Direct mail campaigns with W2P - 17/03/2010

About a decade ago W2P stood for technology that allowed to order printed collateral online. Since those days, the solutions have improved enormously: text modifications, image replacements, complex order structures, etc.

W2P evolution: variable data integration

The first important step in the evolution of web2print might have been the integration of variable content. At first these were only texts. Though, for direct mailings this meant a life-saver for e.g. the production of the address labels. Today direct mail campaigns can go much beyond than that. How about providing newsletters that contain only those news-themes that are of particular interest for the receiver? Or what if you could publish an image that depicts a women using the product for female receivers (instead of a boy for male receivers)? Maybe you want to have a personalized background artwork that fits the receiver's favorite color?

Direct mail: databases as a powerful publishing source

Whatever might be the direct mail project (newsletter, brochure, etc.), to start with: you need to possess the data. Databases come in many versions. What's more, for Direct Mail Campaigns the data are often archived in a CRM software suite. CRM software suites gather intelligence (data) about customers and prospects. Using those data in a direct mail campaign empowers the effect of your campaign. There are two main ways to work with those data within a W2P environment.

• Unstructured, not defined databases: the W2P program requires an interface for matching the data and the expected output. This is mostly done with importing structured file types sych as excel, tab text, comma delimited, XML, etc.


• Structured, pre-defined databases: a connection with the external data source needs to be established in order to use the data directly in the publication. This is done via an intelligent plug-in technology that drags the data into the W2P suite. Of course, the connection can be synchronized at the desired frequency in order to obtain the most up-to-date data for your publishing needs.

Direct mail campaigns with W2P: see how it works!

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