10 Questions for the Manual MPS Assessment

Recently, I had an appointment with a "net" new account that was interested in our Managed Print Service Program. This was not a large account (about 30 employees).  Of course the first item of business was to close on the assessment. In this particular business there were over 15 assorted printers from Dell, HP & Okidata.

In smaller accounts I'm not a big fan of all the assessment software tools that are available. When doing a manual assessment one of the items of business is to inventory the entire fleet. I'm a big fan of doing a walk through and collecting my data the old fashioned way.

Of course the manual assessments will take time, however I'm introduced to every person in every department that prints. Not only do I get to meet that person, but I also get a few minutes to interview that person about how they use the printer. After I print the configuration sheet from the printer I'll then have a short interview with the main user/users of the printer.

1.  What size of paper do you print onto?

2.  What type of documents are you printing (internal docs, reports, external proposals, invoices, etc.)
3.  What type of media do you use the most? (regular bond, envelopes, thick stock, gloss stock)
4.  What do you like most about the printer?
5.  What do you dislike most about the printer?
6.  Why do you print these documents? (which gives me a better understanding of their work flow)
7.  How much paper do you use in the printer, in they don't know that I'll then ask them how many times they fill the paper tray.
8. The documents that you print, do they need to be for your eyes only (secure)?
9.  If you had a printer that printed two sided automatically, would you take advantage of that feature?
10. How many forms are you printing per month (ask this is they are using the printer to print forms)

By the time I'm done with each user I have an excellent snap shot of data for each user/department.  In this particular account I found a department that is using an older Okidata dot matrix printer that is printing 500 invoices per day onto pre-printed carbon less forms.  This one work flow was the holy grail of the assessment. With third party software, we'll be able to capture and manage this print stream to print to a color laser printer with the use of laser NCR paper and then have a staple command inserted for each invoice.  The savings to the customer can be PRICELESS!

This was just a small snap shot of this appointment, it's important to get wide and deep with potential new accounts, and of course existing accounts. Now more than ever businesses what a sole source service provider for MPS, BPS, and MNS.

I'm not sure if the rep before me or after me will do the manual walk through assessment or just go through the automated software process to get serial numbers, model numbers and meter reads.  If they do they later, then I have a better chance of bring this account home!

-=Good Selling=-