For years, omnichannel communications have been designed around customer preferences across the journey and have been positioned as a strategic advantage by vendors and print service providers (PSPs). Today, they are simply expected. Customers now engage with brands through print, email, web portals, mobile apps and text, and they expect those channels to work together. But simply reaching customers across multiple channels is no longer enough to stand out.
Treeline Research’s 2024 Paper Suppression Study found that over 85% of monthly interactions between customers and financial institutions are digital. Nearly all customers check their mobile apps, email or online accounts before ever opening physical mail. Yet many of these digital communications remain static, one-way and disconnected from the broader customer journey.
Organizations that want to differentiate their brand must shift focus. The opportunity is not in adding more communication channels. It is in enabling meaningful digital interactions; real conversations that adapt to the customer and provide context, responsiveness and value.
The Limits of Omnichannel
Omnichannel strategies have played an important role in bridging the gap between legacy print workflows and digital expectations. At their best, they have allowed companies to meet customers where they are. But most omnichannel deployments still function as multi-output platforms. They deliver the same message through different formats, often without considering customer intent or engagement.
For example, a customer receives a printed bill, a matching PDF via email and a generic text notification, all pointing to a payment portal. Each message is a version of the same content. None provide interaction. None respond to customer behavior. None adapt to what the customer needs at that moment.
This static model not only limits the customer experience (CX), but it also misses an opportunity to build brand value. In many cases, it increases cost, complexity and customer service volume. Customers are forced to call, click or search for answers because the communication itself fails to resolve their need.
Conversations, Not Just Communications
A more effective model centers on digital interactions. This is where the conversation begins. Digital interactions are dynamic, personalized and designed to respond to a customer’s question or intent. Instead of sending a bill and hoping the customer pays it, a company might embed options, ask for feedback or provide helpful context within the preferred channel.
This shift toward interactions over channel outputs is already evident in leading customer experience strategies. Banks, insurers and healthcare providers are embedding interactive messaging within their apps and emails. Digital touchpoints now include AI chat, smart forms, video explainers and personalized links to relevant content.
When messages answer anticipated questions, provide real-time updates or enable self-service, the experience becomes relational rather than transactional. And when that happens, customers are more likely to trust the brand, respond quickly and remain loyal.
This is not about eliminating print. It is about making digital work harder and smarter.
The Role of Print Service Providers
This shift presents both a challenge and an opportunity for PSPs. Many still define their business by outputs: formatting, printing and delivering documents. Even when digital services are offered, they often replicate the print model; formatting the same content and pushing it through another channel in a static, one-way format.
Leading PSPs are moving beyond this approach. They are repositioning as enablers of digital interactions and conversations, helping clients orchestrate communications across systems and touchpoints. This includes:
- Supporting preference management: allowing customers to choose how and when they receive different types of messages
- Orchestrating multistep journeys: guiding customers through onboarding, billing, service and renewals in coordinated ways
- Adding interactive features: embedding secure links, response options or layered content to engage customers directly
- Connecting data across touchpoints: delivering insights that help clients personalize and optimize each interaction
A PSP that helps an insurance company reduce call volume by improving the clarity of digital statements and adding interactive FAQ tools is doing more than saving print costs. It is improving customer experience and helping differentiate the insurer’s brand.
A Brand Apart
To stay relevant and grow with enterprise clients, print service providers must move beyond a production mindset and into the business of enabling customer interactions. Here’s how to make that shift:
- Redefine Your Value: Move beyond commoditized channels and volume. Position your services around measurable outcomes such improving response rates, reducing customer effort, and supporting brand loyalty.
- Expand Digital Capabilities: Invest in or partner to deliver digital services that support real-time personalization, interaction management, and multi-step journey orchestration.
- Align to CX Goals: Tie your value to customer experience metrics. Help clients measure engagement, resolution rates and channel preference shifts. Use these insights to drive continuous improvement.
Customer communications have evolved from static outputs to interactive experiences. Omnichannel alone is no longer a competitive advantage, it’s expected. The brands that stand out will be those that carry meaningful conversations with their customers, wherever they are and however they choose to engage.
Print service providers that recognize this shift and act on it can become critical partners in helping organizations differentiate their brands not by producing more documents, but by delivering smarter, more effective interactions that reflect the needs of today’s customer.
Andy Young is the founder and lead analyst at TreelinePress, an independent research and publishing platform on Substack that covers the transformation of customer communications in a digital-first world. Through original research, interviews, and industry commentary, Andy examines how organizations are replacing mailed documents with digital interactions, and what that means for customer experience, compliance, and communication strategy across sectors like financial services, insurance, utilities and healthcare.
