And this means a print buyer will do one of two things.  They will probably put the phone straight down.  After all, this is the tenth identical call that they have received this week.  But if the print buyer is feeling kind, they may give the printer a job to quote on.

But the printer for that job will be chosen on price only
Every printer is giving the same message.  And most printers do deliver on service and quality.  So the buyer has only one way to choose the printer.  And that way is price. 

If printers do not have an engaging sales message they will be fighting a price war.  They will fail to create worthwhile client partnerships.  They won’t have any control over their clients.  And ultimately, most of these printers will go out of business.

Printers who have a sales message that engages clients will achieve far more.  They will gain clients who want to partner with them.  They will have more control over these clients.  Ultimately, printers with engaging sales messages will create more powerful, profitable businesses.

So how do you create an engaging sales message?  Here are three ways:

Make the sales message about the client, not you
Most clients aren’t interested in you.  They aren’t interested in your modern presses.  They aren’t interested in your company history.

But clients are interested in themselves.  So the printer needs to have a message which relates to the client and their market sector.  But the message also needs to understand the challenges that the market sector faces.

Make the sales message relate to the client’s problems
All clients face challenges in their business.  But how do you, as a printer, help solve those challenges?  If you can solve a problem for a client, they are very likely to talk to you.

Remember that the problem may not be what you think it is.  The client problem is unlikely to be about the print itself.  You need to understand the real challenges that the client faces.  You might want to talk to your best clients about the challenges that they face.

But once you engage with the client and their problems, you still need to be different from the competition.

Create a unique selling point that is different to everyone else’s
Most printers rely on service, quality and price as their unique selling points.  But these selling points are not unique:  98% of printers talk about these issues.  Do you want to be part of the 98%?

To have an engaging sales message, you need to create a true point of difference in your business.  And this point of difference must be relevant to the print buyer.

So can printers really sound different to each other?
I recently ran a course on sales messaging for printers.  In the room were four printers with virtually the same presses.  And three of them were also family owned.  They all had very similar sales messages.

But by the end of the day, all of them sounded completely different.  Each of the printers had created different target markets.  They had worked out how they helped these target markets.  And they had created a new message that would engage these markets.

It is easy for printers to sound very different to a print buyer.

But print buyers buy print, not solutions
Have a look at this article on why print buyers should not buy print.  The article will give you a different insight into the mind of a print buyer.  And you will see that the print buyer is actually buying something very different to some ink on a substrate.

When you realise what print buyers are buying, it is much easier to create a more engaging sales message.

Here are three steps for you to start creating your new sales message
1)    Ban the words service, quality and price from your sales message.  And, while you’re at it, bear in mind that the environment is also becoming a pretty standard message.
2)    Before going further with the sales message, talk to a good client.  Understand their problems and how you help them.
3)    Look at the other printers that your client might use.  Focus on what makes you different from these printers.

Remember, you need to sound different from the competition
And you certainly don’t want to end up sounding like print A.

Or print B. Or printer C.  Or printer D….

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P.S. Would you like an audiocast of an expanded version of this article? Print & Procurement will soon be offering an online course on sales messaging. If you sign up to make sure that you are kept up to date with launch details you will be sent a series of four MP3s around this subject. Click here to find out more.