The power of good marketing materials is in their immediate reach. You can impact hundreds or thousands of potential clients with a sign, brochure or catalog-multiplying your sales efforts in an instant. And by creating your marketing materials in-house, you can save the time and money that would go to an outside vendor.
We'll look more closely at the benefits of doing it yourself, and the tools you'll need to create professional quality materials-fast.
Save money
Sending small print jobs to an outside vendor can be expensive: Most of the cost is for the equipment setup, so a run of 250 copies can cost nearly the same as a run of 2500. And if you print more than you need, the materials may wind up collecting dust when your business moves or your catalog changes. So for jobs under a few thousand pages, it's less expensive to print it yourself.
You'll also save money by using cost- and time-saving printer accessories. A duplexer, for example, allows your machine to automatically print on both sides of the paper. And an automatic document feeder just plain frees you up.
Stay in touch
Besides attracting new business, marketing efforts are a great way to stay in touch with current customers, ensuring that they'll buy from you and not your competition. Contact them occasionally with a brochure, catalog, or letter. Or use a newsletter to keep them up to date with industry trends and provide ideas for using your products and services. It's a great way to convey your expertise and strengthen your credibility.
Plus, you can respond quickly to custom marketing needs, creating small batches of materials that are tailored to specific customers, presentations, or tradeshows.
Generate revenue
Customers who understand your marketing materials (and, as a result, your business) will be more likely to spend money with you. And color can be a great communication tool-it's been known to boost customer comprehension by 75 percent, increase readership by 40 percent, and expedite learning from 55 to 75 percent.
The tools
You'll get the same results that professional agencies do, and at a fraction of the cost, by creating your own HP Professional Publishing Solution.
Here's some equipment to consider for your in-house-publishing setup:
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Printers
High-volume - The HP Color LaserJet 4600 produces true 600 x 600 dpi with HP ImageRET 2400, making your product shots and bar charts look stunning. And it offers incredibly fast color printing at 17 ppm, so you can print more than 100 flyers in six minutes.
Medium-volume - The HP Color LaserJet 2500 allows you to produce professional-looking materials inexpensively (under $1000). It prints color documents at 4 ppm, so you can print 24 flyers in six minutes.
Low-volume - The HP Officejet D145 all-in-one comes with great, photo-friendly features that make it easy to print highly effective marketing materials. And it does the job of four machines, saving you a lot of space.
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Powerhouse PC - An HP Pavilion functions in so many ways for your business-as research center, storage room, networking hub, on-site photo lab, and all-around headquarters. The HP Pavilion 780n PC has a DVD+RW drive, and comes pre-loaded with powerful image-editing software and plenty of memory to handle all the image files you'll be using.
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Digital camera - The HP Photosmart 812 digital camera lets you take print-quality digital pictures of products, your storefront, and even your services in action. Use them to add impact to your marketing materials or your company website.
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Professional papers - For professional-looking marketing materials with polish, make sure that you print on high-quality papers designed for the job. HP Soft Gloss Laser Paper, for example, is perfect for classic, understated brochures, while HP High Gloss Laser Paper gives your proposals and communications real punch.
Printable version
