The benefits of using AI in speciality print

Mark Coudray shares how AI is beginning to have a crucial impact in speciality graphics particularly regarding screen printing and wide format printing.

Artificial intelligence (AI) has become a buzzword across various industries, with its applications stretching far beyond the realms of design and automation. One particular sector where AI is beginning to make a significant impact is in specialty graphics, specifically screen printing and wide-format printing.

While the use of generative AI for creating designs and automating processes is already popular, there is a deeper, more transformative potential in leveraging AI to uncover hidden patterns within existing data. This can provide undisclosed competitive advantages, similar to finding a camouflaged hunter within the bushes of current market conditions.

The Current Landscape of Specialty Graphics

Screen printing and wide-format printing are integral to many industries, including advertising, fashion, and manufacturing. Traditionally, these sectors have relied heavily on manual processes and human intuition. The integration of digital technologies has opened new avenues for efficiency and innovation. Despite these technical imaging advancements, most businesses are yet to exploit the potential of AI in analyzing and interpreting complex data sets that can lead to actionable insights.

Beyond Generative AI: The Power of Data Analytics

Generative AI, which involves creating new content based on existing data, has its merits. The true potential of AI in specialty graphics lies in its ability to find patterns and within data. The real value is to uncover hidden patterns within the analyzed data.  This could be considered as second, third, and forth order discovery. These patterns can reveal critical insights into market conditions, customer behavior, and operational efficiency, which are almost never apparent to the naked eye and casual observer.

For instance, consider the forest of data describing customer activity as a dense thicket of brush. Within this thicket, there are hidden patterns that represent undisclosed competitive advantages. These patterns might be customer sales activity (recency, frequency, and value, ) customer retention, churn rates, growth metrics, and lifetime customer value over time.

With the use of the right AI, businesses can discover these patterns with a high degree of accuracy and use predictive analytics to forecast future changes with confidence levels between 95% and 99%, and very low margin of error. This translates to a high degree of accuracy.

Identifying Hidden Patterns in Customer Data

One of the most significant advantages of using AI in specialty graphics is its ability to analyze customer data to identify trends and patterns not immediately visible. For example, customer sales activity over the years might initially appear as random fluctuations. However, by applying AI algorithms, businesses can uncover patterns that indicate customer retention rates, churn or attrition rates, and growth metrics.

It can also be used with a high degree of accuracy to predict how customer sales ebb and grow year-over-year. It’s very hard to recognize this unless you compare the patterns of many customers over time.

Customer Retention and Churn: AI can analyze historical sales data to identify which customers are likely to remain loyal and which are at risk of churning. By understanding these patterns, businesses can implement targeted retention strategies to reduce churn and improve customer loyalty.

Customer Growth Year-over-Year: AI can help businesses track customer growth trends year-over-year, identifying which segments are growing and which are declining. This information can guide marketing and sales strategies to focus on high-growth areas. This has a dramatic impact on profitability and the Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC.)

Lifetime Customer Value (LCV): AI can calculate the lifetime value of customers over time, providing insights into the long-term profitability of different customer segments. This information can be used to tailor marketing efforts and product offerings to maximize LCV.

The insights gained from this analysis are very helpful in determining how the Lifetime Customer Value growth varies by year. It is not a uniform growth and there are highly predictable null or value loss occurring in certain years.  

Enhancing Operational Efficiency

In addition to analyzing customer data, AI can also be used to enhance operational efficiency. By analyzing production data, AI can identify inefficiencies and suggest improvements that can lead to cost savings and increased productivity.

Predictive Maintenance: AI can monitor equipment performance and predict when maintenance is needed, reducing downtime and preventing costly breakdowns.

Supply Chain Optimization: AI can analyze supply chain data to identify bottlenecks and optimize inventory management, ensuring that materials are available when needed without overstocking.

Process Optimization: AI can analyze production processes and workflow design to identify areas where efficiency can be improved. Examples include reducing waste, optimizing printing speeds, identification of related rates, and critical path constraints.

Competitive Advantage Through Predictive Analytics

One of the most powerful applications of AI in specialty graphics is its ability to use predictive analytics to forecast future trends with a high degree of confidence. By analyzing historical, comparative data, and identifying hidden patterns, AI can make accurate predictions about future market opportunities, customer opportunities, and operational performance.

Market Trends: AI can analyze market data to model and predict future trends, helping businesses stay ahead of the competition by anticipating changes in demand and adjusting their strategies accordingly.

Sales Demand: AI can use historical sales data to predict future sales, helping businesses plan their production and inventory management more effectively. For large programs, use Design of Experiment (DOE) practice to test market demand.  The final production quantities are scaled based on the confidence and margin of error from the test sample. This approach aims to maximize the potential based on actual demonstrated market demand.

Risk Management: AI can analyze various risk factors, such as economic indicators and market trends, to predict reduce potential risks and help businesses develop strategies to mitigate them. The use of confidence and margin of error calculations reduce risk and maximize return for the end user.

Case Study: AI in Wide-Format Printing

To illustrate the transformative potential of AI in specialty graphics, consider a case study in wide-format printing. A company specializing in wide-format printing used AI to analyze its customer data and identify patterns that were not immediately apparent.

By applying AI algorithms to historical sales data, the company discovered certain customer segments had higher retention rates and lifetime values than others. They also discovered certain market or niche areas had unusually high profitability and customer retention over time. This information allowed the company to focus its marketing efforts on these high-value segments, resulting in increased customer loyalty, lower customer acquisition costs, and higher revenue from those customers and market segments.

In addition, the company used AI to optimize its production processes. Analyzing production data with a specific AI model identified inefficiencies and constraints in the printing workflow and suggested improvements that reduced waste and increased productivity. As a result, the company was able to reduce costs and improve its overall operational efficiency.

Finally, the company used predictive analytics to forecast customer trends and sales. By analyzing historical data and identifying hidden patterns, AI provided accurate predictions about future demand, allowing the company to plan its production and inventory management more effectively. This proactive approach enabled the company to stay ahead of the competition and achieve sustainable growth.

Conclusion

The use of AI in specialty graphics goes beyond generative design and automation. Leveraging AI to analyze existing data will uncover hidden patterns. With these revealed patterns, businesses can gain a deeper understanding of market conditions, customer behavior, and operational efficiency.

These insights reveal undisclosed competitive advantages and enable businesses to make data-driven decisions with a high degree of confidence. As the industry continues to evolve, the integration of AI will undoubtedly play a crucial role in driving innovation and growth in specialty graphics.

To discover the latest content that covers a wide range of sectors including AI, screen printing and automation sign up for FESPA’s free monthly newsletter FESPA World available in English, Spanish and German.