The PSA Difference

Today, PSA services dozens of publishers and hundreds of publications, large and small. But we’re different from other subscription fulfillment organizations. Here’s why:

OTHERS: Assembly-line “factory” fulfillment model

Up until now, many subscription fulfillment providers have been handled as a manufacturing process, with one department opening mail, another department batching, caging and depositing mail, another department performing data entry, and yet another department handling customer service and incoming phone calls. It looks like this:

These departments are often in different rooms (or even different countries), and one department has no idea what the other department is doing. So errors are never picked up either in the actual mail itself, or in the function performed on the mail. The result? Error-riddled subscription fulfillment, missed email and address updates…  well, poor customer service.

PSA: Custom fulfillment performed by CSR teams – working only on your pubs

At Publishers Service Associates, you have a team of CSRs which work only on your account. It looks like this (it’s very simple):

The same team opens the mail, batches, cages, deposits, does data entry AND handles all aspects of customer service. When they talk to a subscriber on the phone, they often remember processing the customer’s request when the order first came in. The result? Catching errors in your mail, making the customer feel special, updating your database with phone numbers and email addresses, and making sure the data is entered correctly the FIRST time. Also, your customers receive personal, customized service from your team of CSRs – building on customer loyalty and satisfaction.

There’s just no comparison. PSA’s program is the model for high quality subscription fulfillment.

History

Publishers Service Associates was started by Mark Hintz in 1999 – created out of his disappointment with the available subscription fulfillment services at the time. Mark’s publishing company, Sovereign Media, had initially used a small local fulfillment house with disastrous results… their homegrown software could not count deferred liability correctly. Following that experience, he moved to one of the mega subscription fulfillment houses with equally disappointing results… missed renewal efforts, sporadic batching and caging resulting in wild swings in cashflow, monthly reports on green bar, and a constantly changing account representative.

That’s when Mark decided to start a subscription fulfillment operation built for publishers by publishers. Then, Mark went to Williamsport, Pennsylvania where he had worked as circulation manager for Grit Magazine, which had recently moved its headquarters to the Midwest, leaving an in-house subscription fulfillment staff without jobs. Mark re-assembled this fulfillment team and Publishers Service Associates was born! He teamed up with fulfillment consultant Debra Schulle, who designed the process and safeguards PSA uses to assure accurate workflow. Mark continues to serve as CEO and Debra Schulle as President.

Williamsport, Pennsylvania

PSA’s facility is located in beautiful north-central Pennsylvania. The city of Williamsport was incorporated in 1866. The city experienced significant growth through lumber harvesting. Many of the era’s lumber baron’s homes have been preserved and can be experienced today in what is known as “Millionaire’s Row.” Today, Williamsport is also known world-wide as the home of Little League Baseball, Inc. – a legacy which was founded here in 1939 as a three-team league. Each August, the world experiences Little League’s World Series by attending the series or watching on television.

On-Site Lettershop

Here’s a simple concept. Great subscription fulfillment starts with getting the right message to the right audience, but it’s not as easy as it seems.

Mail automation and printing is a manufacturing process, and it can involve many possible component combinations and strategies for delivery. Many subscription fulfillment providers actually farm out this process to other vendors, or locate the lettershop and printing facility away from the customer service department. This results in a lack of communication between customer service representatives and the lettershop, which can leave a huge margin for error.

PSA’s lettershop is located “right across the hall” from our customer service representative area, and right next to the fulfillment services and IT department. There’s a consistent flow of communication between the customer service representatives, fulfillment managers, the people handling personalization and our lettershop team.

Our lettershop manager is world class and has been in the business for years. PSA gets the right mailing to the right subscribers at the right time.

PSA Online Reporting

Hundreds of reports are available anytime you want them. Below is just a sample of the reports PSA can provide to you. Please note there are many report variations that are not listed here that we would be happy to make available to you. Many of the reports listed can be filtered to show different levels of detail. We provide our monthly reports electronically and they can be easily exported to Excel spreadsheets. If you do not see a report listed, please know we can write custom reports to suit your needs.

Analysis Reporting

Order History Report – This report allows you to track new and or renewal orders over an extended period of time. Especially useful for analyzing year-to-year trends, you could also request this report be run to reflect tracking orders on a weekly level.

Renewal Order Analysis Report – This report allows you to analyze how successful different offers were using the same renewal effort, showing you what percentage of renewing on the effort and the detail of which option each subscriber chose.

Detailed New Order Revenue Report – This report offers a detailed way to analyze a promotional campaign after the majority of the responses are in.

Revenue Report – This report gives you a window into the revenue received, broken down by payment type (check, credit, etc.) AND by the type of transaction (refunds, payment, bounced payment and adjustment).

Detailed Payment Rates Report – This report reflects the data to allow you to analyze how effective each effort in your billing series is, you will also be able to see how many responses were generated based on how many pieces were mailed.

Summary of Renewal Rates Report – This report shows different sources and allows you to check on the renewal rates of each subscription. We can provide this report in a number of different ways to reflect marketing plans, channels, and prior renewal series just to name a few of the options.

Summary of Renewal Revenues Report – This report takes into account different sources of renewals and reflects how much revenue these sources are creating.

Summary of New Orders Report – This report shows the results of a promotional campaign right after the launch. Allowing a Publisher or Circulation Manager a clear view of the results of a new campaign.

Summary of the Payment Rates Report – This report shows different sources and allows you to check on the payment rates of each subscription. We can provide this report in a number of different ways to reflect marketing plans, channels, and prior renewal series to name a few of the options.

Expire and Statistic Reporting

Customer Statistics Report – We can provide reporting reflecting demographics of your customers and prospects. We can have this report reflect the number if customers, subscriptions and copies for each demographic code.

Subscription Statistics Report – This report will provide the detail as to how many specific types of subscriptions are in the database. This report can be filtered and run in a number of different ways.

Summary Expire Report – This report details the number of subscriptions expiring in the coming months; it is also a very useful report to help determine your print run for upcoming issues.

Add and Drop Report by Issue – This report will allow you to analyze the changes in the number of copies served with each issue run. We can include cancel reasons at your request.

Renewal Effort Inventory Report – This report shows the number of renewal notices to be mailed.

Prospect Statistics Report – This report shows the number of prospects (with details by list and date) in your file.

Accounting Reporting

Accounts Receivable Details Report – This report shows receivables for accounts that are overdue.

General Ledger Report – This report shows deferred income, accounts receivable and the current balance for each account.

Deferred Income Report – This report reflects the details of your deferred income we can offer this report with customer-by-customer detail or total value only.

Accounting Detail Report – This report offers the detail, with summaries of each accounting entry since.

PSA Complete

Complete subscription fulfillment online reporting

At PSA, gone are the days when your only marketing reporting is a monthly shipment of green bar circulation reports. With PSA Complete you have marketing and accounting reports available online – anytime, because our order processing is “live” (no data updates); these reports are up-to-the-minute accurate. And they’re downloadable to Microsoft Excel, allowing you to massage the data any way you want.

Hand-in-hand with online reporting, at PSA you never have to worry about a backlog of orders sitting somewhere, which could drastically alter your marketing reports. PSA guarantees zero backlog 99% of the time, this assures you every order that came into your mailbox yesterday is reflected in your marketing and accounting reports today.

Many of our publishers have unique reporting needs. Our programmers and circulation database management experts are happy to create custom reports to meet your needs. Over the past decade, we have become very skilled at providing information in many formats. The goal is to get you the information you need and how you want to see it!

Publishers Dashboard available 24/7 from ANY mobile device

Outbound TeleServices

Some details of our Outbound TeleServices Division:

We do not “dial for dollars” all of our calling is “soft touch, conversational calling” we do not use scripts.

  • Depending on the list we have been averaging a 30 to 60% contact rate
  • Many of our clients are seeing up to an 80% return on their investment
  • On collections with higher dollar pricing they are seeing a 95% return on their investment

Overview of Fulfillment Services

Publishers Service Associates offers a comprehensive suite of subscription fulfillment services to the Publishing and Association industries.

Customer Service

• Incoming and outgoing phone calls
• Email responses
• Written correspondence
• Subscriber/Customer “comment log” to keep client informed of trends and issues

Complete Subscription Fulfillment Subscription Database/File Maintenance

• Full financial (earned/deferred/cash and accrual) reporting
• Detailed marketing reporting
• Detailed subscriber record maintenance and reporting
• Website connectivity-online renewals, new orders, premium fulfillment, subscriber access based
  on status and more
• Issue label or file fulfillment
• Premium and report fulfillment via mail or email
• NCOA file updating
• Marketing “finder” number assignments

Mailing Services & Lettershop

• Mailing of magazines, newsletters, books, premium and conference packages, acknowledgments,
  invoices, renewals and more
• Promotional marketing via mail, email, fax and voice mailings
• Skid storage and Inventory management
• Automated inserting of packages up to 9”x12”
• Postal presorting
• Email blasts

PSA Complete our Web Portal Circulation system

• Full product order processing tied to the subscription fulfillment database
• Flexible shopping cart service
• On-line credit card processing tied to the fulfillment database
• Instant PDF fulfillments of premiums, conference registration materials, back issues, alerts
  and more.
  All fulfillment can be tied to credit card authorization

Telemarketing

• Renewals
• Requalification calls for BPA or ABC
• Special cross and upsells
• Accounts receivable/soft collections
• Surveys
• Conference support

List Processing and Database Management

• Merge Purge
• Marketing mail preparation
• Finder code number assignments
• List and data formatting and cleanup
• Track list usage and sales
• NCOA address updates
• USPS CASS Certification

Conference Order Processing and Support

• Order processing
• Marketing reporting
• Registration packet fulfillment (email and mail)

Daily Mail Processing

• Mail pickup from the Post Office
• Cashing & caging mail
• Order entry
• Imports of all orders, renewals and transactions from clients web order and “self-service”
  web pages
• Daily financial reconciliation with software system

Special Consulting Services

• Postal issues
• Marketing and renewals
• Copywriting and printing support

Publishers Service Associates, Inc.

2406 Reach Road
Williamsport, PA 17701

570.322.7848 x121
570.322.2063 (Fax)

Send us an email