Above: the new Infigo Catfish.

Web to print has grown rapidly from a buzzword to a vital piece of a print company’s arsenal. Nessan Cleary says that it’s now adapting to a market of cloud services and cross media.

When the Internet first started to become popular many people struggled to see how physical products such as print could work in the brave new virtual world. After a fitful start web to print has filled that gap, and can now offer everything from e-commerce to marketing services. Indeed, ‘web procurement’ is perhaps now a more accurate term, though vaguer.

For this reason says Jamie Thompson, managing director of RedTie, it can still be difficult to define. However,he says: ‘People now think of it as a templating tool that can take orders online’.
He acknowledges that a lot of this is now being replaced by cross media, another area that’s difficult to define despite having just seen a show devoted to it in London.

This variety of products and approaches makes it hard to compare systems and to work out what offers best value for money. It’s still true that most web to print systems are sold to printers and print management companies but some vendors report that ad agencies are web ordering systems to run marketing campaigns and brand owners trying to exert tighter control across their branding.

Mr Thompson says it’s best for customers to decide what features they want and then see which supplier can come closest, adding that customer requirements are often led by the demands of the first customer they intend to use the system for.

Still, at its simplest, web to print is still being used to set up templates of products for end customers to order from. This can range from simple things such as repeat orders of
stationery, right through to bespoke marketing campaigns. Most systems now include some form of personalisation so that customers can populate the templates with their own data, but there’s considerable variation in sophistication between the different offerings.

Content creation

One system that is gaining a lot of traction recently is Chilli Publish, which has signed deals with several partners including Agfa. At its heart is an extremely flexible layout editor that Alan Dixon, managing director of UK distributor Workflowz, describes as being ‘just like InDesign online.’ It uses an InDesign plugin to let users build templates, which are then imported to Chilli Publish in its own format, giving sophisticated design capabilities without needing InDesign Server. This is in itself an attraction, as InDesign Server is expensive to install. Chilli has been developing its products rapidly in the two years since it was first launched, and is already on version 3.0.

Tharsten, which expanded its web to print system as ePrint Pro in February, has integrated Chilli Publish as the document composition option for the system.

Another program with a strong composition engine is Bitstream’s Pageflex Storefront. Bitstream also acquired iWay, originally one of the first commercially viable web to print
systems, in 2010. Both programs have recently been updated and now offer better support for working across different geographic regions, as well as some search engine optimisation and the social media capabilities – useful for driving traffic to a web to print site, particularly for consumer products. The composition engine now supports transparency and gradients.

Simon Ellington, commercial manager for Pageflex’s UK distributor ROI360, says that there are distinct differences between the two: ‘Storefront suits more complex templates and has a more consumer friendly interface, while iWay is more suited to the corporate implant. It’s got simpler templating but more MIS-type controls than Storefront.’

iWay was updated to version 6.0 at the beginning of August. This now has the Pageflex NuDoc composition engine, that’s used in the higher end Pageflex systems to power the sophisticated variable data personalisation. The company says it allows users to offer additional marketing services. The new Create Order Application Programming Interface (API) lets printers develop custom interfaces for their end users that drive orders into iWay’s back-end. New ‘globalisation’ features allow international trading, with support for multiple currencies and the ability to generate notifications in several languages as appropriate.

ROI has also developed its own modules for Pageflex. This includes a new data module that can pull in data, such as demographics, from the Experian database which is specific to the UK. Mr Ellington says that as well as the web to print product itself printers also need support in how to sell the idea of it to their customers: ‘We work with clients to help them deliver products and we do a lot more consultative work.’

He adds that increasingly companies are looking to web to print to generate revenue, such as from manipulating data streams, running PURL campaigns, or blasting out SMS messages or emails, and then tracking and analysing the response.

Of course, much of this can also be done from an MIS and several MIS, such as Tharstern and Optimus do offer web to print options of their own. Mr Ellington acknowledges that this makes a lot of sense given that the MIS already has access to a lot of the data needed for web to print, but says: ‘Web to print can be its own product area simply because of the breadth of complexity in making a marketing portal work for a number of clients.

Gareth Parker, value proposition manager at Ricoh UK, says that there have been changes in the UK market in the last year or so: ‘Firstly, I think there’s a definite change in understanding of ownership models in web to print, in how they are purchased and run. It depends on how savvy the printer is but the cloud is the main thing.’

He says that vendors are now expected to offer creative options because of financial pressures on customers. ‘The early inhibitions around security have calmed down because people accept that if you are careful in dealing with trusted partners then it’s expected that it will be secure.’

Mr Parker says that where people used to buy web to print systems as a way of saving money, they are now looking for a solution that will actively make them more money. He points out: ‘A lot of businesses have gone through a period of cost cutting and are now working as efficiently as they can, so they are looking towards new business generation.’ He continues: ‘Web to print is not just a technology but it forces a change in the business by forcing you to be closer to the customer.’

Ricoh sells EFI’s Digital Storefront, both as a standalone and a hosted system. It also offered the SaaS hosted NowPrint (developed by NowDocs) as a part of its TotalFlow software offerings.

One stop solution

However, in late August the company also announced that it was investing in the US developer PTI, which has given it access to MarcomCentral, a broad one stop marketing and branding solution for all sorts of products, not just print. This was demonstrated on Ricoh’s stand at the Cross Media Show in London in early September.

MarcomCentral will replace NowPrint in the Ricoh lineup. Existing NowPrint customers will be migrated to the new system says Mr Parker, though he admits that there aren’t all that many users to migrate.

Mr Parker says that MarcomCentral has a different approach to Digital Storefront: ‘It’s for a print service provider that wants to move to offering marketing services for print and non-print products,’ he says. ‘It’s a cloud-based service that can take a print job and send it through to a press, but can also handle cross media campaigns, such as output to SMS or email, or setting up personalised URLs. As such it can handle web to print but is really more of a marketing portal tool. It’s a whole background to a business, not just web to print.’

Red Tie also works entirely through an SaaS model, with customers paying for the use of the system. This is primarily split into two offerings: Red Tie Template (RTT), for setting up the websites and templates, and Red Tie Quotation (TRQ), which handles the live estimates and quotations side. Mr Thompson notes that the value of software development is falling and that customers don’t want to pay huge amounts for updates, adding: ‘Also customers don’t want to carry an in-house IT person.’ Another advantage is that customers always have the most up to date version of the software.

The company spends a lot of time teaching users how to sell the system to their own
customers. Mr Thompson says that it’s in his interest to encourage customers to use the system as much as possible, noting that while the customer base is growing by around 10-15% each year, the amount of jobs run through the system is up by 25%.

Vpress is a privately owned UK-based company that’s been around for more than a decade. It celebrated the tenth birthday of its Coreprint Web to Print system last year. This is available in two flavours, both offered as a hosted cloud-based service, so there’s no need for the printer to install any software at all.

For the standard version Vpress supplies a team to help set up templates and generally manage the system, including dealing with specific job requirements. Coreprint Pro is for users that have their own IT and want to manage the system themselves. Managing director Tim Cox says that many people use a mixture, doing the basics for themselves but calling on Vpress for particular clients. Mr Cox describes the system as a procurement system, saying: ‘It’s a large stock management e-commerce solution.’ It links with MIS and production workflows, via JDF and XML, and can deliver a print-ready PDF file. Customers can use it to order jobs from templates, and can add personalisation or even order non-print items. It can also be used to set up direct mail and marketing campaigns. It’s sold to printers, print buyers and office stationery suppliers. Users can take the whole system, or just use and pay for a part of it, depending on their needs.

Start gradually

He also says that people often start slowly with web to print, perhaps buying a system to be able to procure items for a large client. He adds: ‘But as they understand more they do personalisation and learn how to match their customers to the products being sold.’
Another company that’s embracing the cloud concept is Optimus, which is best known for its MIS products but which was an early developer of web to print too. This year it has introduced Optimus Cloud, which it describes as ‘a complete online solution to allow the purchase of standard products, complex variable data products, to re-order and to offer alternative products.’

It’s a modular system that users can specify and expand as needed. For instance the Fast Quotes module incorporates the quotations element of the dash MIS, introduced a couple of years ago for primarily digital work. The system isn’t confined to print, and allows users to offer related products, such as mugs or badges.

Customers can also view their order history, current order status, previous quotations, stock levels, deliveries etc. Optimus says this enhances the customers’ experience while handling their most common queries automatically, freeing the load from customer service reps.

Templates are created using Adobe InDesign and there’s provision for variable data for any document though the Variable Data Orders Module. Ordered products can be downloaded as either PDFs or InDesign files that the print provider can post-process if needed.
Another recurrent theme is the need to accommodate mobile devices and social networking. Infigo Software, for example, has just launched a new web to print system, Catfish, which it claims is fully optimised for mobile platforms. It also boasts integration with Facebook and Twitter, increasingly seen as being the key to running successful full marketing campaigns. Stock orders card pricing can also be viewed.

One of the earliest UK developers to embrace cloud computing, at least by name, was Cognitu, the current version of a web to print system originally developed in 1998 by London based Ivor Solutions. It launched its Cognitu Cloud service at Ipex in 2010. It offers this in several service levels, named after cloud types.

The entry level is Cumulus, priced at £200 per month, which gives users up to 200 template transactions and 200 stock transactions, with anything over that charged at £150. The Stratus, Nimbus and Cirrus levels cost £300, 500 and £1000 per month, for 300, 500 and 1000 template and stock transactions, though extras cost less each time. A £299.99 three month trial package is also offered, to get you going with one customer.

Another recent addition to cloud based web to print is Agfa, which launched its Apogee Storefront system at drupa. As with its rivals, it’s said to make it easy to set up online stores for both printed and non-printed products.

In the past year or so Quark Systems has introduced its web to print system into Europe. This seems to be almost entirely intended for B2B use, either within large organisations or between a print service supplier and regular, ‘locked-in’ customers. It is based around new XTensions for QuarkXPress to set up templates, plus the existing QuarkXPress Server to deliver them on-line for access through browsers. There are optional modules to support variable data and an Ad production module to speed up the creation of variable instances of an ad.

Some of the technology developed for that has also been built into Quark Brand Manager, a very similar system that allows tightly controlled templates to be set up, with collaborative approvals, and then distributed to local stores, designers, ad agencies etc who can then create localised campaigns based on approved styles.

In conclusion, there is a tremendous breadth of different solutions, all sheltering under the web to print umbrella. But then there are many different kinds of print businesses, and it’s a matter of matching the right solution to the business, and more importantly, to the
direction the business is going in.