Why Do You Need a Warehousing Partner for Your Marketing Material?

What are you doing about your marketing materials? Not the digital marketing pieces that go out in newsletters, emails, and through social media, but the direct mail pieces that you are sending out to your customers. Direct mail marketing can still work because it’s possible to personalize the materials. Many people still prefer direct mail, so it makes sense that it would be something for you to pursue with your marketing.

However, printed materials tend to take up a lot of room and time, and they can be costly if you aren’t careful about how you have them printed. For most companies, even relatively small companies, it is better to work with a warehousing and logistics partner that can handle your marketing materials. Trying to do it all on your own has the potential for too many problems.

Let’s look at some of the benefits that they can provide. You will soon see how it can make your life quite a bit easier.

No Need to Worry About Warehouse Space

This is one of the biggest problems with marketing material. It all needs to be kept somewhere, and if that somewhere happens to be your business, you need to find a place to keep it all. Most companies are already limited on the amount of space they have available. They don’t have a warehouse area that can suddenly accommodate a lot of marketing material. It would take a lot of rearranging, and even then, there would likely be issues with where it’s kept.

When you don’t have space, the best option is to choose a partner that can provide warehousing for you. However, you want the company to be able to do more than just keep the items and ship them to you when they are needed. Ideally, they will ship them to your customers when needed, but more on that later.

You should put the space in your business to good use. Don’t turn it into a holding pen for the marketing materials you have to ship to customers.

No Organization Worries

Organization of marketing materials can feel like a full-time job when you have a substantial number of different materials. If you have different brochures, booklets, catalogs, etc. for different marketing purposes, keeping them all organized and easy to access can be difficult.

What happens when things aren’t properly organized? There’s a good chance that items will go missing or at the very least be difficult to find. It might mean that the wrong materials are sent to customers, which could cause confusion. Of course, if your customers are confused about what you are sending them, it can cause them to start to lose trust in your business. That’s not something you want.

Rather than trying to take care of all of that on your own, it’s a better and simpler solution to outsource that part of marketing operations to another company. The right warehousing and logistics partner will help to make this possible.

Proper Storage

Here’s something that many companies never even consider. How should your marketing materials be stored? You can’t simply put them in the supply closet with cleaning supplies. You can’t put them into a storage space that’s humid because it will damage them. While you might not need to have a refrigerated storage space, you do need to be sure they are kept correctly. You want them to look as good when they reach your customers as they did the day they were printed. Improper storage makes that impossible.

There’s also the fire risk that could come if you are storing large amounts of paper material on your site. If you don’t have a location where you can be sure it is safe, it could be a fire hazard. It could also be against the law depending on where you choose to store the materials.

There are plenty of other risks to storing your own marketing materials including flooding and pests, for example. Choosing a professional warehousing and logistics solution will help to ensure you don’t have to worry about this.

Security

Although it might seem unlikely that you would have to worry about thieves or saboteurs doing anything to your marketing materials, you never know. If you have a disgruntled employee, they could damage thousands of dollars’ worth of your marketing materials before they leave. There is even a chance that you wouldn’t realize anything was damaged or missing for several weeks or longer if you are handling the warehousing at your location.

By keeping your marketing materials offsite, you eliminate this risk entirely. Of course, you need to be sure you choose a company that can ensure security for the materials you store there whether it’s brochures, a booklet, or promotional items. When you talk with the company, ask them about security for their warehouses, just to be on the safe side.

Manage the Inventory

If you were to guess how many brochures you sent out to customers last month and how many of those same brochures you still have available for another marketing campaign, would you know? Trying to manage the inventory of the printed material can take up a lot of time and energy that you would probably be better-served spending elsewhere.

A company that offers both warehousing and logistics can keep track of the inventory for you. At a glance, you will know how much you have of different items and when things may need to be reordered to make sure you can meet your marketing needs. It’s nice to always be able to know what the inventory is when you need to know and not to have to worry about not realizing just how low you might be on certain materials.

Pick the Products

What if you had your own warehouse space or even just a corner of your warehouse that you dedicated to your printed marketing materials. How are you going to access those items and who will do it?

Will you have your staff be responsible for putting together the materials and shipping them in addition to handling all of their other tasks? They likely wouldn’t be happy in doing something that’s not in their job description. Are you going to do it on your own? Where will you find the time? Hiring a new team just to take care of these tasks wouldn’t make financial sense.

Why not make things easier and find a warehousing company that can take care of the picking and compiling for you? This is a better solution all around. When you work with the right company, you don’t have to worry about the picking at all.

Ship the Products

Not only will you not need to worry about picking, but you won’t need to worry about shipping the materials out either. With the right warehousing company, you’ll find that they can handle this for you, as well. The right company can offer flexible shipping solutions, which can ensure that your marketing operations and product fulfillment needs are taken care of properly.

This means you won’t need to have the materials shipped from the warehouse to your company and then shipped to the customers. They can go right from the warehouse to the customer’s mailbox. This helps to save time and money. It’s a more efficient solution, and it means you won’t have to worry about all of the issues that often come along with shipping.

Better for the Customers

How will your customers become happier? It’s easy. They will be getting requested materials and products faster than if you didn’t use one of these solutions. It allows them to make faster and more informed decisions. Ultimately, this is better for your company since happier customers will often mean converted customers and repeat customers.

Some Warehousing Companies Have Commercial Print Services

Here’s a good idea that will help to cut down on costs and increase efficiency even further. When you choose a company for your warehousing and logistics regarding your marketing material, check to see whether they can provide commercial printing services. Combine your marketing printing with a company that also provides warehousing and logistics.

Think about how much time and money this could save. Your materials will go right from the printer to the warehouse without needing to be shipped to a separate facility. It’s a more convenient option that means your materials will be ready to be shipped to customers faster. It reduces your costs since you don’t have to pay for materials to be shipped from a printer to a warehouse, as well.

Lower Your Expenses

As you can imagine, warehousing and logistics companies have the potential to help you save a lot of money. Even though you will have to pay for the services, it will generally be far less than you would have to pay if you tried to do it all on your own.

Keeping the materials at your business may not be possible given how much space you have available. It could require renovating or repurposing an area, which would be expensive. Even if you could find the space, you still don’t want to have the materials on-site due to the reasons discussed above.

You would have to hire more people to handle the materials and to ship them. It’s going to be more expensive to create a job at your company, hire someone, potentially pay for healthcare, benefits, etc. Hiring a third party for your warehousing and logistics will help you to save quite a bit of money.

It also means you only have to pay for shipping once. If you were to ship it from the printer to you and then to the customer, you would have to pay for shipping twice. When you have a printer that also offers warehousing services and shipping, it will help to keep those costs down. You’ll also find that often warehousing companies will have good deals with carriers to help you get the best shipping prices possible.

Digital Project Manager

A digital project manager is a simple but important tool that’s available through quality companies like FuseBox One. This tool will let you see what’s happening with your print projects from start to finish. You can see what’s happening in real-time, so you know when it’s being printed, done, and put into the warehouse.

Why do you need this type of information? It’s important for the marketing operations, as it can give you a better idea of exactly when materials will be ready to send to customers.

Keep in mind that not all commercial print companies offer warehousing and not all warehouses have commercial print capabilities. Digital project managers are not a given either. Make sure the one you choose does have these various features. It will make printing, warehousing, and marketing much easier.

What Else Do You Need to Consider When Choosing the Warehousing and Logistics Partner?

In addition to choosing a company that can provide the commercial print services needed for the materials, you also need to be sure that they can provide you with a safe storage location. The company should be able to pick and ship the materials to your customers or send items directly to you if needed. Sometimes, you might need the materials for in-person events.

Of course, you also want to make sure that you have a cost-effective solution for your warehousing and logistics. Check the prices based on the services you will need. Check to see what other features and services might be offered through the company, as well.

Remember, the goal of the warehousing and logistics company should be to take the work and worry out of your hands. They should make handling all of your storage and shipping needs as simple as possible.

Take some time to check out the options from FuseBox One. The company offers more than digital asset management. You’ll find commercial print services, promotional products, help with marketing operations, and much more.

Resources: https://www.fuseboxone.com/services/#MP