Daily Managed Print Service Industry Notes from Around the World! 4/4/2012

The DOCUWISE 5-Star cloud- based MPS Partner Program was created for Managed Services Professionals and it allows MSPs, VARs and IT Service Providers to become Managed Print Solutions professionals within days of registering.
See all stories on this topic »

The US government uses BPAs for the procurement of services and products that are required on an ongoing basis. Per the contract terms, Lexmark will provide its Managed Printing Services (MPS) for managing the printing needs of each department of the ...
See all stories on this topic »

"Public and commercial tenders for managed print service (MPS) solutions contributed most to the growth. The laser multi function printer (MFP) experienced a robust growth of 52.2 percent in 2011 as compared to just 4.1 percent for laser single ...
See all stories on this topic »

IDC further outlines that by using managed print services (MPS) alone, a savings of a fourth of the costs can be achieved by reducing ink/toner and paper consumption, lowering hardware costs, using less IT support, streamlining document workflows, ...
See all stories on this topic »

-=Good Selling=-

The Birth of Managed Print Services "According to Art"

So, I'm just about to pack it in for the weekend after having to doggie sit for my sons dog while he's off at drill for the weekend.  "Nutbuster", that's my name for my sons dog cause she's just big enough to jump on you and well, the name states the rest. 

Anyway I came across this article The Origin of Managed Print Services: Xerox or HP? by Jennifer Shutwell.

Anything with Managed Print, Xerox or HP in the title will tempt me enough to give it a read.  Jen puts some excellent points across about the economics of Managed Print.  The article is an excellent read and two statements stood out for me "With the continuous incline and growth of printing volume between 1991 until 2007" and "The origin of MPS was from neither Xerox nor HP, but created from people seeing a need for management".

I wanted to elaborate on Managed Print and where I think the origin was.  Now, I'm not saying that this was a Jersey idea, however back in the mid eighties there was a Canon dealer that went by the name of Duplifax.  I hated when I crossed paths with them because they had a unique offering for their maintenance agreements for copiers.  Once sold, the copier was put on a "managed care" plan.  That plan worked off the yield of the toner cartridge.  What Duplifax did was to package four or five toners together and build in the cost for service.  For example, four toners had a yield of 40K copies.  So instead of selling the toner for $80, they would sell the "managed care" pack for $800 and include service, parts and supplies for as long as the toner lasted. If you got the yield of 80,000 pages then it was a good thing for you and if you fell short on the yield it was then a better deal for Duplifax.

To me, a seasoned copier professional the term of managed prints means to manage output from systems that print.  Analog copiers print, but they were printing an analog image from a photoconductor, fax machines made prints, and of course laser printers made prints also.  Somewhere in the mid 90's we saw our first digital copy machines that were able to print, copy and fax (scanning came later).  For those of us in the copier industry that knew what the cost per page was for fax machines, and laser printers (some of the first laser printers that remember came from a Canon print engine, I remember the engines well because the low end canon analog copiers used the same type of toner cartridge, those of us in the industry knew that these cartridges had a high cost per page when compared to traditional analog copiers) we were presented with a treasure trove of accounts that we could migrate to one system while lowering the customers cost for "printing".

In effect in the late 90's copier dealerships were already starting to migrate prints away from printers and managing the cost with maintenance agreements that covered everything but staples and paper!

So there we have it Jersey invented the "Managed Care" approach for copiers in the mid 80's and Jersey again led the industry by offering a "Managed Print Service" with their All inclusive Maintenance Agreements for Digital Copiers in the late 90's!

Did we make you laugh, groan or smile yet?  It's my perception that Managed Print evolved from the elite core of Copier Dealers from the 90's, even though most were not servicing or supplying laser printers then, the idea and concept transplanted to the printer industry.

-=Good Selling=-

Managed Documents "The Next Big Thing"?

We've all read the hype about Managed Print Services, some of us have embraced it, some of us have tried it and stated it's not for us.  But did we ever think about Managing the Scanned Documents? 

I sell "down the street", hardware has always been my bread and butter.  After 32 years in the business I can see the trend to scan more, and email more and a distinct line in the sand for companies to not print and copy as much.  The documents are still there, they're just being scanned and saved more and more.

So, with more SaaS Cloud Document Management Systems on the horizon, the increasing popularity of Microsoft 365 why can't we (dealers) have a plan for SMB's to manage the scanned documents?

I hear excuses from potential customers like  "We'd like to do this, however we don't have the IT expertise to do this",  "We can't hire another person right now for this", "We're kind of illiterate when it comes to operating new software applications", "We can't afford the training right now". 

Everyone likes idea of being able to find documents when they need them and the idea of being able to access documents when they are out of the office. 

So, why can't we offer a Managed Document approach to the scanned documents?  I'm thinking we can do this easily and offer Block Time Agreements, a monthly billing charge or maybe a document charge.  We could meet with clients and develop their index and naming process. The customer would then scan all of the documents to a folder on the server, once a week we could log in, index and upload those documents to the SaaS program. 

We would only have to train the user in finding the documents, or we could even manage this part of the business.  Just think of it, no IT resources would be needed for the customer, no additional hardware, no learning curve on how to use the software.  We can manage and do it for them similar to a Managed Print Program, only we would control the documents.

We can bill professional services monthly or even bill by the document.  This would alleviate the large investment, along with removing the fear of buying a product and never using it.

I'm sure, someone, somewhere is doing this.  I think it's about time we offered this to our SMB accounts.  Thoughts, Ideas?

-=Good Selling=-

Daily Managed Print Service Industry Notes from Around the World! 2/4/2012

Tim Brien, Oki Data America's Director of Managed Print Services talks with Channelline CEO Robert Cohen talks about managed print services and the profitability that surrounds it, which are far higher than selling hardware. He also talks about how MSPs need to broaden their own business to ensure they can become a one-stop shop for the customer, and how managed services fits into that...you can read more here

As I got ready to watch the India – Australia Test Series on my 74 inch flat screen television with a high-definition cable service, I wondered how technology has evolved in the last decade. Earlier, holidays revolved around a 35mm film camera to capture all the wonderful memories and then rushing to a studio to get the film processed. Now, that negative film has been replaced by a DSLR....you can read more here

If there was one clear lesson from the 2012 Lyra MPS Forum, an “add-on” half-day conference held in conjunction with the 2012 Lyra Symposium, it was that the managed print services (MPS) business is getting tougher. The easy part—selling printing and copier savings to corporations—has gotten more competitive, and perhaps even has become a “commodity,” according to Lyra analyst Robert Palmer.
As a result, MPS vendors are searching for new sources of profit such as small- to medium-sized businesses (SMBs), global accounts, or more service-intensive accounts. But in all cases,....you can read more here

When Xerox eConcierge™ premiered early in 2011, managed print services providers had an inkling that the new program would have an impact on their managed print operations. Fast forward several months: Some print service providers have made Xerox eConcierge a standard component of their managed print offerings, and they are expecting the platform to play a role in their business in 2012. Xerox promotes Xerox eConcierge as the “quickest, easiest way to order printer supplies.” The technology eliminates the need for end users to manually check the supply levels of each of their networked printers, search for model and part numbers or look for vendors that have supplies in stock...you can read more here

-=Good Selling=-http://p4photel.com/eve/premium