Managed Print Services: Owners/Manufacturers/Sales Managers DO NOT READ THIS: Selling Professionals Only

The blame game is starting up - and as you know, sh*t rolls downhill.

Are you starting to hear the following:

"How many DCA's are you installing a week?"

"How many assessments are you conducting a week?"

"How many face-to-face, C-Level meetings are you having a week?"

"fill-in-the-blank, say's if you close 50 MPS deals a year, you'll be making over $200k!"

"So and so says to get in front of C-Level's or your deal will never get off the ground..."

"What's her name says forget about C-Level, they don't feel the pain, get to the IT guy..."

"don't worry about the compensation on your MPS deals, we'll figure that out as we go..."

"oh, and how many machines are you installing this month?"

I can count perhaps half a dozen, MPS Specific training programs in the ecosystem - third party trainers and consultants.

Add in manufacture programs and you get to around a dozen different MPS training programs - I calculate that adds up to nearly 1,500 PowerPoint slides - LOL!

Have you been a victim of one of these charades?

The More Things Change, the More Things Stay the Same -

If you are in the field, trying to sell this hot, new thing called MPS - how is it going?

Did the two day training class you sat in on help?

Are your scripts killin?

Is your Value Proposition dead nuts on?

Do you have a SOW? Scope document? Standard meeting Agenda?

Do you still have questions about strategy and tactics when it comes to MPS?

Is your sales manager just as new at this as you are?

How about your principals or executive management, can they even spell "MPS"?

No? Nothing? Nadda?

Huh, that's too bad. Or, is it?

Questions, questions...they're just questions.

The same questions selling professionals asked when the first fax machine came out, or back when the first photocopier hit, the personal computer, spreadsheets, light bulb, automobile, steamship, loom, printing press and buggy whip - all paradigm shifting, business model redefining, hybrid generating, advances.

And as much as we all want to believe this MPS thing is "new", it really isn't. It all goes back to the basics, everything good does.

This is nothing to get alarmed over, indeed this could be a generational opportunity for us - for us in the field.

Here's the deal. Your manager and owners alike are at the same level of MPS awareness you are - actually, they are worse off unless they go into the field as you do, every single day.

Each appointment you have, every call you make, every time you talk about MPS, read about MPS, each of these events add to your personal, knowledge base. Tell me you don't learn something new with every "assessment" you perform? Not about assessments, but about the business you are assessing.

Specifically - these instances are "resume enhancing experiences". Wha..wha..whaaaaat?

The world is changing.

Managed Print Services isn't changing the world, bigger things are. The world of brick and mortar is starting to dissolve - are you still conducting 30 demo's a month in your big, expensive showroom?

IBM figured it out two recessions ago and HP is on it now - the world won't need as many distributed pieces of hardware as it once did.

Cloud computing, the Death of Newspapers, iTunes, Androids, Moore's Law and You -

In the 1950's I guess it took maybe 20 admin's to support one or two sales people. From typists, to accounting clerks, order processing, filing, management, out to production.

I have no idea what the ratio is today, but considering all we can do with a laptop and a Blackberry, I can imagine the number of support staff is or should be,much, much lower. (I still remember an email string containing 74 different people on just one of my orders at IKON...74 people touched one order!)

Everyone is doing more with less.

As the number of non-customer facing employees dwindles, the value of those who do, increases.

Consider that statement again.
.........

Other than you, personally, who else will benefit from your increased value?

Your next "employer" that's who.

A better question might be, "will you even need an "employer" in the first place...?"

Managed Print Services, Size Does Matter - Just Not In The Way You Think

2009

I have been getting alot of "size" questions lately.

You know, how big is too big, how small is too small?

Is "small" ok if there are multiples?

What, exactly, is too big?

And by the time I find out its too big, is it too late?

Titillating queries with scintillating responses.

The answer, of course, depends on your sweet spot.

Get your mind out of my gutter -

I'm talking about how you define a Managed Print Services prospect - by number of employees, number of copiers, number of printers, fax lines, scanners or what?

Depends.

Great. What does it depend on?

It depends on what your organization can handle - more importantly - it depends on you.

Let's compare this in the most simplest terms and reduce MPS down to CPC - a prospect for a copier is anyone who has volume, wants to buy, or fogs a mirror, right?

I am not saying we should, but why don't some in MPS feel the same way?

Why is there a difference between how we qualify a copier deal vs. a MPS Engagement?

These aren't rhetorical questions, there are answers.

One answer is some do equate MPS with CPC - not that there is anything wrong with that, equipment optimization and capturing print volume is one component of MPS; indeed, just the beginning.

And, this is big, "equipment and volume" are easy issues for a dealer or Selling Professional to get his head around.

So, if your company's definition of MPS is simply equipment refresh, right-sizing, and supplies management, why not go after the 7,600 images per month deals? (Yeah, I am pulling 7,600 images out of thin air, just like everyone else is doing. But let's proceed on this assumption.)

That's 19 accounts per month if you use the 150,000 image quota per month, per rep figure being bantered about currently.

Now, if we further extrapolate an average of 3,400 images/month/machine(my accumulated studies numbers, HP shares the opinion) to reach the 150k/month, we need to sell or capture 44 machines each month, spread across 19 opportunities - just over 2 machines per deal.

Huh.

The Assassin, "I'm afraid, Captain, it's Worse than you Think."

Mal, "...it usually is..." -

These 19 deals need to take place over 20 working days each month - One, 7,600 image deal each day.

How much time, if any, would you, the Selling Professional in the field, spend on pursuing a MPS Engagement with a client generating 7,600 images a month? Would you even pursue? Is it worth your time?

As a Selling Professional, some studies say, your time is worth around $180.00/hr. $180.00 to you, personally.

How many hours of your time, does it take to close one deal?

Let's guess:

Drive Time - .5 hour
First appointment - 1 hour
Follow up/appointment summary communication - .5 hour

Drive Time - .5 hour
Second appointment - 1 hour

Assessment/Survey/Study/Data collection - 4-6 hours(?)
Analysis - 1 hour
Proposal generation - 1 hour

Drive Time - .5
Presentation of Findings and Recommendations - .75 hour
Agreement Execution/Implementation - 1 hour(?)

Close to eight hours; that's $180.00 X 8 hours for every deal you work on; or $1,440.00. So for every deal you put 8 hours of time into, you should bring home, in your pocket, $1,440.00. The bad side is, you are going to put more than 8 hours into deals you will never close - it's inevitable.

Further, 8 hours per deal, multiplied by 19 deals/month, requires 152 hours total - there are 160 hours/month available.

Roll in all the Monday Morning Meetings, conference calls, "training" sessions, your 4 hours/week of cold calls, and the all mighty, ever important, client service/problem resolution(cleverly disguised as toner delivery) and we are all upside down.

I know the numbers above are debatable, that's not the point, it's the process I am trying to illustrate. Does this make sense?

"Show Me The Money" -

Let's look at how all this fleshes out in terms of greenbacks, shekels, lire, cabbage, money.

The possible commission on that revenue, 150,000 images/month, is $150.00. This doesn't look all that enticing, does it? (150,000 times 0.020, times 5% commission equals $150.00)

But if you keep a run rate of 150,000 images added each month, after 12 months, your MONTHLY RESIDUAL COMMISSION should be $1,800.00/month, riding 1.8 million monthly images.

At this point, if you didn't sell an image for the next 24 months, you would still be collecting $1,800.00/month.

And watch out, there are all sorts of schemes coming to the surface veiled as techniques "not allowing the sales team to get lazy"; sunset clauses, equipment revenue and percentage of quota gates, etc.

So, how big is too big?

I dunno. I do know there is no magic bullet, no singularity. Unlike the copier world, for the MPS Ecosystem, THERE IS NO SINGLE ANSWER FOR EVERYONE.

And by everyone, I mean we on this side, and those soon to be Partners, our Prospects.

The best thing to do is plug in your own numbers and determine your ideal "size".

Everybody else has got an agenda, why shouldn't you?

HP LaserJet II: Whadda Mean, It's not Under Warranty?

Canon Down 54%, Ricoh Down 69%, Xerox Down 50% - Profits? We Don't Need No Stinkin Profits...

The third quarter was not kind, here are some numbers:

Canon operating profit was down 54% year-over-year and sales down 22%

Ricoh profits were down 69%, and

Xerox profit was down a little over 50 % and sales by nearly 20%.

Konica Minolta and Kyocera also reported fall-offs in profit and have readjusted their expectations for the year and have lowered profit predictions considerably.

I don't know about you, but I can not think of too many businesses that can survive these kind of numbers.

Thank goodness "O" can't get a hold of these...wait, is Xerox "too big to fail?" -

Stunning.

Absolutely stunning.

Here.

The New Document Management and The Help Desk

It's funny.

Managed Print Services North American Conference: May 3-5, 2010 San Antonio, TX

The second North American MPS Conference is scheduled for May, 2010.

A good time should be had by all.

Some of the themes so far:

Managing RFPs
MPS - Financial models for MPS providers
Moving customers to stage 3, how to know when you are ready. How to identify the right customers for stage 3 engagements.


Additionally, just like in Europe, there will be a pre-conference seminar aimed at participants with less background and knowledge in the world of managed print.

Pre-conference sessions will be offered for both end users and channel partners. These sessions will concentrate on providing a solid foundation of the subject and offering practical strategies when selecting an appropriate MPS partner or provider for first-time MPS engagements.

Last year was good, the European conference better, this May should be stellar.

See you there!

Seeking Alpha: Will HP Remain the Leader in Printers and Ink?

From the Seeking Alpha site:

"We estimate that HP's (HPQ) Printers and Ink Cartridges business constitutes 24% of the company's stock price.

HP's printer business makes money primarily through the sale of ink and toner supplies for its printers.

HP's market share in printers has gone from 35% in 2005 to 40% in 2008. We expect HP's share gains to continue over the Trefis forecast period due to HP's strong relationships with large business buyers and its traction with consumers through its PC business which has also gained share in recent years."

However, HP's printing business is continuously at risk of commoditization. The company has been able to maintain share and some pricing power in this market through printing technology designed to limit the use of low cost (non-HP) ink and toner supplies, with HP printers. As low cost printers and printing supplies become increasingly capable, HP's printing market share along with its printing profit margins will be at risk.

If HP's printing market share were to decline to 2005 levels of 35%, the company could lose $6 billion of its value or about $2 per share.

Here.

HP IPG folding into PSG? Someday, HP Won't Sell Printers