - Financial Director

Chris has decided to support Brooklands Youth FC, which is a volunteer-run organisation which helps local children develop key skills learned through the game of football. Chris’s support means that the club will be able to afford things such as uniform kits and training equipment, and most importantly, be able to run events and put on games for the players.

SHARING THE LOVE

At the DS Group, we love to support the local community, and we feel that one of the best ways to do that is by working with charity organisations.

Because of our company’s community-oriented ethos, each of our Directors have chosen a specific charity to focus their fundraising efforts towards.

If you’d like to help out too, you can find links to the Directors’ justgiving pages through our social media channels!

MS UK SKYDIVE

Clara Perry - Commercial/Publishing Director

For her charity project, Clara has decided that she’d like to complete a skydive. Clara will be jumping out of a plane at 13,000 feet, and falling at speeds of over 120 mph!

Like Allistair, Clara has decided that all the money raised by her skydive will go to supporting MS UK.

MIND Tracy Mead - Operations Director

Tracy has decided that she’ll be sponsoring Mind, the leading mental health charity in England and Wales. Thanks to Tracy’s support, the DS Group is now a Corporate Partner of Mind, which means that as well as us handling their print needs and giving them a sponsorship donation, Mind will also be assisting us with workplace mental health initiatives.

MÜLLER’S FOLDED CORNER BILLBOARD

Each issue, we like to close the magazine by bringing to your attention a cool marketing campaign that’s recently caught our eye.

This issue, we’re really loving this advert from dairy company Müller, who have launched a marketing campaign making use of a physical billboard that highlights their iconic and timeless yoghurt corner design.

Considering the amount of corner yoghurt products that have entered the market in the years since Müller

released the original product, the company are hoping that the adverts will remind consumers who pioneered the original product.

The simple campaign features no words except for the company’s logo, and instead focuses on the company’s distinctive packaging. Interestingly, the billboard was engineered so that the corner of the advert protrudes slightly from the board itself, so it appears like a giant hand has just snapped it off, ready to pour the contents of the corner compartment into the yoghurt itself.

The billboard with its folded corner has appeared in London, and is undoubtedly seen by thousands of people every day on their way to work, with the idea of trying to get them to consider having a Müller corner yoghurt product for their office breakfast or lunch!

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