PATIENT: "Doc, it's a lot of trouble to proofread, and we end up with errors in the catalog anyway. Can we just stop proofing and use spell-check instead?"
CATALOG DOCTOR: "No. Take proofreading seriously. It's important for your brand (errors are bad for your image), customer service (errors annoy customers, causing complaints), profits (errors cost you credits and reships) and sales (errors confuse or irritate customers, losing you orders).
Susan J. McIntyre is Founder and Chief Strategist of McIntyre Direct, a catalog agency and consultancy in Portland, Oregon offering complete creative, strategic, circulation and production services since 1991. Susan's broad experience with cataloging in multi-channel environments, plus her common-sense, bottom-line approach, have won clients from Vermont Country Store to Nautilus to C.C. Filson. A three-time ECHO award winner, McIntyre has addressed marketers in Europe, Australia and New Zealand, has written and been quoted in publications worldwide, and is a regular columnist for Retail Online Integration magazine and ACMA. She can be reached at 503-286-1400 or susan@mcintyredirect.com.