Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Another score for InfoPrint: But is it TransPromo or TransInfo?

As is so often the case, Cary Sherburne gets the story right at WhatTheyThink. But in this one I have a quibble.

Our industry has been trapped by Transpromo for a while. It was useful when the issues was marketing. It's much less useful when describing the role of Print to create a smart infrastructure. Health, education and government do not need or want Promo. But they do need, want and will pay for Info.

The first snippet below is from Cary's article. Most definitely worth the click to read the whole thing. The second snippet below is a simple search and replace. I invite you to compare and contrast and decide which helps clarify the importance of what InfoPrint is up to.

Snippet One:
from WhatTheyThink:
InfoPrint Solutions and Sinclair Oil
By: Cary Sherburne

August 11th, 2009 -- Yesterday, InfoPrint Solutions and Sinclair Oil announced a TransPromo partnership that has a slightly different twist than the programs we normally hear about. Most of the TransPromo case studies tend to focus on business-to-consumer applications: Companies who place marketing or educational messages on statements, invoices, notifications and other consumer (customer) communications, reducing costs and often converting these mundane documents from a cost center into revenue generators."

. . . according to Lee Gallagher, InfoPrint’s Manager, Direct Marketing Solutions. “Sinclair commercial accounts can offer this card to the truckers that drive their oil trucks.

It allows the consolidated, real-time capture of all of the relevant data when truckers refuel, purchase food, or make other business-related expenditures. With the program, Sinclair does all of the program management based on rules established by the customer.

For example, a Sinclair commercial account may have an established daily spending limit for driver purchases at convenience stores. When drivers make a purchase, they are able to get immediate point-of-purchase feedback with messages that indicate they have reached their daily limit for food expenditures. Or perhaps the message might thank them for filling up at Point A, but let them know they could have saved a certain dollar amount by filling up at Point B. It takes the burden of analyzing credit card information off of the customer and it allows them to reduce expense, maximize assets and become more cost effective in the management of their fleets.”
Snippet Two. A few words changed and a sentence or two added.
August 11th, 2009 -- Yesterday, InfoPrint Solutions and Sinclair Oil announced a TransInfo partnership that has a slightly different twist than the programs we normally hear about. TransPromo case studies tend to focus on companies who place marketing or educational messages on statements, invoices, notifications and other consumer (customer) communications, reducing costs and often converting these mundane documents from a cost center into revenue generators. TransInfo focuses on delivering timely appropriate information at the appropriate time to improve the efficiency of infrastructure transactions.
. . .
Gallagher explains, “Sinclair commercial accounts can offer this card to the truckers that drive their oil trucks. It allows the consolidated, real-time capture of all of the relevant data when truckers refuel, purchase food, or make other business-related expenditures.

For example, a Sinclair commercial account may have an established daily spending limit for driver purchases at convenience stores.

When drivers make a purchase, they are able to get immediate point-of-purchase feedback with messages that indicate they have reached their daily limit for food expenditures. Or perhaps the message might thank them for filling up at Point A, but let them know they could have saved a certain dollar amount by filling up at Point B. It takes the burden of analyzing credit card information off of the customer and it allows them to reduce expense, maximize assets and become more cost effective in the management of their fleets.”

5 comments:

  1. Michael, an interesting change, but is it Point of Purchase information or transpromo/transinfo, surely the two are very different....

    POP info would be like a rdif id carried by the truckers that then received POP information when when arrived at the truck stop, where as transpromo would be the information they receive on their credit card statement with offers targetted at the places they have been? Or am I getting mixed up here?

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  2. tunicca,

    The point I'm trying to make is that there is a distinction between transpromo and what I've coined as TransInfo.

    In use case you describe there is no selling going on. Just the right information at the right time to the right person so that person can make a decision that is compliant with management rules.

    One assumes that if management rules are smart, that will lead naturally to a smarter organization. It's using the infrastructure of print output , in this case POP, to deliver the information in the best way.It could be repurposed to use the print infrastructure in a school or health system to do similar things.

    Maybe it will help to clarify what I'm trying to say if you consider that a POP receipt can be seen as a micro leaflet. You scan it. Get the info you want. Throw it away or maybe keep it to remind yourself later.

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  3. tunica,
    lol. I was just reading your post about newspapers, when I flipped over to gmail. Didn't realize it was you until I clicked on your name here.

    Ain't life grand!

    Interesting post. For visitors, here's the link:
    http://tunicca.wordpress.com/2009/08/07/a-possible-future-for-newsprint-%E2%80%93-part-3/

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  4. Grrr. here's a a bit.ly link for anyone who is interested.
    http://bit.ly/3NMgTf

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  5. Lol, sweet, I get it what you are saying now, and transinfo I guess has as much power as transpromo, just a different sort of power.
    The micro leaflet example can contain both selling material and informational material, I can now see a lot of potential in the oil trucker example.

    Yes sorry that's me, interesting that you were reading the blog, I almost used my blogspot login which isn't half as interesting as my Tunicca stuff,

    And sorry about the links, Wordpress seems to do strange things with the title font encoding! But glad you enjoyed and that you read the other parts to the story.

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