Sewickley, PA, March 26, 2007 -- PIA/GATF announced that its Variable Data and Personalization Conference, November 4–6, 2007 in Phoenix, Arizona, will feature an expanded array of topics. The event, now in its sixth year, helps printers plan strategy and learn about new approaches, applications, and technologies surrounding the increasing use of variable data and personalization techniques in client campaigns. “The event’s growth has paralleled the increase in the percentage of printed pages that contain variable data,” said Jim Workman, vice president of training for PIA/GATF. “We've come a long way since our first conference when many still doubted the profit potential of variable data. Now, there are close to 50,000 digital presses in the U.S. and Canada, and owners are reporting that, job-by-job, variable data is their most profitable segment. Our expanded content reflects that a lot of companies now have considerable experience under their belt,” said Workman. The Variable Data and Personalization Conference has been reorganized into three special seminar tracks: a “fundamentals” track for firms relatively new to variable data, a “cross-media” track for more advanced practitioners, and a “business” track focusing on sales, marketing, and performance-related issues. In total, the conference will feature over 30 sessions covering workflow, pricing considerations, data management, collaborative selling, MIS and metrics, trigger marketing, sales compensation, and selling to vertical markets. Attendees will also have a choice of hearing several case studies in which companies share the details of their variable data applications. Two day-long programs will be offered on November 4 in advance of the conference: The Anatomy of a Variable Data Campaign and the Web-to-Print Symposium. In addition, a hands-on Web-to-Print Boot Camp has been added on November 2–3. The development of the expanded content was led by an advisory committee comprised of print providers and suppliers. “This year’s committee did a terrific job organizing the content in a new series of tracks, including advanced sessions on applying the dynamics of variable data to multimedia,” said Steven Schnoll, conference consultant and managing director of Schnoll Media Consulting. “And based on their input, we’re not going to finalize the content until registrants go to PURLs that we've assigned them and identify the sessions they have the greatest interest in.” Information on the conference is available at the conference web page at www.gain.net (visit “Events and Training”) or by contacting Ned Herrick, PIA/GATF’s conference manager, at 800/910-4283, ext. 712.