对几个在线印刷网站的点评

Vistaprint.com
可能不是第一个在线印刷网站，但无疑是做得最好的在线印刷网站。无论是网站设计还是市场推广，Vistaprint的做法都可以用牛B来形容。它的在线设计界面做得非常棒，用起来非常顺手而且特别能激发用户购买附带产品的欲望。Vistaprint的数据也证明了这一点：有28%的被免费名片吸引的客户购买了网站的付费产品和服务。用免费名片吸引客流量是非常聪明的一招，特别是在Vistaprint的网站能把很大比例的冲着免费名片过来的客户转换成付费客户的情况下。Vistaprint运道也不错，微软下一代操作系统就叫Vista。
当然，只有完美的前台设计界面是远远不够的，Vistaprint的核心竞争力还在于其后台定单整合系统。Vistaprint据说雇佣了八个斯坦福博士，忙得当然不止是前台设计那点活。Vistaprint的后台系统我没有机会见到，但这个系统一定能高效率地把分散的小额定单按照给定的规则拼版、整合成生产任务单，使整个工作流程前后一体。搞过印刷的都知道能够高效率拼版意味着什么——基本上就象航空公司能保证每个航班满员。
对于Vistaprint从在线印刷的角度来看我基本上没什么可批评的。如果非要找出什么可提高的地方的话，一是拓展速度太慢，到现在居然没在中国搞个生产中心服务全世界；二是在线支付系统管理得有些问题，英文搜索一下最热门的关于Vistaprint的话题居然是信用卡被盗用；三是新闻热点制造得不够，市场宣传水平有待提高，作为在线印刷的领头羊， Vistaprint的江湖名头实在不够响亮。

inker.com.cn
印客网的网站设计值得称道，客户端（印客通）尤其是亮点。不过成亦萧何败亦萧何，印客网最终毛病可能也就出在这个客户端上——在我看来，投入大量精力做一个离线设计客户端有点象reinvent the wheel，哪怕这个客户端本身做得相当出色。如果设计一个Adobe插件，自动下载设计模版什么的，推广更容易也更能为客户接受。另起炉灶的好处是能制造垄断，不允许使用印客通设计的作品上传到其它网站。我认为这种垄断其实是非常脆弱的——如果竞争对手推出一个基于PDF开放标准的客户端呢？
市场推广方面印客网做得不是一般地牛。它在极短的时间里建立了知名度并且看上去没烧太多钱。首先，企业CI做得非常之好：印客网，印客通，inker.com.cn，简直是和谐社会的样本（没有inker.com域名要算最大的遗憾了）。其次，它成功制造了新闻热点——自助出版在中国是个敏感话题，印客网在这个议题上操作尺度把握得很好，既吸引了眼球又没有把自己变成可能被枪打的出头鸟。方正印捷相比之下就操之过急，大鸣大放搞什么国外报纸按需印刷，逼得新闻出版署不得不出面表态。要是印捷乘着北京奥运的东风，打着为国外奥运观众服务的幌子，悄悄地进村，这事说不定就成了。印客网在起初大概想拷贝Booksurge或者Lulu的模式，但显然没有成功。我认为Booksurge的模式明显不适合中国国情，政策风险太高，价值链拉得太长，中国人不大有我已经知道内容了还为了尊重作者再买一本的习惯。所以印客网现在转型成个人在线印刷，实属聪明之举。
与不错的网站前台相对应，印客网大概还没有成型的后台处理系统——用户对印客网的评价概括成一句话，就是“服务态度很好，服务速度太慢”。我想这肯定和印客后台的定单处理系统有关。毕竟缺乏印刷行业的背景，这个问题解决起来不是一朝一夕之功。
作为在线印刷的先驱之一，印客网将来肯定在市场上能占一席之地。当然，它的隐忧也不在少数：B2C在线印刷的市场规模有多大，能容纳多少家成功企业，值得探讨；印客通客户端迟早会成为鸡肋；网站的粘度不够，免费促销期间网站访问量成倍增长，免费促销结束就立马打回原形。

Lonprint.com
如果说现阶段谁最有可能成为中国的Vistaprint，大概就是龙樱了。龙樱具备成为Vistaprint的一切必要条件：资金实力、印刷背景，除了需要更好的业务规划。就网站设计而言，inker.com.cn象专卖店，Vistaprint.com象百货商店，Lonprint.com则像杂货摊。Lonprint的管理人员肯定做了足够的市场调查，把在线印刷的纸质产品线几乎一网打尽，连在线数据库印刷和在线直邮印刷也未放过，然后把所有市场可能需要的产品都堆放在自家摊头。龙樱还非常不聪明地把自己同时定位在B2C和B2B市场上——如果专注于B2B市场，龙樱肯定能更好地发挥自己大型印刷企业背景的优势。
如果没有强有力的竞争对手出现，龙樱最有可能成为中国在线印刷市场的王者。龙樱声称在06年底每天处理的定单达到500笔，这个数字比传说中印捷每天印几百本博客书可信多了, 从Alexa访问量的数据也能得到印证。虽然还存在很多问题，但龙樱的实力允许它从失误中学习，它已经领先市场至少两年，剩下的无非是小修小补。这让我对界龙集团的创始人充满了敬意——他的背景看起来实在不像是能引导潮流的人物，但他的确成功地做到了这一点。
 
方正印捷
网址就不列出来了，它也算不上是在线印刷的网站。如果要做网络印刷、网络出版的话，方正无疑是最具备资源的公司，无论是行业背景、技术实力、内容资源还是品牌形象。但他们竟然选择了发展加盟商以变相推销设备（而且是贴牌设备）这条不归之路！难道方正在决策之前没有多方面考察一下快印先生、时浪这些加盟品牌的经营状况么？就加盟推广的战术层面而言，印捷做得非常成功，短短时间就开出了无数家加盟店。可惜，好钢没有花在刀刃上，让人有“暴殄天物”之叹。和方正同一阵营的还有柯达，收购了无数家公司，却还没找到一个管用的价值定位。柯达难道就眼睁睁地看着全国七八千家加盟店自然消亡么？

评论

29 楼 stevenkoh 2012-02-03  

楼主说的几个网站 印客网 龙樱 都已经全部倒闭了. 上海的色多丽试水了一下数码印刷也不玩了

个性印刷,伤不起啊

28 楼 zhenxie 2007-07-01  

http://startup.wsj.com/ideas/services/20060216-tam.html?refresh=on

27 楼 zhenxie 2007-07-01  

Some See Opportunity
In the New Paper Trail
By PUI-WING TAM
Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal.

From The Wall Street Journal Online


For Sharon Katz, producing fliers and postcards for her company used to be a time-consuming and complex job. First she had to bat around ideas with a designer and sort through the finished proposals. After that came another round of discussions with her printing company.

Then Ms. Katz discovered VistaPrint Ltd., an online printing company that allows consumers to design and print everything from business cards to brochures through the Internet.

These days, she can create marketing materials herself within minutes: She chooses a template for the document on VistaPrint's Web site, plugs in her own artwork and text, then clicks to place the order. Within three business days, she says, VistaPrint sends the completed job -- usually several hundred pieces or so -- right to her office.

"I'm a one-person marketing department, so I don't have the resources or money" to deal with complicated printing processes, says Ms. Katz, director of marketing at Mt. Vernon Mortgage Corp. in Weymouth, Mass. "Now I can place a print order in under 10 minutes, and I don't have to deal with other printers and designers."

Printing has long been a fragmented process, requiring customers to shuttle back and forth between independent designers and print shops to get the job done. Now a growing number of businesses and consumers are turning to online printers as a one-stop shop -- where they can easily design and order everything from annual reports to letterhead stationery. And thanks to low overhead and new technology, the online printers can offer lower prices and quicker turnaround times than traditional outfits.

The surging interest in e-printers is roiling the $126 billion U.S. printing industry. According to research firm InfoTrends/CAP Ventures, print jobs that move through the Internet made up 12.5% of the total U.S. printing market last year. Charlie Corr, a group director at InfoTrends, projects e-printing will grow at a rate of 19% a year through 2010.

Robert Keane, VistaPrint's chief executive, says the Bermuda-based company generates about $30 million in revenue a quarter. The company went public in late September -- underwritten by investment bank Goldman Sachs Group Inc. -- and has seen its stock price more than double from the offering price of $12.

Its competitors are also posting strong numbers. Privately held Mimeo Inc., based in New York, says it generated $15 million in revenue in 2004, up 70% from 2003. IPrint Systems Inc., Redwood City, Calif., says it has one million customers and its revenue is rising 65% a year, though the private company declined to disclose underlying figures.

Perhaps the best measure of e-printing's success is that traditional printers are taking steps online as well. For instance, FedEx Corp.'s FedEx Kinko's unit now provides online ordering. There are no design services available, as with purely online printers. But you can upload a fully completed document to FedEx Kinko's site and then walk through the entire order process, choosing the type of paper and binding, for example, in a matter of minutes. Customers can arrange for the order to be shipped to their own address or picked up at a FedEx Kinko's store.

"It's a dynamic market, and a lot of local printers are also moving into our direction," acknowledges Letty Swank, iPrint's chief executive.

Times weren't always so rosy for e-printing companies. Online printers flooded the Web during the dot-com boom, and many disappeared during the bust. The market was too crowded for so many competitors to survive, and even the biggest names were scattershot in their marketing: They tried to target businesses of all sizes instead of focusing on the niches that needed them most.

VistaPrint, for instance, was founded in 1999, and raised about $10 million in venture capital. But by late 2000 the money was running out. In early 2001, VistaPrint embarked on a major restructuring, selling off a piece of its business in Europe and laying off 40 of its 60 employees, says Mr. Keane, the chief executive.

Now "it's a much healthier market," InfoTrends' Mr. Corr says. And the companies that survived the shakeout have taken a number of steps to revitalize their business plans. Many e-printing companies have narrowed their focus to concentrate on particular customer segments, such as small to medium-size businesses, that are typically not well-served by commercial printers. VistaPrint and iPrint, for example, target companies with just one or two employees, such as those run by entrepreneurs. Mimeo focuses on midsize to larger businesses.

In addition, many e-printers have improved their software and processes so they are able to aggregate orders -- and use the volume to lower their prices and attract new customers.

At VistaPrint, for instance, the average size of a print order is $30. But VistaPrint's proprietary software automatically adds these tiny orders together to create one giant print run, allowing the company to print many small orders at once for a low cost. Traditional printers typically can print just one job at a time -- resetting the printing press each time for a different job -- for a higher cost.

VistaPrint, which owns production facilities in Windsor, Ontario, and in the Netherlands, usually charges 25% to 50% less for an order than a local printer, says Mr. Keane.

Easy design is also a big selling point for e-printers. VistaPrint, for example, offers thousands of online templates from which customers can choose, to create everything from presentation folders to greeting cards. Each template can be customized with graphics, fonts and colors, among other options.

Mimeo, meanwhile, has created software that can be embedded into a user's Microsoft Word program. So you call up the company's templates in the word processor, plug your own information into them, and then upload them directly to the Mimeo Web site to order prints. IPrint offers similar customization services, and prints on items such as rubber stamps and mugs.

Along with such do-it-yourself offerings, many printers now provide free design services by phone. Many traditional printers don't offer in-house design, forcing their consumers to turn to specialized -- and pricey -- designers.

VistaPrint, for example, says it can design most products with a phone consultation of 30 minutes or less. The VistaPrint designer questions the customer about the product and plugs the answers into a template, which the client can check online in real time.

Some customers have mixed feelings about the service. Jeff Coveney, president of Boston Movie Tours, which takes visitors to spots in Boston where films or TV series were shot, discovered VistaPrint late last year. He says he worked with VistaPrint's designers to come up with a brochure, a free service that would have cost at least several thousand dollars elsewhere. Within a few weeks, VistaPrint sent him 2,000 tailored marketing pieces for less than $500.

Mr. Coveney says that dealing with VistaPrint's designers was very different from dealing with an independent designer, who typically pays more attention and does more customization work. VistaPrint's design "wasn't the quality of an ad agency," he says. "The experience took a little getting used to."

In the end, though, he says he's happy with the work. "I plan to use VistaPrint again in the spring when I'm going to redo a few pieces," says Mr. Coveney. "They served my needs."

26 楼 younggun 2007-06-14  

要说到这个,怎么可能少的了FedEx Kinko呢?现在Adobe Reader里面都已经集成了到Kinko打印.

25 楼 andrewdu 2007-05-17  

还没有尝试过在线印刷呢,以后有需要的话尝试一下

24 楼 andyyehoo 2007-05-15  

zhenxie 写道

andyyehoo 写道

春节前去成都红星路的方正印捷自费做了本旅行画册，50页，A4，每页2.5,总共125，加上装订费用，优惠总共130，感觉不错，回家给朋友亲戚看，效果很好。

看了这几个在线网站，龙樱没有这样的画册服务，类似的婚礼画册贵得离谱。印客的不错，有画册服务，还可以有印客通DIY，价格50页是115，还算可以。

不过和现场做还是有差异了，印捷现场做是用CorelDraw排版，照片全部原样大小转TIF，而且可以跟设计人员讲，想怎么样排版。

但是方正的机器，效果真的不怎么样，宽容度很低，很多照片的细节，高光部和低光部的都丢失了，不知道富士的会不会好点。

龙樱和印客，又都是采用什么印刷机呢？其实这个才是最重要的。

楼上的很专业啊，估计是搞设计出身的。印捷用的设备大都是方正OEM的小型机器，比较低端。我相信龙樱和印客都会强很多。我看过印客的一些作品，实事求是地讲做得真是非常漂亮。

面对面服务在沟通和满足个性需求方面肯定是有优点，不过没有办法作为一个生意模式来推广~成本太高了，服务水平也无法保持一致性。而且大部分人是没有能力和设计师沟通的，往往是希望看看这么弄有什么效果，那么弄有什么效果，几个效果一搞，两个小时的时间过去了~~

呵呵，确实如此，这个也是网络印刷尚未大规模普及的原因，因为这种东西，如果不能个性化需求的话，就只能做中低端的产品，做做日历和简单画册。

不过其实只要能够抓住中端客户，也就够了，毕竟中端客户的市场是最大的。龙樱和印客在提供印刷服务的多样性和深入性上，只要能再改进，应该都是很有前途的。

23 楼 ah520 2007-05-07  

呵呵不容易这样网站看到这样文章不容易

22 楼 zhenxie 2007-04-11  

对在线印刷网站开发感兴趣的高手，请把我加为好友~

21 楼 抛出异常的爱 2007-04-08  

建筑工程公司比较需要大量的印制品
如果能作进这个行会有比较稳定的市场。。
标书的外封如果漂亮了也会很有面子。

20 楼 eyejava 2007-04-07  

建议转入行业版

19 楼 庄表伟 2007-04-07  

这篇帖子我很认真的看过多遍

因为身份的关系，的确不太方便给出针对性的回复。

特别是客户端是否鸡肋的问题，我当然不这么认为，但是要给出有说服力的回答，就牵涉到公司战略了。。。。。。

18 楼 lgn21st 2007-04-07  

听君一席话，盛读10年书～～～
不知道楼主是自己原创的还是转的，估计八成是原创的，赞一个
真没有想到Javaeye上还能看到数码快印的评论文章，我之前也作这行，我做过硬件，HP的Indigo数码印刷机，lonprint的数码印刷就是这个
Xerox，HP-indigo，方正印捷(美能达OEM)也罢，都专注在硬件设备上面，投入大量的资金人力，看不见他们扶持数码行业尤其是网络印刷，市场方面现实的原因太多～～～

17 楼 zhenxie 2007-04-04  

andyyehoo 写道

春节前去成都红星路的方正印捷自费做了本旅行画册，50页，A4，每页2.5,总共125，加上装订费用，优惠总共130，感觉不错，回家给朋友亲戚看，效果很好。

看了这几个在线网站，龙樱没有这样的画册服务，类似的婚礼画册贵得离谱。印客的不错，有画册服务，还可以有印客通DIY，价格50页是115，还算可以。

不过和现场做还是有差异了，印捷现场做是用CorelDraw排版，照片全部原样大小转TIF，而且可以跟设计人员讲，想怎么样排版。

但是方正的机器，效果真的不怎么样，宽容度很低，很多照片的细节，高光部和低光部的都丢失了，不知道富士的会不会好点。

龙樱和印客，又都是采用什么印刷机呢？其实这个才是最重要的。

楼上的很专业啊，估计是搞设计出身的。印捷用的设备大都是方正OEM的小型机器，比较低端。我相信龙樱和印客都会强很多。我看过印客的一些作品，实事求是地讲做得真是非常漂亮。

面对面服务在沟通和满足个性需求方面肯定是有优点，不过没有办法作为一个生意模式来推广~成本太高了，服务水平也无法保持一致性。而且大部分人是没有能力和设计师沟通的，往往是希望看看这么弄有什么效果，那么弄有什么效果，几个效果一搞，两个小时的时间过去了~~

16 楼 andyyehoo 2007-04-04  

春节前去成都红星路的方正印捷自费做了本旅行画册，50页，A4，每页2.5,总共125，加上装订费用，优惠总共130，感觉不错，回家给朋友亲戚看，效果很好。

看了这几个在线网站，龙樱没有这样的画册服务，类似的婚礼画册贵得离谱。印客的不错，有画册服务，还可以有印客通DIY，价格50页是115，还算可以。

不过和现场做还是有差异了，印捷现场做是用CorelDraw排版，照片全部原样大小转TIF，而且可以跟设计人员讲，想怎么样排版。

但是方正的机器，效果真的不怎么样，宽容度很低，很多照片的细节，高光部和低光部的都丢失了，不知道富士的会不会好点。

龙樱和印客，又都是采用什么印刷机呢？其实这个才是最重要的。

15 楼 ddandyy 2007-04-04  

我们部长倒是每年都会去lonprint一次  印个挂历啊 什么的

14 楼 kaktos 2007-04-04  

lonprint.com 的网站做的实在不敢恭维，firefox里面一塌糊涂

13 楼 bayers 2007-04-04  

12 楼 winterwolf 2007-04-04  

感觉inker好一点. 自己排版有些麻烦

11 楼 zhenxie 2007-04-04  

zhenxie 写道

不知道怎么贴图

如果看两年的跨度的话你会发现在推广期和非推广期网站流量的波动是非常大的

10 楼 zhenxie 2007-04-04  

robbin 写道

对zhenxie对于在线印刷网站的了解很惊讶，冒昧的问一句，你也是做在线印刷的吗？

是业内人士~~

按照Infotrend的报告，中国数码印刷零售市场的规模在2005年约为30亿元人民币，在2010年预计增长到400亿元人民币，年复合增长率为66%。

这是个金矿，不过得找到几个身强力壮的大牛和我一起开挖才行~