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Barriers To Entry

February 15th, 2017 - Posted by Jamie Thomson, Managing Director

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It is a hot topic in the news at the moment due to the ongoing legal wrangling over President Donald Trump’s executive order on immigration rules in the USA, and its subsequent suspension by a federal judge, but how do barriers to entry affect the print industry and web to print?

Some professions have barriers to entry; if you want to be a doctor you have to spend 5 years at medical college, if you want to be a lawyer you have to go to law school and if you want to be a chartered accountant you need a qualification from one of the recognised accounting institutions. These types of restrictions do not apply in the print industry. Modern digital presses are compact, inexpensive and user friendly meaning that it is now easier than ever to set up a print business.

However while the mechanics of the print industry have changed significantly over the last 20 years, the same is also true for the way in which print is sold. The online marketplace has gone from being something that didn’t exist 20 years ago to becoming the dominant way of selling goods and services. Online retail sales in the UK topped £133 billion in 2016, a 16% increase from 2015. The growth is forecast to continue in 2017 by a further 14%. Millennials and younger consumers are becoming larger parts of the key spending demographic and research shows that these users spend the majority of their time in browser based solutions.

Clearly, not having an online presence or an online storefront would be a significant barrier to entry for any business hoping to achieve significant sales in the modern marketplace. Although the recorded statistics relate to business to consumer transactions, the business to business environment has gone through the same evolution and as millennials enter the workplace they will obviously be accustomed to the convenience and accessibility of the online platform. The days when the only computer in the school was to be found in the library are long gone.

Don’t create a barrier to entry for your business. Ensure you have a flexible online solution that caters for B2C and B2B use. Choose a solution that includes updates when they are released without any interruption to your service, without any additional cost and without the need to perform any installations yourself. For the sake of data security look for an ISO certified supplier and make sure you have control over the configuration of your storefronts and products.

I can only think of one solution that ticks all these boxes so talk to RedTie about removing your barriers to entry.