Nex Media • BOWENS REALISING PERSONALISED MAGAZINE COVERS
Having your face on a magazine cover can be a life-changing event. A whole
industry, country, or even the whole world, sees and takes note of the face on the
cover of a magazine. Bowens has partnered with several agencies and magazines
in the past to create unique, personalised ‘with-your-face’ magazine covers in
record time for events, shows and golf days.
So, how does it work? Typically a photographer is set up at the registration table
of the event, guests are photographed as part of the registration process. These
photos are processed through a special workflow for optimisation and edited
into a specially designed magazine cover. Each cover, now personalised with the
guest’s face is printed, bound onto the magazine, trimmed, sealed and delivered
back to the event for the prize-giving a few hours later.
These magazine covers, personalised with the recipient’s face, are fast-paced,
high-pressure, tech-intensive projects which Bowens had planned and executed
flawlessly countless times.
Bowens personalised its billboard
As crazy as it may sound. Bowens was so passionate about personalised print,
that it even personalised its own billboard.
All of the unique, challenging personalisation projects that Bowens gets involved
in stem from a passion for one-to-one, totally personalised, high-impact, and long
lasting print marketing. To get someone’s attention, you have to know who they
are. Big data and the internet of things make it easy for tech companies to know
more about you than you might be comfortable with; your name, what you buy
and where, what to recommend, and how to approach you.
The key to success in one-to-one marketing is using this data effectively without
unsettling the client or giving them concern about their privacy. It’s also terrible to
receive something personalised if it’s clear they know nothing about you. Calling
a 50-year old male business owner by name, and trying to sell him lingerie might
be amusing, but he might just find it offensive.
With over 20 years’ experience in personalised marketing, Bowens gets it right,
and can help you to conceptualise, design, and execute plans that will knock the
socks off your clients and their customers.
When Bowens moved into a new building it had bought and renovated in 2007,
terming it ‘the home of personalisation’ the team toyed with various ideas on
how to best convey that message to their clients. In the end, a billboard was
commissioned to wrap the two sides of the building that had the most exposure
to the passing highway. This was, however, not your average billboard.
Bowens had recently revamped its client-facing website, and gathered and
cleaned it’s client database. It decided to honour its loyal clients by dedicating
the entire billboard to them. First names and last names of the people at their
clients who they interacted with on a daily basis, the accountants, copywriters,
designers and administrators, and their company names, were extracted from
the database, randomised for privacy, and those names were used to create
the entire billboard out of cleverly designed word art.
The impact of the billboard was enormous, a personalised mailer was sent out
to all the ‘participants’ whose names were on the billboard, explaining what was
being done, and inviting them to come to check it out when it was finished. The
excitement of the people who saw their names up there and knowing that they
were a part of the Bowens family of customers was immeasurable.
It’s just a small three-storey illustration of how passionate Bowens is about
personalisation, and how personalised print can be used in new and unusual
ways to engage, and market to the individuals who make business happen.
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