Canvas Magazine | All Ears | May 2016

IN THIS ISSUE Inside the buyer's journey

Phoning it in On Point with Lang Smith MAY 2016

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VOLUME 10 • ISSUE 5 • DIGITAL EDITION

INSIDE

02 10 20 WHO ARE YOUR CUSTOMERS, REALLY? Editor’s Note

ALL EARS

Q&A: LANG SMITH

Predictive analytic junkie

How to get your client's attention

CANVAS

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Editor’s Note| Best of Notes BOILERPLATE

WHO ARE YOUR CUSTOMERS, REALLY?

Once you truly understand what drives your customers' motivations, you can interact with them in a way that adds value and influences their perception of your brand.

Michael J. Pallerino, Editor @mpallerino

I had an interesting conversation recently with a printing and marketing services group that runs a small but aggressive operation in the greater San Antonio area. It goes without saying that their marketplace, like yours, is infiltrated with similar companies offering similar services – each one touting the best of the best.

When I pressed them on the real secret behind their success, their answer surprisingly didn't lean so much toward keeping up with the latest technology, offering the most up-todate products and services, or treating their customers like family. Sure, their success is based on all of the above – and more. Those factors, as you would agree, are critically important to delivering a brand that people want to be associated with.

But the real secret behind their success, they admit, is having a keen understanding of what drives their customers' actions and decisions – across all demographics. Think about that for a minute and how it relates to the interactions you have with your customers every day.

The key to engaging any consumer group is to understand their basic human motivations and drive. Digital agency Moosylvania recently conducted a study based on interviews with more than 6,000 consumers that

aimed to find what, truly, drives today's consumer mindset.

They sought to find the attributes that drive decisions and actions.

Among the leading attributes were being self-directed, positive, free spirited, confident, well-read, fiscally responsible, globally aware and health conscious.

All of the qualities can, and often do, echo across all demographics.

Reaching today's consumers based on their mindsets goes beyond messaging. The bottom line is that you need to be where your customers are and, more important, understand the reasons for their choices.

Once you truly understand what drives your customers' motivations, you can interact with them in a way that adds value and influences their perception of your brand.

In our cover story, "All Ears – How To Get Your Client's Attention" – bestselling author and speaker Anne Graham talks about the art of refreshing your brand with a technique she calls the "Dog Whistle." Her strategy, like yours should be, revolves around drawing your ideal clients to you, and then delivering the value proposition that keeps them committed to your business.

It's a strategy that can and will pay dividends in today's increasingly competitive landscape.

ALSO INSIDE BOILERPLATE

04 Magnetic

Best of notes

STAT PACK

06 08

Insights

Phoning it in

Inside the buyer's journey

Buyers say vendor relationships are improving P2

CANVAS MAY 2016

BEHIND THE CURTAIN

18

News from around the industry

Editor’s Note| Best of Notes BOILERPLATE

MAGNETIC Best of Notes

CONTRIBUTORS

Anna Graham Author, Speaker & Founder, The Legendary Value Institute

@ AnneCGraham

I often use kids as an analogy for a better version of our business selves. That may be because they are so raw and uncooked. In other words, they don’t have a lot of the baggage that comes from adulthood and their frontal lobes are not fully developed (science backs me up on this one).

As I try to help mold my kids into people who make good decisions, respect others and thirst for knowledge, I toss a barrage of anecdotes and philosophies at them. As you can imagine, it is probably exhausting for those two little lobes, being exposed to the constancy of my voice.

One of my new pearls is based on my kids’ struggle to make new friends. My advice to them was that if they want people to like them, they simply need to be the best at what they do. Whether they are playing a sport, taking a class or performing music, the fact is that people are attracted The life you lead is, to success. They want it for themselves, to a large degree, so they naturally migrate to it. determined by how Now, that does not mean you cannot accept being anything less than well you prepare the best, but striving to be excellent yourself for – and has a pretty amazing magnetic pull. In handle – the fact, a commitment to being the best opportunities that version of you, combined with a level come your way. of humility, is akin to the ACME magnet that Wile E. Coyote used to chase the Road Runner. Simply put, when we push ourselves to achieve greatness, but don’t hold ourselves above others, friends, partners and clients will appear in droves.

The life you lead is, to a large degree, determined by how well you prepare yourself for – and handle – the opportunities that come your way. When you commit to something, you do the kind of hard work that leads to success when nobody is watching. You internalize your goals and make them become a part of your every day and every moment. In turn, those goals drive you and provide the kind of commitment that shapes you and your personal brand.

You don’t have to be the best to attract what you want, but why wouldn’t you take a shot at it? Just like the rest of us, you may fall short of being No. 1. However, opportunities you never dreamed of will appear, and others will take notice of your work ethic, your passion and your drive, and they will want to tap into it.

They will be drawn to you like the magnet you are.

Be magnetic.

Mark Potter, Publisher @MarkRicePotter

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CANVAS MAY 2016

Lang Smith CEO, Cloud Signalytics

www.cloudsignalytics.com

GET IN TOUCH WITH US @THECANVASMAG @CANVASMAGAZINE THECANVASMAGAZINE WWW.THECANVASMAG.COM

THE CANVAS TEAM MANAGING EDITOR michael j. pallerino CREATIVE DIRECTOR brandon clark SALES/MARKETING mark potter

EDITORIAL BOARD lisa arsenault McArdle Solutions gina danner NextPage tom moe Daily Printing dean petrulakis Rider Dickerson david bennett Bennett Graphics

PUBLISHED BY CANVAS, Volume 10, Issue 5 .

Published bi-monthly, copyright 2016 CANVAS, All rights reserved, 2180 Satellite Blvd., Suite 400, Duluth, GA 30097. Please note: The acceptance of advertising or products mentioned by contributing authors does not constitute endorsement by the publisher. Publisher cannot accept responsibility for the correctness of an opinion expressed by contributing authors.

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Insights| Infographic STAT PACK

LEADERSHIP BS

Fixing Workplaces and Careers One Truth at a Time

By Jeffrey Pfeffer Even with thousands of books on the topic, and hundreds of thousands of blogs and talks, today's billion dollar leadership industry is failing.

That is the assessment of leading management thinker and Stanford business school professor Jeffrey Pfeffer.

In Leadership BS, Pfeffer sets the record straight on the oft-made prescriptions for leaders to be honest, authentic and modest, tell the truth, build trust and take care of others. By calling BS on so many of the stories and myths of leadership, Pfeffer gives people a more scientific look at the evidence and better information to guide their careers.

Rooted in social science, and with practical examples and advice for improving management, Leadership BS is a guide to help you accept the truth, and then use facts to change for the better.

PHONING IT IN

Within a year, U.S. adults will spend one hour more using their mobile device per day than they will their desktop or laptop, according to eMarketer's “Six B2B Mobile Marketing Trends for 2016." The report also says that 55.8 percent of U.S. mobile phone users (138.8 million people) will be Facebook users, while nine in 10 ( 53.2 million people) will access Twitter via mobile devices by year's end.

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CANVAS MAY 2016

RELATIONSHIPS ARE THE VEHICLE FOR BRAND ADVOCACY, AND THAT VEHICLE REQUIRES FUEL IN THE FORM OF VALUE-ADDED CONTENT, LOYALTY EXPERIENCES AND SIMPLE WAYS TO ENGAGE WITH OUR BRAND. – Patrick Bernardi, CMO of dental instrument maker Hugo Friedman, on how the company is building its brand with content marketing

81

The percent of today's customers who expect vendors to engage with them, according to Forbes Insight's “Mastering Revenue Lifecycle Management” study. Interestingly, the study also shows that 73 percent say that customers also tend to compare current vendors with their competitors in regards to how they are engaged after the initial sale.

The study surveyed 334 C-suite executives and senior managers from around the world.

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Process Improvement

Insights| Infographic STAT PACK

INSIDE THE BUYER'S JOURNEY

How's your relationship with your vendors? According to LinkedIn's “Rethink the B2B Buyer’s Journey,” 48 percent of buyers say that vendor relationships are getting “stronger.” The study, which examined the relationships among buyers, marketers and salespeople, surveyed more than 6,000 executives from each segment, all over the world. Here are some of the key reasons buyers say vendor relationships are improving:

52% Trust

45% Personal relationships

45%

Responsiveness

43%

Quality improvements

38% Value for the money

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CANVAS MAY 2016

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BUSINESS

By Anne Graham

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Feature Story

ust recently I spoke with the CEO of a very successful business who wanted to expand into new geographies. Her firm has a solid presence in her local market and a great website, yet she’d been talked into doing a costly “rebranding” exercise by a marketing firm that's helping advertise and promote her business in the new target markets.

As a veteran of receiving these kinds of pitches, I cringed.

Most rebranding efforts rely on the outdated approaches of using traditional psychographics and demographics – i.e., “managers over 35 responsible for benefits programs in their workplace” to develop brand strategy. That’s an ineffective strategy. It's too generic and just not finely-tuned enough to cope with today’s short attention spans and social media opportunities to tightly target ideal customers.

What they really need to turbocharge their branding is the “Dog Whistle” – the marketing message that causes their ideal customers’ ears to perk up immediately.

Conventional copywriting doesn’t ever surface and leverage the dog whistle, or what Seth Godin calls the "Purple Cow." Instead, a bland regurgitation of conventional features and benefits usually results in your business sounding like every other one of your competitors – the same and undifferentiated.

DON’T SETTLE FOR AN EXPENSIVE CONVENTIONAL REBRANDING EXERCISE. INSTEAD, REFRESH YOUR BRAND WITH A POWERFUL DOG WHISTLE THAT DRAWS YOUR IDEAL CLIENTS TO YOU.

TURNING UP THE CHURN RATE

I stumbled on a great shortcut for helping clients identify their dog whistle, which has impressive spinoff benefits for every organization.

I was consulting for a membership-based organization that had a horrendous churn rate. For every new member they brought on board, one left. They were running out of new prospects and their financial situation was precarious at best. Their first thought was to drop the price of membership, but you already know how destructive that can be – look what happens with cell phone companies when new customers get a better deal than existing customers.

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All ears

MOST REBRANDING EFFORTS RELY ON THE OUTDATED APPROACHES OF USING TRADITIONAL PSYCHOGRAPHICS AND DEMOGRAPHICS. THAT’S AN INEFFECTIVE STRATEGY.

Instead, I recommended two strategies – talk to members who’d left, and to talk to members who had stayed. And before developing any new tactics, understand the difference between the two.

Surprise. They found that members who left didn't bolt because of price. They loved being part of the organization, but left because they couldn’t justify the price to those above them who had to sign off on the fairly sizable membership fee. It was an issue with the way they were communicating their value proposition.

Members who stayed had a different story.

They’d received so much tangible benefit from the new connections and training they’d received as part of their membership that renewing was a nobrainer. They saw the value-add and were happy to pay for it.

SUCCESS STRATEGIES DELIVERED TAKE-IT-TO-THE-BANK RESULTS

Their next move was crystal-clear. They attached hard-value testimonials from long-term members to a letter and invoice inviting lapsed members to return. More than 50 percent of the lapsed members came back within 30 days – a huge boost to revenues and profits.

The magic was they gave the lapsed members the Dog Whistle to take to the decision makers that made them sit up, take notice, and then sign off on the renewal.

It only got better. By including the Dog Whistle with every renewal invoice, they turned the tide on churn. Their member retention rate went from 5050 to an astonishing 94 percent, within one year.

And then they added the icing on the cake, not by re-branding, but by completely revamping their marketing materials with the new value proposition that spoke to the hard and soft benefits of becoming a member. When they took their exciting new message to the marketplace, they successfully converted one in three sales conversations into a new member, where previously their hit rate had been one in 100.

The outreach and sales conversion process became much more efficient and effective because the Dog Whistle resonated with new prospects who were ideal members, and made them prick up their ears and engage with the organization.

Revenues and profitability skyrocketed from all the new memberships and renewals, and they

P12 CANVAS MAY 2016

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You can’t miss the best show for graphic imagers: 2016 SGIA Expo, September 14–16 in Las Vegas!

All ears ended up on solid and sustainable financial ground for the first time in years.

ACTION PLAN

Something as simple as testimonials may or may not be the only component of leveraging your Dog Whistle, but the process of identifying the differences between lost and loyal customers always is the first step in surfacing what core messages your brand really stands for.

Don’t settle for an expensive conventional rebranding exercise. Instead, refresh your brand with a powerful Dog Whistle that draws your ideal clients to you, and then deliver the value proposition that keeps them loving your business and happy to pay for the privilege of doing business with you.

YOUR 5-STEP DOG WHISTLE APPROACH 1

Retain your most profitable customers

2

Ramp up your marginally profitable customers to build customer satisfaction, value and retention

3

Restore your unprofitable customers to break even or better

4

Regain your lost customers

5

Reactivate your inactive customers

Every customer wants to feel special, but it’s especially important to take extra care of the ones keeping you in business with a client retention strategy.

How often do you feel that business is going to your competitors should be coming to you because you don’t have a strong retention strategy in place?

Some of your customers are costing you more than they’re worth, but you don’t have an effective way to deal with it other than firing them, which creates customer churn.

Almost every organization dreads reaching out to lost customers, because they’re either afraid of the complaints or issues they’ll find, or because they don’t have a good answer to the "It was price” excuse.

Improving retention is about being proactive. Do you have people in your database that you never hear from? The answer isn't sending more emails, newsletters and junk mail. It's about using your Dog Whistle to wake them up.

Bestselling author, speaker and accelerator Anne C. Graham is the creator of the P.R.O.F.I+T Roadmap.

She also is the founder of managing consultant firm, The Legendary Value Institute.

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MISS AN ISSUE? CHECK OUT THE ONLINE ARCHIVES. WWW.THECANVASMAG.COM

BEHIND THE SCENES

Awards, Mergers & Personnel moves | Around the industry

Mergers & Acquisitions Action Print has merged with Universal Printing.

The merger will allow Universal Printing to provide additional services to Action Print clients. Under the merger, nearly the entire Action Print staff will transition to Universal. Action Print is a second generation family-owned business with more than 40 years in the printing industry, while Universal Printing is a third generation, family-owned company that is celebrating its 50th year in business. Both companies are located in Des Moines, Iowa.

Personnel Moves Thayer Long has been named president of NPES – The Association for Suppliers of Printing, Publishing and Converting Technologies, succeeding Ralph Nappi, who announced his retirement this past October. In addition, Long also will serve as president of the Graphic Arts Education and Research Foundation (GAERF). With nearly 20 years of association experience, Long has served as executive VP and CEO of the Independent Electrical Contractors, and president and CEO of the Manufactured Housing Institute.

Around the industry

Epson, an SGIA member since 2006, has donated an Epson SureColor P7000 24-inch large-format printer to the state-of-the-art laboratory at SGIA headquarters in Fairfax, Va. SGIA plans to use the printer for print verifications in its ongoing Digital Equipment Evaluations. The Epson SureColor P7000 is the latest donation for the SGIA laboratory, joining donations from Roland, Mutoh, Mimaki and HP.

International Paper, a global leader in packaging, paper and pulp, has become a platinum level Patron of the Sustainable Green Printing Partnership (SGP). As a platinum level Patron, International Paper will help support the goals of the SGP program at the highest level. With the support of its patrons, SGP promotes sustainability to the printing industry, keeps certification affordable and provides educational programs.

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thINK, an independent community of Canon Solutions America production print customers, has added Todd Roth, VP, Core Publishing Solutions at Thomson Reuters, to fill its seventh voting member slot. Roth also serves on the Canon Solutions America Digital Print advisory council (DPAC), which meets semiannually to discuss current industry trends, market changes and business conditions and provide feedback to the Production Print business unit.

Canon U.S.A. Inc. has made several executive appointments and promotions, including Toyo Kuwamura, who was named senior VP and GM, Business Imaging Solutions Group (BISG), and Yoshinori Shimono, who was tabbed senior VP of finance and accounting. Kuwamura, who will continue to build the BISG business into an industry leading solutions, services and support business, will retain his current position and responsibilities as president and CEO of Canon Solutions America (CSA). Shimono will assume the position as president of Canon Financial Services Inc. (CFS).

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BEHIND THE SCENES

Awards, Mergers & Personnel moves | Around the industry

Submit your nominations

PIA award honors significant contributions by women Printing Industries of America (PIA) is accepting nominations for the "2016 Naomi Berber Memorial Award." The award honors outstanding women for their exceptional record of accomplishments in graphic communications, significant contributions toward the development of the industry, and for having furthered the interests of the field.

Eligible candidates must have worked in the graphic communications industry for 10 years or more and have an outstanding record of accomplishments that demonstrate remarkable contributions toward the development of the graphic communications industry, including leadership, direction, and/or support of programs or projects that have furthered the interests of the industry.

While candidates do not have to be PIA members, they cannot be previous winners or employees of graphic arts associations.

The award will be presented at PIA’s Fall Administrative Meetings on Nov. 18–20 in Kansas City.

For more information on PIA’s Naomi Berber Memorial Award, visit: www.printing.org/berberaward

WHAT’S GOING ON? LET US KNOW! GET YOUR NEWS HERE.

People news. New products. Trends shaping the way our industry does business. If you have a news item, CANVAS wants to hear about it.

All you have to do is email us the information and a photograph, and we’ll do the rest.

Send your information to michael@thecanvasmag.com.

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CANVAS P19

FINAL THOUGHT

Around the industry| Q&A

On point with...

LANG SMITH

Lang Smith stands at the forefront of one of the fastest moving technology industry movements: predictive analytics.

Over the past few years, he has helped create industry-wide shifts, such as the auto industry’s first digital redeemed coupon.

A calculated risk taker with deep tech industry knowledge, Smith, CEO of Cloud Signalytics, continues to embrace how Big Data is changing the way today’s businesses prepare for the future.

Why is it so important to know your customers inside-out?

It helps you determine your most relevant customer base. Customer desires change, and you need to know what they are in order to change with them. In order to grow your business, you need to determine a path the business should take to maximize growth.

That’s what makes market research so important. To me, one of the most important things it does is reduce your company’s risk of failure. When you have a marketing plan and stick to it, chances are your business will grow.

How much emphasis should be put on changing with the changing times?

I believe the marketing world is changing drastically.

People are scattering to find the best tools for their business, but they are not sure what they are quite yet. Profit margins are lower for most products these days than they used to be, so factoring that into the marketing budget to get a good ROI is much more difficult. That’s why predictive analytics and Big Data are so important. It helps reduce marketing costs significantly, while allowing your business to identify its target market.

What are the most important things your research must uncover?

It has to be your differentiation in the market. I would consider this the No. 1 factor in the success of one business, and the failure of another. If you don’t want to price compete in your market, you need to show how you’re different than your competitors. Stop looking in the news for the latest hype and trends, and start solving the problems nobody’s looking for.

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As a business, you need to realize that not all customers are lifetime customers, and in order to grow, you need to acquire new customers.

What tools can help make the right decisions?

Big Data is definitely the most important one today.

To harness the power of Big Data is like having a magic wand that funnels customers your way. The more you know about your customers, the more successful your business will be. I’m not a fan of focus groups, because they’re usually very small and not always right. I’d substitute them with a soft launch that’s directed to your market, and then gather feedback from that. This will allow you to answer all of your market objections and eliminate any reason not to buy from you.

Why is it important to never stop learning about your customers and marketplace?

It’s never-ending because customer behavior is everchanging. People want brand new vehicles one year, and then they realize they can live with a used car. As a business, you need to realize that not all customers are lifetime customers, and in order to grow, you need to acquire new customers. To do that, you need market research to find your most relevant customers during the lifetime of the business.

BEYOND BREAKTHROUGHS

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Canon is a registered trademark of Canon Inc. in the United States and elsewhere. Océ and Océ VarioPrint are registered trademarks of Océ-Technologies B.V. in the United States and elsewhere.

All other referenced product names and marks are trademarks of their respective owners and are hereby acknowledged. © 2016 Canon Solutions America, Inc. All rights reserved.

TOUCH IS THE FINE LINE BETWEEN

read & remembered

There’s a reason the smartest brands choose paper for important messages. Because holding something in our hands can shape how we feel. What we know. And, critically for marketers, what we buy.

See how brilliant brands use haptics—the science of how things we touch shape the way we feel— to create deeper connections with their customers.

Visit sappi.com/haptics to learn more and request your own copy of “A Communicators Guide to the Neuroscience of Touch.”