And the winners are printers A & C

Apr 1, 2008 12:00 PM, Michael Casey

The buyers were given 14 choices, but five floated to the top and great customer service was way out in front as the No. 1 reason. Who says there is a price war out there?

Competitive prices, meeting delivery commitments and producing quality product were in a dead heat for second place; fast turnaround was a distant third. Of the seven printers participating in the study, six found their customers ranked customer service as the No. 1 reason for choosing them. We commend them for not playing the price war game.

Printer B in the chart admitted leading with price and probably training its customers to negotiate on many deals! Bad move. This sends a message that maybe you are not offering the best deal out of the gate. It promotes shopping around or roll-up-your-sleeves negotiation. Price the job right, be creative with different options, but don't train your customers to turn you into a three-bid vendor. Partner and offer the best service experience: Your customers will value you more.

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Michael Casey is president and founder of Survey Advantage (www.surveyadvantage.com). He is an Intl. Franchise Assn. technology board member and recently became a major partner with NAPL, supporting its consulting and research practices. Survey Advantage's mission is to help printers improve their business performance through the delivery of cost-effective, comprehensive customer feedback systems and easy-to-digest reports.

Customers' priorities for three key firms

Overall print buyer ranking*	Priority	Printer
		A	B	C
1st	Great customer service	1st		1st
2nd	Competitive prices		1st
	Meets delivery commitments	3rd	3rd	2nd
	Superior quality	2nd	2nd
3rd	Fast turnaround			3rd
*Based on 1,000 print buyer opinions from the customer bases of 7 different printers.

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