OKI Europe has launched The Design Hub, a user-friendly creative software, powered by Shoppa, for creating visual communications and marketing collateral in-house, on-demand. The Design Hub allows businesses to produce, print and place professional quality signage in minutes, offering a fast, cost-effective alternative to using third-party creative and print suppliers.
With ongoing changes in guidelines, volatile trading conditions and fluctuating market trends influencing customer behaviour, The Design Hub enables businesses to react rapidly to unexpected situations as they unfold. Businesses can quickly and easily create eye-catching visual signage and communications with an extensive library of pre-created templates that can be customised with text, images and other design elements, without the need for professional design skills. Easy ‘drag and drop’ functionality enables users to create and print collateral instantly to help maintain a competitive advantage and keep customers engaged.
The Design Hub’s library includes templates for signage of all sizes, from A5 to 1.3m long banners, pre-cut labels, stickers, price tags, wrist bands, bottle collars, door hangers and more, as well as a wide range of imagery and content. In addition to the pre-installed templates, users can import or create custom templates for formats that meet their specific needs and add or modify images. QR codes can also be automatically generated promoting customer engagement through low-touch communications, for example restaurant table stickers to access menus and place orders. Furthermore, assets can be completely personalised through variable data printing.
The Design Hub combined with OKI’s printers has already been recognised for offering retailers an end-to-end solution for producing in-store signage, recently winning a prestigious Gold Innovation Retail 2020 Award in the category for Applications Supporting Retailers. The judging panel commented: “Retailers now have the flexibility of an end-to-end solution to produce professional-looking, consistent and effective in-store communications on-demand without the need for specialist design or printing skills.”
The Design Hub works exclusively with selected OKI printers. Printing is made easy with custom media files embedded within the print settings, ensuring each design is easy to print directly from The Design Hub to a wide range of media sizes, weights and types on an OKI printer. The Design Hub also allows users to monitor the status of their OKI printer, including consumables levels, with automated notifications when new consumables are required. Consumables are easy to source and purchase via links to authorised OKI partners for continuous, hassle-free printing.
“Visual communications are key to enticing, engaging and educating customers, particularly in sectors like retail and hospitality where conditions are constantly changing,” says Javier Lopez, General Manager Vertical Solutions EMEA, OKI Europe Ltd. “More than ever, businesses need to be able to adapt quickly and communicate clearly and cost-effectively with customers in a professional manner. With The Design Hub, organisations can produce, print and place high quality signage within minutes, at the click of a button, enabling effective personalisation on demand and saving valuable time and money.”
Having helped over 700 organisations over the past few months to promote social distancing by providing them with floor stickers and graphics, OKI Europe recognises the ongoing challenge businesses face in adapting to changing circumstances. As part of its ‘Adapt Today’ campaign, OKI is offering businesses a free* Business Agility pack which includes a six-month subscription** to The Design Hub. With an approximate value of €500*, the pack is available to customers with the purchase of an eligible OKI colour printer and set of OKI Original CYMK toners. Businesses that already own an eligible OKI colour printer can claim their pack when they purchase a set of OKI Original CMYK toners*.
In addition to the 6-month subscription to The Design Hub, customers will also receive a 6-month subscription to ABBYY FineScanner Premium**, the first AI-powered smart mobile scanner for scanning paper documents and creating perfect digital copies to either store or print and store. This adds smart scanning capabilities to OKI printers and removes the requirement to invest in a bulky desktop scanner or multifunction printer.
Customers will also receive a variety of media for sector-specific applications, as well as access to a range of different templates and artwork to help them quickly adapt their customer signage and communications, further reducing time consuming and costly reliance on third party suppliers.
Organisations that wish to take advantage of the offer should visit www.oki.com/eu
