If you're in the print, mailing, or fulfillment industry, you should know by now how important it is to provide a full range of services for your customers. In order to show your customers and prospects that you have the ability to provide these dynamic services for them, you need to use your own business as a model. The types of communications you should be considering for the promotion of your own business mirror those you will sell to clients. They include:

1. One-to-one ROI-driven, multi-channel relationship marketing solutions that are designed to deliver individual communications to the best and most profitable customers, create unique and customized messages across multiple channels, manage campaigns, track expenses, and calculate ROI in real time. To do this, you must have the right infrastructure in place.

    

2. Data modeling and data mining to determine the "sweet spot" based on specific criteria established by data experts. This is a service you can always outsource. Profiling factors such as demographics, product affinity, lifestyle, and cluster analysis enable the modeling of existing customer data against scrubbed national consumer files, extracting important and relevant demographics as well as lifestyle data. This means that you can model the trends and traits of your best customers and then use that "model" to find thousands more just like them. Hire a data expert or find a solid partner and try it first in your own self-promotional efforts. First-hand experience is the best way for you to learn how to sell what can appear to be a very complex service. It is complex - no question, but often painted to be more complex than it needs to be. With the right resources in place, it will add extreme value to the services you can offer.

    

    

3.  A digital asset management system must be in place to house all of the digital assets you and your clients will use in marketing efforts. This includes graphics, logos, templates, audio, video, and more. A good digital asset management system ensures access to the most current version and includes security controls to prevent access by unauthorized users. Your digital asset management system should be able to handle digital assets, of course, but can also be used to track physical assets.

1. Comprehensive and marketing program measurement metrics and analytics are available through marketing dashboards. With a dashboard, you and/or your customers can:

• See who is responding within seconds of the visit

• Use up-to-date collected results for ROI calculations

• Create graphical representations of results that update automatically

• Improve sales lead effectiveness via automatically delivered lead email messages

• Gain immediate access to raw data for other corporate systems or processes

1. Printing services includes more than just putting ink and toner on paper and shipping it out the door. As a mailing/fulfillment service provider, you already have many of the pieces in place to add value to printing services. And printing presses are easier to use than ever before - digital, DI and even offset. You are already working with clients to minimize the impact of postage increases (or should be!) while maintaining response rates. Marketing services providers consult with clients to discuss options such as modified packaging, address quality, bar-coding, delivery point verification, volume discounts, and other money-saving ideas. With printing services under your roof, it is one more arrow in your value-added quiver that will attract and keep loyal customers.

    

2. Best-in-class mailing and fulfillment services using the latest technology are table stakes in today's market - that goes without saying. But by expanding your scope beyond mailing by equipping yourself to provide integrated marketing services to clients, you can solidify and increase their presence with existing customers and help them bring in new customers to grow their businesses. Obviously, the same applies to your self-promotional efforts.

    

   If you want to transform your business and diversify your services to expand your customer base, you need to create an effective promotion plan. Get started growing your business by using these seven communications to build your self-promotion portfolio and show clients all that you can do for them.

    

    

   About John Foley, Jr.

John Foley, Jr. is the CEO of interlinkONE and Grow Socially. John and his team consult with print, mailing, and fulfillment companies on transforming and thriving by maximizing the success of their services through new technology and strategies, write strategic marketing plans to get them on a path to multi-channel success, and John speaks frequently to providers on how to integrate technology and communications into their products and services to better interact with their audience and grow their business. Learn more about John at JohnFoleyJr.com, and his companies at interlinkONE.com and GrowSocially.com.