MFP Copier Blog

Just a side note for everyone. Great chat with Andrew from Austral Business about the current state of business and how Austral is making a difference in their market place. More to come. Would love to hear everyone's thoughts!

COVID19 Remote Working Day Two Hundred and Sixty-Eight of Selling Copiers, Managed IT, BDR & Content

I feel like I'm back to last April when I spent almost every day sending mass amounts of emails.  I guess the biggest difference between then and now is that I'm getting somewhat better results. For now nothing has changed in New Jersey when it comes to COVID, most businesses are still remote, most have put lease upgrades on the back burner. I'm now tracking 5 leases that are in renewal with a shot of upgrading one of them this month.  Thank goodness for that one!

Todays prospecting email total was forty-nine, nine Linkedin in-mails, and twenty three calls. I wasn't able to generate any opportunities nut was able to salvage one appointment with an existing client. All in all it was a terrible day for prospecting.  I rolled through every client in the CRM and then went into Wednesdays calls to finish the day. I did that because I have to spend some time creating a spreadsheet for one of my larger accounts for a 10AM this Thursday.  This opportunity is for 60PPM color devices which are in the last 120 days of the lease.  Somehow, someway I need to figure a way to see that the order goes through this month.

Vaccine

Well...., yours truly finally received his first shot of the vaccine on Saturday. The order came down on Friday that my wife had secured me an appointment.  I was not thrilled for a couple of reason.  The first is that I believe the entire family had Covid back in late December of 2019 and the second because I've latest this long without one and felt it wasn't needed.  However my wife stated that if I didn't get vaccinated I wouldn't be able to visit our second granddaughter that's due the third week of May. My how time does fly!

Tomorrow

I can't wait to hit the prospecting trail again tomorrow.  You think I'm kidding right?  At this point in time the more calls or email I get will get me closer to developing more opportunities. Now it's all about turning planting the seeds  and turning the rocks to see what's out there. 

ADD anyone?

I'll admit that that I am my worst enemy from time to time.  When things are going good I'm not prospecting as much as I should. I mean you can always find time for prospecting even if it's only 5-10 per day.  Five per days gets you more than 100 a month and ten gets you more than 200.  I know the root of the problem and that's incoming emails and my ADD. Too many times I'll skip from one task to another task when I should finish the first task and let the others wait.  I know it,  but the desire to answer an email and get that task out of the way is so intoxicating.  It's after completing the incoming email task that I've distracted my self from the real task at hand.

April

It was last April that I prospecting like hell and each day moving forward will seem more like Ground Hog day again.  May of last year saw me log in more than $200K in orders.  Thus even if I have another stinker this month I'm still building for another spectacular May. 

The harder you work the luckier you get!

-=Good Selling+-

Is preempted due to the Mets vs Phillies game and the start of the Mets 2021 season!

COVID19 Remote Working Day Two Hundred and Sixty-Seven of Selling Copiers, BDR, Managed IT and Content

It was great to have half the day off on Friday and even better to be with our family and friends for Easter.  Last Friday as expected was dead as a doornail with Good Friday and Passover Week.

Spring is finally here for good in New Jersey and that means to continue my mega prospecting ways for April.  When you have no orders to write and and very few appointments the only left to do is too prospect!

Today I was able to send fifty-eight emails, nine phone calls, one text message and five Linkledin inmails.  I was able to connect with eight DM's, scheduled one appointment and also hit an opportunity via email for $27K.  Emails still seem to be doing the trick since I had eleven return response which is about 20%.  In addition I have zero responses for messages left and Linkedin inmails sent.  I'm sure in the next few days there will be more responses since today is Easter Monday and it seems this is a vacation week for many.

I'm still sitting at zero for the month in revenue, however with the addition of the $27K opportuni8ty today I've created $100K plus in the last week.  Sure would be nice to keep creating $100K a week in opps for the next 3-4 weeks.

Someone had asked me what type of message I'm sending in my emails last week.  The best I could tell them is that I'm crafting each email to net new suspects and prospects from previous emails or chats. Each one was different and no two were the same. 

Constant Contact Emails

Last week I was also able to send my monthly email newsletter to more than 600 suspects. On Friday of last week I received the results. Opens was far better than what I hoped for. Six hundred and twenty three were sent, there was a 23% open rate (that's good), however the click through rate was only 4%. By the numbers that 138 opens and only 8 click throughs.  However 5 of those click throughs gave me the additional information I need to craft a call or email about the content that they opened.  Like I stated before this is a work in progress with the email list. Next month's goal is to keep the same open percentage and get the opens to 15%.   

My header title was "Best Password Practices" followed by "Say Good Bye to Inkjet Wide Format".   I'm thinking I'll stay with the same type of header for next month also. 

I usually put in four sources of content for each campaign. With the last one I used content for wide format, content for passwords, content for document management and content for how to spot phishing campaigns. 

When selecting content you want to share information that you think will help educate your clients.  That's all you're doing and not trying to sell them or put pricing specials in the email.  You want them to recognize you as the guru in your market place.

Tomorrow

One appointment with an existing client and then another full day of prospecting and I'm hoping to put up the same numbers or more from today.

-=Good Selling=-

EXTON, Pa., April 1, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Ricoh today announced that Carsten Bruhn is now the President and CEO of Ricoh North America. A self-described "global citizen," Bruhn brings more than 20 years of experience from around the world. This includes having lived in Great Britain, Denmark and Japan, and with extensive travel meeting with customers in all regions throughout the world, including North America. He has led global teams that have successfully built digital transformation strategies and implemented services that solve crucial problems for organizations of all sizes – from global enterprises to small businesses.

"The opportunity that lies ahead for Ricoh, our partners and customers is incredible," said Bruhn. "Customer behaviors, the increasingly changing workforce and the speed of digital transformation are driving toward the need for new business models, including digital services and subscription models, to name a few. And there's so much to be energized about in North America specifically. We have a tremendous customer base, a passionately dedicated team and a network of dealer partners who share our commitment to solving challenging business problems today and into the future."

Bruhn most recently served as Corporate Vice President for Ricoh Global Services. In this role, he managed and fostered Ricoh's relationship with the company's largest, enterprise customers around the world. He focused on empowering customers to embrace digital transformation and built strategies with Ricoh's best-in-class partners to enable businesses to transform into digital businesses. Under Bruhn's leadership, Ricoh's Global Major Account (GMA) channel experienced growth by attracting new customers, while also renewing and providing increased value to existing customers. In 2020, these initiatives continued to accelerate by helping customers work from anywhere with digitalization, automation, and collaboration solutions, as well as providing tools for a safe return to the workplace.

During a two-year assignment in Japan, at Ricoh's global headquarters, Bruhn led the global services transformation for Ricoh Business Solutions. Previous roles included Corporate Vice President and General Manager of Ricoh Global Services. Prior to joining Ricoh, Bruhn managed Lanier's Northern Europe region. Leveraging this experience, he understands the entrepreneurial spirit and passion that drives Ricoh Family Group dealer partners today and is eager to collaborate with them.

Bruhn's leadership approach includes articulating a clear vision and direction to inspire employees and foster collaboration and productivity. As a "servant leader" he consistently drives the collective team forward, leveraging individual strengths to support a common goal: customer success. Bruhn also focuses on important cultural issues such as diversity and inclusion in the workplace, and he discusses the importance of understanding and addressing unconscious biases. His global experiences and unique perspective encourage and embrace an inclusive company culture.

In the coming months, Bruhn will publicly outline his business strategy for Ricoh North America. Bruhn's strategy will provide a clear and ambitious path forward – both short and long-term – built with agility and flexibility to quickly address customers' changing needs throughout 2021 and beyond.

Click here to read Bruhn's first message in his new role. For more information about Ricoh's customer commitment, click here, or follow the company's social media channels on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.

| About Ricoh |

Ricoh is empowering digital workplaces using innovative technologies and services enabling individuals to work smarter. For more than 80 years, Ricoh has been driving innovation and is a leading provider of document management solutions, IT services, communications services, commercial and industrial printing, digital cameras, and industrial systems.

Headquartered in Tokyo, Ricoh Group operates in approximately 200 countries and regions. In the financial year ended March 2020, Ricoh Group had worldwide sales of 2,008 billion yen (approx. 18.5 billion USD).

For further information, please visit www.ricoh.com.

© 2021 Ricoh USA, Inc. All rights reserved. All referenced product names are the trademarks of their respective companies.

SOURCE Ricoh USA, Inc.

COVID19 Remote Working Day Two Hundred and Sixty-Five of Selling Copiers Managed IT, BDR & Content

According to our Governor New Jersey is in another surge even with almost having two million people vaccinated in the last two months.  There were two software models that showed a moderate surge over the next 90 days with an average of 6,000 infections a day and then a super surge which would have us back at 8,000-9,000 per day.  Our Governor stated, "we are in for a long hot summer". 

You know me I always try to read between the lines and these lines are telling me that the Health Emergency Order will not be lifted in the next 60 days and maybe 90 days.  I still can't understand with all of the mandates in place why another surge.

Back to the office

In recent meetings many of my accounts have told me about their back to work initiatives for the coming months.  Most are planning for a full re-opening of the offices by July with a hybrid in-office and some remote. My fear is the continuation of the Health Emergency Orders that some businesses may reconsider their openings and drop back to Labor Day.  Seems the Governor may be telling the true for once with the statement of "one long hot summer".

Thursday

There were no orders for today and so far none for the month of April.  Even though it's the calendar first of the month I'm at seven days already.  Today saw me with two appointments with existing clients.  The first meeting was to introduce myself to the new CFO of an existing account.  My old contact retired about a month ago and and it was time to start a new relationship with an account that has 5 print devices from us.  All I was expecting was to make the introduction, see how things were going and give a copy of the current leases and costs (just in case she did not have them).  One lease is coming due in September and of course there is the 90 day notification clause which got us to June 1st (two months away) to make a decision.  At then end of the meeting I was able to walk away with a $12K opportunity to upgrade the lease that's ending in September.  Unexpected because I let the client do most of the talking and I just kept on listening.

One good deserves another

My second appointment was virtual with another existing client.  We have all of the copier business with that account but I've never been able to crack the wide format device that they have. I won't get into details about what I did for this account but that I can tell us is that I went out of my way to make sure an issue was solved to their satisfaction on our chat.  At the end I asked for copies of invoices for the last 12 months for their wide format because I believe I can save them money.  This all stems from analysis I did years ago and hit a snag with their current agreement.  The snag is now gone and the CFO stated he will send me all of the invoices. Another opportunity created for the day and I believe it's in the $15K range. 

All in all not a bad day, coupled with the opportunities from yesterday and today I think that's about $80K that could close this month.  It may or may not but the end result is I've padding my opportunity bank for the month to almost $150K. I'm a firm believer that in order to hit your monthly quota you need three times your quota in opportunities that could close that month. Any thing less is like mystery meat you just never know what's in it.

Friday

Working a half day to catch up prospecting emails, my to do list and then to create my constant contact mailer to net new prospects.

-=Good Selling=-