PFL helps businesses deliver authentic moments by
creating impactful direct mail that is data-driven, bringing measurement,
personalization, and predictability from digital to direct mail. PFL offers direct mail that is... Simplified: PFL simplifies direct mail execution by managing the entire process under one roof from strategy and production to delivery and measurement. Engaging: Supports engagement that results in action by paring digital tactics with memorable…
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Printfection
Score 9.6 out of 10
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Printfection is a swag management platform that aims to simplify the buying, managing, and distribution of swag and branded merchandise, from the company of the same name in Denver. They offer a suite of online swag management tools and APIs alongside custom printing, inventory management, and distribution. The vendor states their customers use the platform to drive more leads, reward customers, and engage employees.
The reason it's not a seven or above is purely because of the timing of a solution we had requested originally back in August 2023. It's now February 2024, and we're waiting for a wow-factor pitch deck. Previously, we only received a demo recording and an order form quote. These truthfully aren't helpful enough to convince and sway our senior leaders into spending the $35k+ investment into the PMC.
It is well suited for a one-stop shop that gets everything done in one place (sizing, order, warehousing, shipping, drop-shipping, ability to do one-off orders, support in the process). It is less appropriate if you need something very specific and what they have doesn't work for you or if you like to be very involved in the complete process. It is also less appropriate if price is a major factor.
Personalization: It allows us to create highly personalized direct mail pieces tailored to individual recipients. For instance, we can include the recipient's name, relevant product recommendations, or even custom images that resonate with their preferences.
Multi-Channel Integration: The platform seamlessly integrates with our existing digital marketing tools and CRM systems. It enables us to orchestrate cohesive campaigns that combine email, social media, and direct mail to reach our target audience through multiple touchpoints.
Automated Workflows: PFL offers robust automation capabilities, streamlining the entire direct mail process. We can set triggers, such as website visits or email engagement, to automatically trigger the sending of personalized direct mail pieces, ensuring timely and relevant outreach.
Variable Data Printing: The platform simplifies variable data printing, enabling us to print custom content for each recipient efficiently. This is particularly useful for A/B testing different messaging or designs within a single campaign.
Getting started, it took me a bit to navigate the various features of their platform as well as a few calls to customer support to help me find my way but after some practice I was able to navigate and found that the platform is pretty intuitive.
We are currently extremely satisfied with printfection. The quality of swag is very good, but the customer service ranks high above any other swag company. I have been working closely with my Printfection manager (Tyler Rowland) and he has been more than helpful from the start.
The UI is friendly, clear, and accessible, and I access it directly through the interface (Salesforce) that I perform my function in every day. It is intuitive to navigate, and I am able to find most functionalities I need without the need to consult an admin and/or support teams.
The product is really easy to use and manage. We love using Printfection. It's easy to order, ship and manage everything. I did remove one rating point because their set up for "giveaways" is a little cumbersome and I wish their platform notified you when products in your giveaways are running low.
Prinfection's availability has been great. There was one time when a product we needed wasn't available, but our Printfection rep made sure to get what we needed.
Only thing holding me back from a perfect 10 would be the timelines for involving the technical team on occasion. There have been a few times where the PFL technical support team has been booked up for days or more than a week out which can delay our project timelines. This doesn't happen often, let me be clear. But when it does, it's usually at the worst time for our campaigns.
Whenever I have a question or problem, I email and get a response by a knowledgeable rep (I believe we have a dedicated rep), that typically solves my issue at first pass. There's not a lot of back and forth. Also, they are FAST to respond. I'm really satisfied with their support team - I wish all companies' support teams were as speedy and helpful.
Their team is very helpful in getting set up and we felt like they worked with us on price and also getting our previous inventory we had at our offices set up in Printfection. The only down side of shipping in your items to Printfection is the photography of the items (which clients can see) is pretty terrible if you don't have clear product photos prior to sending the items to Printfection warehouse.
**All items purchased through Printfection the product photos look better (so this issue won't be the case with those who aren't shipping existing swag to their warehouse)
JourneyMail is one I have evaluated. It did not seem as full featured as PFL Direct Mail Platform, nor did it integrate with the rest of the Salesforce products like PFL Direct Mail Platform (journeymail ONLY integrates to marketing cloud). My customers tend to be cross-cloud and own multiple products and want solutions that can integrate across their stack easily.
I reserached swag platforms and narrowed it down to 3 that I wanted to learn more about. I based my choices on response time to demo requests, customer service, items, ability to meet the needs of my supervisor, etc. I learned that 2 out of the 3 platforms I found were both under Custom Ink which I have used in the past. So I know the items are of good quality. The main deciding factor was the staff. Both companies had nice staff. But Printfection did a superb job of not making me feel like a cutomer but a friend. I didn't fee like I was a sale but a partner.
It does take a while to launch or re-launch a campaign, which can make it difficult to pivot quickly. However, if you're integrated with Marketo, then PFL is as scalable as your database and marketing strategy! The sky is the limit in terms of creativity. Post launch, the program is hands-off apart from report monitoring and potential optimization tweaks.
Only a few of our departments will be using Printfection, (like HR and Customer Success), but both departments find Printfection flexible and scalable.
