by Kevin Cook

0/ 4377/

/

Last Updated on: 9th November 2024, 11:19 pm

The traditional way is way too slow and frustrating both for the customers and business owners to work with. There is a reason why physical stores are losing customers without sign/banner design software and going out of business so quickly. Below mentioned are a few reasons why the old way is no longer a viable business plan.

Frustrated Customers

There are many reasons why the traditional way is so frustrating to customers

1. Time-consuming: With a physical store, the customers have to keep aside a particular time from their busy schedule to go to the store and make their orders. The problem is many customers are discouraged simply because of the fact it’s time-consuming.
2. Lost Interest: Many customers can’t find any time to physically go to the store and order their banners. This forces many customers to lose interest and you lose business.
3. Expensive Process: Sign designing is an expensive process; even for a simple artwork they have to hire professionals. They have to spend extra on various types of banners and signs.
4. Cannot Make Changes: Usually, banner designing is a complicated process and a lot of brainstorming goes into making the final design as it is for marketing and advertising. However, with the traditional way, if the company wants to make changes in the design and type, it cannot be done at the last moment.
5. Repeat Work: Companies who attend trade shows need banners every year. Some keep their design same for multiple tradeshows every year. In this case, in a traditional way, the company has to prepare the design and order again from the store which creates a lot of repeat work.
6. Frustrating Experience: Most customers are unaware of the image resolution necessary for the size of the sign they are printing. In this case, the customer and the print shop have to return and send their design back and forth multiple times before finalizing it.
7. Cannot Have Rush Orders: If the customer decides to order signs and banners at the last moment of the event, it can’t be done with the traditional method.

Frustrated Print shops/Decorators

1. Few Customer Reach: Signs and banners are typically ordered by business and if you have a physical store, you will have only a limited reach to your customer. Only businesses established near you will order from you and that too don’t happen too often.
2. Lost Sales: With the emerging online sign customization options, businesses are losing interest in ordering it from a physical store because of its long and tedious process.
3. Sales are Seasonal: Because with a physical store, you can only operate in a particular niche area, the print businesses get orders seasonally especially when businesses attend trade shows and events.
4. No Sales on Holidays: Physical store stay closed during holidays for which they lose sales to their online competitors.
5. Lost Branding Opportunity: With a physical store, they lose their opportunity to advertise their brand and often times they have to lose sales and reputation because of the fault of the customers.

Swamped Art Dept

1. Customer Dependency: Most customers don’t have the right knowledge of the type of design necessary for printing a sign or banner, which is why the art department has to struggle to get the right design from their customers. They are completely dependent on the customer and have to deal with their shortcomings.
2. Receive Frequent Unprintable Designs: Because the print shops receive their designs from the customer’s hand to hand, they usually send faulty designs that are incomplete and unprintable. Rectifying the design alone takes up a few extra days to complete the order.
3. Tedious Process: Both the customers and print shops are dependent on each other, which is why an order is typically sent back and forth between the two parties before finalizing the order.
4. All lost Orders: The tedious process sometimes encourages customers to drop the order midway and go for other stores.

Lost (Sales + Time + Resources)

Lost Sales:

Sign & banner designers lose sales through multiple channels in the traditional way

1. They primarily lose sales because of the other competitors in the area and also to the increasing online stores.
2. Sign & banner design is typically B2B and to make sales, they have to be nearer to the business area. Because of this limited reach, they lose sales every day.
3. They lose sales because many businesses don’t prefer the tedious process.
4. Businesses send low-quality artworks that are unprintable which after being printed the customers are unsatisfied and ask for returns.
5. This also makes customers lose trust in the brand, even if it’s for the incomplete knowledge of the customers.
6. Print shops stay closed during the holidays and weekends, which is when they lose customers.
7. Because the prints are sent back and forth multiple times before finalization, customers get frustrated and they drop the order midway and go for another printer.

Lost Time:

There are many ways physical print stores lose time

1. Sign and banner printers lose time in sending back and forth the designs and other essentials to the customers before finalization.
2. Because the shop operated within a particular niche, some days the store remains ideal without any orders.
3. Sometimes Businesses are dissatisfied with the final order and ask for returns which is a complete waste of time and resources.
4. The complete workflow in a physical print shop is manual, which takes up a lot of time especially for repetitive works.
5. Most of the time is lost in explaining the process to the customers and taking or processing orders.

Lost Resources:

1. Maintaining a physical store takes up a lot of manual work for which they have to hire professionals for repetitive tasks.
2. Many man-hours are lost in the process of finalizing the design and processing the orders.
3. Many printing inks, equipment, and resources are lost because of returned or discarded orders.
4. You have to create additional space for the customers because you can’t take online orders.
5. You need special professionals to explain the print process to inexperienced customers.

Lost $:

• Avg. the income per hour = ~$1000
• Avg. income per 8 hour = ~$8,000
• Potential $ lost during closed hours = ~$16,000/day
• Additional man-hours to run the store = ~$2000/day
• Avg. loss of money due to returns = ~$1000/day

Total avg. money lost = ~$19,000/day or ~$570,000/month

No Branding Opportunity:

Other disadvantages of the old way are that physical stores rarely make an impression on their customers. There is no time for branding or business expansion. They are always in the rush because the order is not processed in the order. This turns into a vicious loop and a tedious everyday process.

How Product Designer Tool Fixes Your Problems?

The Sign/banner design software has all that is need to revolutionize the way you make an online business.

Do you have printers? Are those printers sitting idle?

Become a Print-on-Demand dropshipping app like Printful or Printify. Dropship your merchants' orders.

Unlimited Merchant stores. Dropship and Fulfil Merchants' orders. Manage merchant invoice, sales commission, etc. Merchants sell the designed products in shopify, etsy stores, etc.

Know more

Digital age:

1. 90% of today’s businesses prefer to order signs and banners online. This makes it very important for sign printing businesses to have a digital presence.
2. An eCommerce store along with a sign design software enables businesses to capture a larger audience outside their demographics.
3. With an online store, the banner printers or sign printers can stay open 24/7 and take orders even during holidays.
4. Digital presence also makes it easier for businesses to market online and run several online campaigns to reach more customers and get repeat sales.
5. The online sign/banner design software comes with multiple features that automate many repetitive works.
6. Customers will be able to customize signs and banners on the mobile phone without wasting time going to a physical store.

Social Presence:

1. A strong social media presence will enable you to connect to businesses on a personal level.
2. You can run social media campaigns to be able to target relevant leads and businesses to boost sales.
3. Send you messages, ads, and other content to thousands of target customers in minutes.
4. Businesses can connect to other businesses on a personal level to understand the market demands better.

Customer reach to multiple demographics:

1. Connect to a maximum number of potential customers by going online. You can have your business presence even outside your current demographics. You even have the potential to reach global customers.
2. Take orders from different time zones.

Online Business Expansion:

1. With an online sign/banner designer tool and eCommerce store, expanding your business reach is only a few clicks away.
2. Get the opportunity of partnership by getting noticed by other businesses.
3. Run efficient market research by connecting with potential customers directly.
4. Use the online banner designer app to easily set up multiple stores in multiple languages and themes at multiple locations.

More Sales:

By now it’s obvious that integrating sign designer apps will significantly increase your sales.

1. As customer design their signs and banners online by themselves, there will be little chance of error and they will value their product highly and there will be little chance of returns and unhappy customers.
2. Impress other businesses with an easy-to-use and interactive user interface for designing the signs and banners.
3. Increase sales by taking orders even during holidays and off-times as you are open 24/7.
4. Boost sales with online campaigns such as email campaigns, Google ads, social media ads, etc.

More Productivity:

1. As an online sign/banner design software automates most of the repetitive work, the order process becomes faster and more efficient.
2. You can integrate other business tools and apps with the sign designer app to increase productivity.
3. Because it has little human intervention, there is less chance of human error.
4. Features such as “Bleed Mark” and “Safe Zone” enable businesses to quickly resolve the issue of faulty images. As everything is done online it eliminates the lengthy process of sending back and forth the designs.
5. Customers understand the process and they get exactly what they want.
6. Banner printers get print-ready files that are well organized to make printing easier.
7. Pricing, taxes, and shipping are already mentioned in the store, which eliminates any misunderstanding between the print shop and customer.
8. Customers can order everything in one place include signs, banners, banner stands, banner flags, etc.

Fewer Resources:

1. With the online banner designer tool, most of the work is automated so you need less manpower.
2. With the option of online branding, you need a few field marketing professionals.
3. You don’t need experts to explain to the customers as the online process is self-explanatory.

More $:

• Avg. the income per hour = ~$1500
• The avg. income per 24 hour = ~$36,000
• Avg. loss of money due to returns = ~$500/day

Total avg. money earned = ~$31,000/day or ~$930,000/month

Fewer Returns:

1. Low-Resolution Warning – Sign designer app automatically notifies customers if the uploaded image is unprintable.
2. Artwork approval – It speeds up the process of finalizing the artwork before production.
3. Customer communication portal – It directly connects the production team to the customers to help them finalize the designs.
4. Bleed mark and safe zone – Customers don’t have to worry about the final design as the designer app comes with bleed mark and safe zone.
5. Configure banner stands – Customers can order everything from one place and can also configure the banner stands and flag poles.

Single/Bulk Orders:

1. Receive both bulk and single orders round the clock.
2. Signs and banners eCommerce app comes with quotation feature to enable bulk orders.
3. Online sign designer extension automatically produces print-ready files which makes production easier.
4. Automate the process with taxes, shipping, with other integrated apps.

Happy Customers:

1. Customer loves the shopping experience for which you get more repeat sales.
2. Easy artwork approval makes ordering hassle-free and fast.
3. Most satisfied customers mean fewer returns and little loss of resources.
4. Takes little time from design to production to delivery.

Better reviews:

1. Get lots of reviews from multiple channels.
2. Get more positive reviews online and 5-star ratings.
3. Show your customer testimonials to new users.

Everything Else:

In this digital age, it is necessary to have a stronger online presence with have a personal connection with your customers to understand them better. By going online, you are giving your customers the ease to customize banners and signs online conveniently without visiting a physical store.

Therefore, the sign/banner design software is the right choice for you and your customers to personalize banners specific to their purpose.

Do you have printers? Are those printers sitting idle?

Become a Print-on-Demand dropshipping app like Printful or Printify. Dropship your merchants' orders.

Know more