Marketing Strategy for Print Businesses

A marketing strategy combines all of a print business's marketing goals and objectives into a single comprehensive plan. Market research helps business leaders develop an effective marketing plan, and prioritize the right product mix to maximize profits. Simply put, a marketing strategy is a plan aimed at promoting a product or service while making a profit.

A good marketing strategy helps a print business identify its ideal clients and understand what they want, which makes it possible to use the marketing tactics that actually work for that audience.

1. What is a marketing strategy?

A marketing strategy is a company's overall game plan for reaching out to prospective customers and converting them into customers of its products or services. It includes the company's value proposition, key brand messaging, data on target customer demographics, and other high-level elements. A comprehensive marketing strategy addresses the "four Ps" of marketing: product, price, place, and promotion.

A clear marketing strategy should revolve around the company's value proposition, which communicates to customers what the company stands for, how it operates, and why they should do business with it. For a print business, that might mean being known for fast turnaround on rush orders, for a particular product specialty such as large-format signage or custom apparel, or for an easy-to-use online design tool. This gives the whole team a consistent message to use across all of the business's products and services.

2. Why does a print business need a marketing strategy?

The marketing strategy is outlined in a marketing plan: a document that details the specific marketing activities a business engages in, with timetables for implementing them.

Marketing strategies, as opposed to individual marketing plans, should ideally have longer lifespans, because they contain a value proposition and other key elements of a brand that generally remain constant over time. In other words, a marketing strategy addresses big-picture messaging, while a marketing plan outlines the operational details of specific campaigns.

2.1 Advantages of a marketing strategy

The goal of a marketing strategy is to achieve and communicate a sustainable advantage over competitors by understanding customers' needs and desires. A marketing asset, whether it's a print ad design, a product mockup, or a social media post, can be judged on how effectively it communicates the business's core value proposition.

Market research can help a print business determine how well a campaign is working and identify audiences it hasn't reached yet, in order to increase sales.

2.2 Why does my print business need a marketing strategy?

A marketing strategy directs a business's advertising budget to where it will have the greatest impact, rather than spreading it thinly across untargeted efforts.

2.3 What does a marketing strategy include?

A marketing strategy outlines a company's advertising, outreach, and public relations activities, and how it will measure the impact of those activities. It typically covers the "four Ps": market research to support pricing decisions and new product lines, messaging tailored to specific customer segments and regions, the platforms used to promote products and services (digital, social, print, trade channels, and the mix of those for each campaign), and the metrics used to measure results and how often they're reported.

3. What marketing tactics work well for a print business?

There's no single tactic that works for every print business, and most of what follows takes time rather than a large budget. As long as the basics of the business are solid and you're consistently trying to offer real value to customers, these are tactics worth using.

3.1 Use social media

Post photos of the custom products you've produced: business cards, apparel, signage, packaging, or whatever your store specializes in. Share your ideas, your process, and anything relevant that helps your audience learn more about your business or the print industry. Use direct messages on platforms like Instagram or Twitter to connect with potential clients who are looking for the products or services you offer.

3.2 Create video tutorials

Video is one of the most effective ways to spread the word about a print business. Show customers how to use your online product designer to create their own business cards, signs, or apparel, step by step. The more genuinely useful the video, the more exposure, and sales, it's likely to generate over time.

3.3 Start blogging

If your print business doesn't already have a blog, it's worth starting one, covering things like design tips for specific products, how to prepare print-ready artwork, or care instructions for finished products. You're also not limited to your own blog: platforms like Medium, Quora, Reddit or LinkedIn's publishing tool can give you reach you wouldn't otherwise have. When you blog, focus on giving real value rather than thin, generic content.

3.4 Understand search engine optimization

SEO can be intimidating, but it pays off over the long run, unlike shortcuts such as link schemes that can backfire. For a print business, this usually means writing content around the specific products, materials and services customers search for, rather than overusing generic keywords, and making sure the content is genuinely useful to a reader, not just written for search engines.

3.5 Create an affiliate program

Affiliates can be a source of growth once your store has a reasonably good conversion rate, since affiliates are more willing to promote a store that is already converting well. Setting up an affiliate program and reaching out to potential affiliates, or listing your program on an established affiliate network, is one way to extend your reach beyond your own marketing.

3.6 Use LinkedIn the right way

LinkedIn is a useful, and often underused, channel for a print business, particularly for reaching corporate or B2B customers who order promotional products, business cards or branded merchandise in bulk. Posting about your business, sharing your story, and reaching out to other businesses directly can help build these relationships.

3.7 Use Facebook ads with retargeting

Facebook lets you target a specific audience by interest, location and other criteria, but the real value comes from retargeting rather than just click traffic. Installing a tracking pixel lets you build custom audiences from people who visited your site. For a print business, that might mean retargeting visitors who started designing a custom product in your online designer but didn't complete the order, which tends to improve conversions more than cold traffic alone.

3.8 Leverage influencers

Working with influencers, including smaller, niche "micro-influencers" rather than only those with huge followings, is a way to build awareness faster than growing an audience from scratch. The key is finding influencers whose audience actually matches your target customers, so unboxing or showcasing a custom print product reaches people likely to order one themselves. This works best once your offer and ordering process already convert well; start with small tests before committing a larger budget.

3.9 Use email marketing

An email sequence is a standard part of a print business's sales funnel: the automatic messages subscribers get after signing up. Use it to build a relationship with the subscriber and tell them about your business. Segment your list based on what people click on or buy, for example a subscriber who clicked on business-card templates versus one who bought custom apparel, so you can send more relevant follow-ups. Testing different subject lines and content helps you learn what your audience responds to.

Conclusion

A marketing strategy outlines how a print business intends to fulfill its vision, purpose and business objectives. It brings together a clear understanding of the market and where your products or services fit into it.

Your strategy should be well articulated and shared with the whole team, so everyone understands the long-term plan and how success will be measured. As market conditions change and you learn more about what your customers want, you'll need to revisit your strategy from time to time, to keep your marketing activities aligned with the business and your customers engaged.