With Victoria’s Secret catalog no longer in print, one has to wonder about the future of catalogs in our industry. I am not sure if anyone would miss my catalog as much as I will miss Victoria’s. Much has been written and said about the continued need for print catalogs in our business and a reality check is due once again.
There are a few givens:
1) Suppliers are producing far fewer catalogs than ever and the unit cost is rising.
2) Shipping a single catalog is more expensive than ever.
3) Distributors, on the whole, are not taking print catalogs from trade shows as they did before the internet.
4) Distributors over the age of 40 are still “more comfortable” having print catalogs from, at the very least, their top 40 to 100 suppliers.
5) Catalogs from other suppliers languish in file cabinets and are cleaned out “every so often.”
6) Distributors who do not subscribe to the internet search engines (Distributor Central, SAGE, ASI, etc.) are still in need of print catalogs.
I won’t debate the future of print but rather look at the future of digital. Keep in mind as I present my case that I have been doing print catalogs since 1974 and, according to many of my colleagues, I’m “too old to figure out digital programs.” I love digital primarily because it provides me with an opportunity to make many, many targeted catalogs. I don’t have to start at ground zero, but simply massage the base content of my master catalog. Why make “many” different catalogs?
Let’s take a flashlight. The typical catalog simply shows a picture, it gives the vital data and presents a price. Rarely, if ever, is there a case history or any copy slanting, presenting and convincing a buyer that this is the right flashlight for their specific needs. In reality, promotional product catalogers can’t do that. A supplier, heretofore, has had to produce a “universal” catalog appealing to any and every end-buyer. We don’t know to whom you will show our catalog. If the flashlight buyer were at sleep-away camp, the copy should speak to his/her needs. That would be vastly different from a safety director where the light may be used in lifesaving ways. The use of the light and features could be different for a mining company, a utility company, etc. Copy for a healthcare professional using a pen light to look into your mouth could be fun to write “powerful, but short enough not to make you gag” or “no matter where you probe, we can shine a light up there.” Application and market specific catalogs can offer the needed “romance,” case histories and diversified application information.
The internet is filled with flip catalogs. These catalogs, when produced correctly, can be used on mobile devices and on computers; they can be accessed on line, loaded onto flash drives and burned onto discs. They can have hyperlinks and other interactive ingredients providing everything including a shopping cart. If suppliers embrace and create more specialty catalogs talking to, and about, specific buying markets, the distributor and end-user both will benefit.
It’s been about 45 years since I was a distributor, but I know buyers still say... “send me your catalog.” Don’t you just love the request for a singular catalog? Hey, Mr. Prospect, there is no such thing as “a catalog.” If there was one catalog, it would be over 100,000 pages and I would need a truck and forklift to deliver it. Consolidated catalogs may still be fashionable and some and have a positive cache about them, but are they still needed and as effective today? Going digital is not about saving a tree, it’s about delivering need focus information the way today’s Gen X, Gen Y and Millennial buyers want.
If your prospect were a safety director and you were asked to “send me your catalog,” in the new digital world, it is quick and easy to assemble one of your own. Identify your dozen or so prime safety product suppliers, copy their digital flip catalogs onto a flash drive, CD or file and you have your very own specialty catalog. But, what if these catalogs were the “safety market” editions from each supplier? They would feature only related product and would talk the language of the buyer. By your putting together your selected digital catalogs just one time, you have an asset for prospecting other buyers and you can link it to your social media pages, etc.
For my own company, I have taken the heart of our product line, still CDs and DVDs, USBs, printing and music, and broken down our core product into many, many different market application catalogs. It is the same product group but each catalog talks to the specific market and buyer. Were you to call my office today and request information on a given product that has to do with anti-distracted driving, you would be sent a catalog of products with pictures and copy addressing that need and application.
It is easy for distributors to take matters into their own hands. There are programs available to create them or some industry service providers, including PromoCorner, that can do it for you.
Let’s assume you want to make a basic gift catalog of your own for the holidays. Start by selecting pictures of the products you want to show from your supplier websites. Drop them into slides on PowerPoint or Microsoft publisher. You can even put them into Word. Add some copy and save each page as a .pdf. From there, it is a simple process of creating a flip book with user friendly software from many different sources. Add music, your own narration or many other features.
Your catalogs can be uploaded to services such as Dropbox and, whenever the need is there, you send a link to your prospect.
The applications to prospect by market are endless – fundraising, schools, associations, etc. Prospecting by application is endless, as well – membership recruitment, retention, appreciation. Perhaps suppliers will get the message that a universal catalog is the common core, but the annual need is to break it down into a set of catalogs by market and application.
Whether you own your own agency or work with a larger company, you are your own vice president of marketing. I have always preached that every salesperson needs to take one day a month and leave their office and cellphone behind. No distractions. That one day is when you become the chief marketing officer and focus only upon marketing. Be it a direct mail, email, or advertising campaign, that one day is vital to future business. With the digital assets we have today, your short- or long-term marketing plan becomes easier to achieve. Using or creating digital catalogs should be part of that plan.
The take away – long live the catalog – whatever form it has in the future.
And I will miss Victoria.
Joel D. Schaffer, MAS is CEO and Founder of Soundline, LLC, the pioneering supplier to the promotional products industry of audio products. Joel has 48 years of promotional product industry experience and proudly heralds "I was a distributor." He has been on the advisory panel of the business and marketing department of St. John’s University in New York and is frequent speaker at Rutgers Graduate School of Business. He is an industry Advocate and has appeared before the American Bankers Association, American Marketing Association, National Premium Sales Executives, American Booksellers Association and several other major groups. He has been a management consultant to organizations such as The College Board and helped many suppliers enter this industry. He is a frequent contributor to PPB and Counselor Magazines. He has facilitated over 200 classes sharing his industry knowledge nationwide. He is known for his cutting humor and enthusiasm in presenting provocative and motivating programs. He is the only person to have received both the Marvin Spike Industry Lifetime Achievement Award (2002) and PPAI’s Distinguished Service Award (2011). He is a past director of PPAI and has chaired several PPAI committees and task forces. He is a past Chair of the SAAGNY Foundation, Past President of SAAGNY and a SAAGNY Hall of Fame member. He was cited by ASI as one of the 50 most influential people in the industry.