Free stock photo for SMB postcard brochure

PhotoXpress is claiming to be world's largest free stock photo site for commercials / professional use.

There is a reasonable selection of images for some of the SMB business I searched for - health and wellness, restaurant, cafe, bakery...

Images are print quality (300dpi at ~10" x 12") and are useful as long as you don't crop / scale as a large background image.

Defn worth checking it out for your next in-house project. Keep this in mind when you work with external designers as well and let them try to pick from these before going through expensive stock photo sites.

Print your job online - quality but cheaper

http://www.printyourjob.com/

Online print service with / without design service

There are many online print providers today. Most, if not all of them seem to be an extension of their core print business (like VistaPrint). Exceptions include HP's Marketing Splash, who seem to have a print relationship with Staples.

While most of these sites focus on providing us a good enough design to start with, customize and print, a few web sites are still catching up to that. These site, rather focus on attracting customers who already have a design handy in a PDF format - probably from a friendly designer or from a previous job through an agency.

Watch out when submitted PDF for print

It is scary to upload a PDF, designed for a different printer, and expect to meet same color and other quality standards. So, please use caution or speak with them before placing final order.

Ask for press-proofs and negotiate cost to zero or use it towards final print cost.

Ask for reject/return policy and make sure you have a say in rejecting prints if you are not satisfied.

If you are in the mood to add up some good Karma, you may want to send few copied of your previous print work to them and ask them to match it or at least let you know if they can't before they start the full production run.

Design tool in printyourjob.com

Thankfully they hid this link below the fold line of their web page. This is pretty lame. You may be better of using PowerPoint to create your design and uplod to them. They do provide some stock photo options which I usually find as an easy way to make a pretty design. I can only assume that their editor might help you avoid typically RGB/CMYK problem that non-designers are not familiar with and end up using colors in PowerPoint or Publisher that won't print properly.

VistaPrint - Print+Web+Email

Finally, one vendor offering all the three major marketing channels for SMb market.

Almost every SBO starts with a business card, then look for a friend (or dare to use GoDaddy on their own) to get a simple web site running. Then, once the business essentially start taking less of their 48hr per day routine, their ears open up to their friends and family members who had been tell them about using email to get to grow their business through their loyal customers.

Typically, three different vendors offered these three different channels. However, there is agrowing trend for a single vendor offering direct mail, email with landing pages.

VistaPrint is the latest big consumer vendor who jumped into this bandwagon by offering very limited, but essential email solution for SBOs wanting to try their hands at email.

http://www.vistaprint.com/emailmarketing

Their email solution seems to be primarily targeting eBlasts and not eNewsletter. In my opinio0n, eBlasts are easy to get going on a weekly basis. Their templates are also pretty good looking, unlike the standard email look and feel. Ulike ConstantContact whose HTMl template editor will require you to look for the geeky friend, VistaPrint, while very limited in feature, is way easier to get going.