FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
SAGE Announces New Products and Updates For 2018 at SAGE Conference
Plano, TX (January 15, 2018) – Today, at SAGE Conference, held in Las Vegas, in conjunction with The PPAI Expo, SAGE announced several new product releases and updates to their products and services. Eric Natinsky, SAGE CEO, revealed SAGE Online 14, the latest version of the company's flagship research and business management solution, SAGE Web 3.0, the latest version of SAGE's web-based research and business management service, new themes and capabilities for SAGE Websites, and a brand new advanced end-buyer store website called SAGE Company Store Premium.
The upcoming release of SAGE Online 14 will introduce industry distributors to a brand-new, industry-first service, called the SAGE Print Studio, that makes it easy to create and order completely custom catalogs and flyers. Distributors can select any products from the SAGE database or add their own completely custom products. SAGE provides a variety of ready-to-go covers to which distributors can easily add their own logo or their customer's logo, or upload a completely custom cover. Either way, in a matter of minutes, distributors can create a beautiful custom catalog that is ready to go for important sales pitches and other marketing activities. Once designed, just order however many catalogs or flyers are needed and they will ship within two business days! The new Print Studio also allows distributors to get flip books and PDF versions of the catalogs and flyers without charge.
In addition to the new Print Studio, SAGE Online 14 will also include full payment processing, allowing distributors to process payments for customers directly from SAGE Online through SAGE Payment Processing. SAGE also added a number of new search features, the ability to show presentations on websites with full e-commerce support, French and Spanish-language presentations, and much more.
Eric Natinsky, SAGE CEO, commented, "We're very proud to be releasing another version of SAGE Online with over 150 new features and enhancements, many of which were suggested by our customers. One of those new features, of course, is the SAGE Print Studio, which is an industry first. We're proud to be able to make it both easy and affordable for distributors to create custom print media to help support their sales activities."
The launch of SAGE Web 3.0 adds major features and enhancements that were previously only in SAGE Online to SAGE's web-based service. SAGE Web 3.0 is now home to an advanced product search area, featuring more filtering options and multiple product images that show alternate colors and angles for products in the database. Distributors will now be able to search for embroiderers and screen printers in the new decorator search area, review full business rating information on suppliers and ask other distributors questions about products in the new Q&A section. To further extend collaboration between industry colleagues, distributors will also be able to communicate and share ideas in the new discussion groups area of SAGE Web. SAGE Web 3.0 also adds SAGE's popular email campaigns service to SAGE Web, allowing distributors to send email campaigns to clients or prospects and track their success rates with real-time reporting.
"With this recent release of SAGE Web 3.0, Mac and other web-based customers can now access all of the same functionality that SAGE Online offers for Windows users," said David Natinsky, MAS, SAGE President. "Our vision has been to provide the same functionality across all our Total Access product line, so that customers can have what they need no matter if they are using SAGE Online, SAGE Web or SAGE Mobile while on-the-go. We're really excited to be realizing that vision with this update."
SAGE also announced another industry first, the Content Library for SAGE Websites. As part of the new SAGE Website Professional Plus offering, this innovative service gives distributors industry-relevant content for their websites. By working with a SAGE website specialist, distributors can specify their areas of interest as well as how often they would like their site updated. With that information, SAGE's web specialists will go to work by adding blog articles, videos, case studies, and other content on the distributor's website. Distributors can still, like always, supplement with their own content whenever they would like.
Chris Sumpter, SAGE's Director of Web Development, noted, "For a long time now, distributors have struggled with providing relevant, professionally-written content for their sites. We recognize that most distributors want a professional, modern website loaded with new and interesting content, but they would rather be selling than working on their website. That's where we come in. With one of our new website packages, we take the burden of maintaining the website off the shoulders of the distributor. We've been helping distributors with design for a long time, but now we can also give them the content they've been craving to keep their websites fresh and relevant."
In addition to the new Content Library, SAGE also introduced a new ultra-modern website theme. The new theme includes content carousels, parallax image support, stylish page feature banner images, a sticky nav bar menu that appears at the top of the browser as visitors scroll down the page, welcome page alerts, and so much more. SAGE websites will now also offer full-site SSL support, an industry-first for CMS-based websites. Full-site SSL support is becoming more and more important for site SEO due to Google and other search engines' promoting sites that support full-site SSL.
Coupled with the excitement of the new SAGE Websites, SAGE also announced the release of the SAGE Company Store Premium platform. SAGE Company Store Premium will allow promotional product distributors to sell products online through completely customizable professional stores, create an unlimited number of custom pages, manage inventory levels with real-time alerts, and see advanced statistics and reports for each store.
Finally, SAGE announced that its popular Inspire end-user catalogs are now ready to ship now instead of the traditional March ship date. Distributors can now get their 2018 catalogs and have them for the important first quarter instead of having to wait until later in the year.
In addition to new releases, SAGE has recently brokered a partnership with Stripe, a leading payment processing provider, to offer a simple and affordable credit card processing service to all SAGE subscribers. Available now, SAGE Payment Processing charges a fixed rate of 2.9% plus 30 cents per transaction, and allows users to sign-up instantly and avoid the trouble of paying monthly fees.
Eric Natinsky, added, "We always listen to our customers and try to implement as many of their ideas as we can to help them become more efficient, more productive and more successful. I am proud of the work we've done to take that feedback and turn it into all of these new products and features that I think our customers are really going to enjoy using."
SAGE Web 3.0 is available now to all SAGE Total Access subscribers at no additional charge. The SAGE Website Professional Plus, with the content library, is also available now, as is the new SAGE Payment Processing service with Stripe. SAGE Online 14, including the Print Studio, SAGE Company Store Premium, as well as the other new website features will be rolled out by the end of Q1 of this year.
SAGE encourages distributors who are not already SAGE subscribers to take advantage of its complimentary 30-day Total Access subscription to give it a test drive. Visit trysage.com to get started with SAGE Total Access, which includes SAGE Online, SAGE Web, and SAGE Mobile.
About SAGE
SAGE, based in Plano, Texas, is the leading provider of information, marketing and business management solutions to the promotional products industry. In addition to SAGE's flagship SAGE Online™, SAGE Mobile™, and SAGE Web™ research and business management services, SAGE also provides the industry with other research services, order management, website and email services, e-commerce solutions, end-buyer catalogs, artwork services, payment processing, tradeshows, tradeshow management services, and lead retrieval software. SAGE is also the exclusive technology provider for members of the Promotional Products Association International (PPAI), the industry's non-profit association. For more information, please visit www.sageworld.com or call 800.925.7243.
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