Managed Print Services Engagements and Bringing Equipment “Up To Spec.”

This is one of the steps that will need to be address when implementing a Managed Print Services program. There are several methods of dealing with bringing equipment up to OEM specification when taking over the full responsibility for all maintenance issues going forward. The important point is to not allow this to become a barrier to getting started. You need to

get your solution in place as soon as possible. Below are a couple of common methods we have seen for dealing with this issue. See which works best in a particular situation and know that you can come up with any hybrid that meets the customer needs and helps to move the deal forward

Methods For Addressing Existing Inventory Levels When Implementing Managed Print Services (Cost Per Page) Programs

There are several methods of dealing with beginning inventory at the start of a Managed Print Services (cost per page) program. The important point is to not allow beginning inventory from being a barrier to getting started. You need to get your solution in place as soon as possible. Below are a couple of common approaches that can be utilized to address beginning inventory. These will help to remove any barriers from moving forward, and can help expedite implementation. See which works best in a particular situation and know that you can come up with any hybrid that meets your customer’s needs and helps to move the deal forward.

* Page Credits:

Under this scenario, you would add up all the remaining on site inventory and provide the customer with a credit in future pages printed. These credits can be spread over any number of their future invoices. For example, the credit may be 100,000 pages and the customer prints approximately 500,000 pages per month; you may issue them a 25,000 page credit against their next four (4) months invoices.

When Should You Use A Data Collection Agent (DCA) As A Prospecting Tool?

Short Answer: as often as you can! Prospecting is a wonderful way to initially engage a potential customer or to expand the service offerings within your existing customer base through deeper automated data collection and analysis including print device over and under utilization reporting. Whether you’re looking to gather data on a print environment in support of a proposal that you are looking to put forth, or just looking to add value to your current offering, it always makes sense to prospect with your DCA. Additionally, just about any account size can make sense to prospect in. It all really depends on just what you’re looking to accomplish. If your DCA is tied to an efficient MPS software solution, it will undoubtedly make you, the Service Provider, more strategic to your customers and prospects. And do remember that every one of your customers is someone else’s prospect! Your DCS should be tied to an MPS software solution that can manage and support any program type; whether that’s a All inclusive Cost Per Page, a toner only cost per page, a service only cost per page, a cost per device, a time and material (break fix) or any combination of the above. Flexibility in billing mechanisms is a key component if your want to reap high rewards from your prospecting efforts. If your end goal is to demonstrate that you can be more proactive and better equipped to understand and respond to devices needs, then prospecting will demonstrate that you have a strategic tool to accomplish this. If your goal is a continuation of traditional services to an account, (toner, service, or a combination of the two), the right MPS application can be configured to accommodate that need. If you are looking to provide an even more proactive, Cost Management offering, then prospecting with the right DCA can position and present your strategic capabilities. Prospecting will almost always lead to additional service within an account and is, therefore, a great sales generation tool.

Corporate Benefits Of Managed Print Services Programs

Managed Print Services Approach to Managing Your Print Environment:

 Managed Print Services (MPS) is an outsourcing service by which a service provider takes on full responsibility for a company’s print environment. It requires knowing how to analyze print data in order to drive efficiencies and cost savings!

 An information management tool that not only allows you to track important data relative to your print devices and the services you receive, but it allows you to track bottom line data that impacts your very business, such as costs and device utilization.

 Empowers and supports your business print needs while streamlining your business processes.

What Message Should You Deliver To CFO's About Your Managed Print Services Program?

• Research shows that companies spend approximately $1,000 per employee per year just on the variable costs of printing.

• Over the life of a print device, supply expenditures can total three to five times the actual acquisition cost of the device.

• Budgets for supplies are growing by 20-40% per year; Dataquest, IDC and CAP Ventures have all concluded that page volumes are growing at a compound annual growth rate of roughly 8%.

• The average office worker uses about 10,000 sheets of copy paper per year.

• It is estimated that 30-50% of print assets in office environments are underutilized, while 20-30% are over-utilized.

• It is estimated that 20-30% of print assets in office environments are over-utilized.

• The cost of printing is equivalent to 2‐3% of a company’s gross revenue.

While the growing cost of print can be controlled, long‐term cost savings requires consistent and meaningful data. This data will enable you to make strategic and analytical decisions that will lead to cost containment, cost savings, and even more importantly, cost avoidance.

Print Management is the last un‐audited business expense. Few companies track printing costs at all. But an accurate assessment of costs is essential to reducing them. This is what we do; and our services and solutions will cost you no more than any other Service Provider in the market.

We manage print as a business process, making it more efficient and cost effective. We’re not just interested in cost savings; we’re also interested in your being able to verify those savings. We are adamant about open communication and data transparency; it’s what helps define the value of our Managed Print Services Solution.

What Message Should I Be Delivering To The CIO, CTO, or IT Director About My Managed Print Services Program?

Network printers are growing at a rate of 20% annually, and the amount of information printed by network users is increasing accordingly; over 50% of network traffic is printer traffic; Dataquest, IDC and CAP Ventures have all concluded that page volumes are growing at a compound annual growth rate of roughly 8%; help desk support studies have shown that 30‐60% of the calls to help desks are print related; it is widely accepted that 20% of IT support time is spent in addressing printer problems in one form or another; and printers, the supplies associated with them and the support required to keep them operating represent 5‐10 percent of the typical IT budget.

Few network managers and IT departments track printing costs at all. But an accurate assessment of costs is essential to reducing them. This is what we do. In fact we’re even able to audit the performance of your current Service Provider!

How Can A Managed Print Services Program Continue To Identify And Lower Costs?

We all know that good decisions are based on good information; with MPS, this is certainly true and becomes more meaningful over time. With an outsourced approach to print management MPS), the need for meaningful data on an on-going basis is key to strategically managing print as a business process. Real‐time data allows a Service Provider to proactively manage their customer needs, improve service levels, and improve productivity, all while lowering costs.

A managed Print Solution doesn’t end with the implementation of a new solution; on the contrary, that’s where it begins. Rather than just tracking historical maintenance events, being able to make prioritized decisions for allocating limited resources based on more complete information is critical to the process. Without a clear understanding of cost structures, it’s difficult, if not impossible, to accurately prioritize, define, and manage a print environment; including service and support requirements. With available data, a Service Provider can identify areas for greater scrutiny and delve into underlying drivers in pursuing continuous improvement. Furthermore, data transparency enables heightened scrutiny and audit capabilities, both for the Service Provider and the customer, which inherently demands over‐sight and review.

What Should You Expect From A Managed Print Services Program In Terms Of Initial Lowered Costs?

To begin, the first 1‐6 months of a Managed Print Services engagement should be all about cost containment. However honorable one’s intentions, it’s impossible to contain costs if you don’t understand where they exist, how they’re created, and how a company’s print environment is impacting those costs.

This kind of analysis requires data, which many Service Providers are too lazy to collect, or who collect partial data inconsistently; don’t know how to analyze it, analyze it for the wrong reasons, or who just don’t understand the value of data to begin with.

So the first 6 months can be used primarily to collect and track data. That doesn’t mean that you’re not fully engaged with managing the Customer’s environment. On the contrary, you should be engaged from day one. It does mean that you need to communicate and set expectations. Let your Customer know that the immediate cost reduction will occur through the very act of outsourcing the management of print to a strategic Service Provider who is knowledgeable and 100% focused on managing print as a business process.

How Does Managed Print Services Help to Reduce the Long Term Costs of Print?

Un-managed and poorly managed print environments result in redundant assets, excessive inventory, inefficiencies, and uncontrolled costs. In today’s competitive marketplace, you must control and accurately allocate your assets and related costs. In order to do this, a service provider must be proactive, must gather extensive data, analyze that data, make adjustments to an organization’s print environment based on that analysis, and then do it all over again, and again.

As a Manages Print Services Service Provider, you are seeking to make the costs associated with device management more visible, and reduce them through ongoing analysis and process improvement. In order to provide this level of service, you must have access to meaningful data. You must also establish a baseline to quantify the impact of your managed Print Services program. With access, you’re now in the position to analyze the data and to drive efficiencies and cost savings. This is how you can manage and accomplish a well executed plan of long term reduction in print costs.

What Are a Few Key Advantages of Selling a Managed Print Services Solution?

Let’s begin with the obvious; every one of us are in this to make a few bucks and that will happen by earning our customers business.   To that end, we need to be providing real value; through helping to indentify and lower hard direct and indirect costs and/or soft cost savings; hopefully, a blend of the two. If reductions can be achieved through a combination of the two, it will ultimately keep more margins in the game.  With Managed Print Services, you are able to take control; and with control, come ownership over your customer’s entire print environment. This will enable you to divert risk and incremental margins from multiple pieces of business as opposed to one primary piece. If you’re selling the toner, then get the parts; and if you’re getting the parts, sell them the repair services’ etc. And while not providing a bundle solution is no longer an option, remember the old adage. “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket” – diversify! Control how and where your margins are derived and your expenses are allocated.

How Should You Differentiate Your Managed Print Services Solution From Traditional CPP Offerings?

While many Managed Print Services (Cost Management) Solutions are billed on a Cost-Per-Page (CPP) or Cost-Per-Copy (CPC) basis, you should explain to your customer that these are billing methods and not necessarily synonymous with a Strategic MPS Solutions; you need to get proficient at communicating these differences to your corporate clients.  Many times, CPP and CPC programs are nothing more than a billing approach to traditional repair and maintenance services with the customer simply being sold equipment, service and supplies, on a cost per page basis. The reality is that many Print Management companies who offer MPS solutions are not generating the kind of meaningful data necessary for the effective manage of a print environment, data that would enable them to reduce and avoid costs.

Obviously, these companies are not managing print as a business process. In fact, many of them are still very traditional in nature with a traditional mindset and therefore have little incentive to improve processes and lower costs. Educate your customer; let them know that the cost to print a document not only includes the cost of hardware, toner and repairs, but also includes preventative maintenance, inventory carrying costs, delivery expenses, IT support, help desk support, electric, administrative and transaction costs, among others. Ask the following opening questions:

What is Cost Management (MPS) and why would I want to provide it to my customer?

More than ever, products are being commoditized and marginalized, forcing you to compete solely on price – a game you can’t really win. In this kind of environment your margins fall, and competition becomes more intense. The only way you can overcome such demanding challenges to your business is to reinvent yourself; create new business paradigms that provides your customers with greater value – value that very few of your competitors can provide or are too lazy and complacent to provide – value that can generate higher profit margins for you while eliminating much of your competition. This is Cost Management, more commonly referred to today as Managed Print Services (MPS). More than anything, it is a means for you to change the value proposition you bring to market. Unlike a commodity, Cost Management is a strategic solution that can’t be marginalized!

Cost Management is an outsourcing service by which you take on full responsibility for a company’s print environment, including the maintenance, support, and acquisition of all print devices and consumables. You accept full financial responsibility for maintaining, protecting, utilizing and deploying assets in a way that will create the greatest efficiency of operation and return on investment for both you and your customer. Such services are a true shifting of financial responsibility and accountability. Cost Management is about continuous process improvement and cost savings.