MFP Copier Blog

The Week in Copiers Fifteen Years Ago

Last Week of May 2006

Another day of rain, wind and temps in the fifties.   There's a chance it may all clear out for tomorrow.  Enjoy Your Weekend!

Enjoy these awesome copier threads from 15 years ago

"If I speak of myself in different ways, that is because I look at myself in different ways."

Michel de Montaigne

Let me ask you a question, how far and how much have you grown in your sales life?

Take a moment, grab a cup of coffee, sit down, and reflect... go back 5 years ago and then push to the present...

• Are you reaching greater heights in your sales life, now?
• Have you achieved most of your sales goals, now?
• Do you feel extremely fulfilled with your sales life, now?

If you want to live a better sales life, you must learn to grow.

Success in sales does not come to you overnight. It is achieved through daily improvement and small consistent increments over time.

A true sales professional doesn't sleepwalk through the day nor their career.

Sales professionals actively think about the things they do. They objectively evaluate themselves on a regular basis. They look at things through an unbiased and clear set of lenses.

On a daily basis they ask themselves:

• Am I learning from my mistakes?
• Am I constantly pushing myself out of my comfort zone?
• Do I still believe I can do this?

DEEP QUESTIONING... STARTS WITH LOOKING INWARD

The journey to becoming a sales professional starts with understanding who you are at your core. It is becoming more in tune with your deeper self. It is the ability to recognize what fires you up, what makes you happy or sad.

As a sales society, we’re largely fixated on the outer work. We focus on the stack rankings, where we are at quarter or year to date, key performance indicators, and number of new clients... starting to the get the picture?

Take a step back and realize that these are merely outer symbols. This does not reflect your inner world.

The key to sales happiness lies in transforming yourself and your career through the inner work.

When you truly understand who you are, you can make a conscious effort to improve yourself and how you communicate better with others.

• How do you deal with your emotions?
• How do you react when your sales life goes astray?
• What areas do you really excel at?
• What areas do you need to work on in your personal growth and development?

Do you have the courage to dig in and ask yourself deep questions?

THE INNER WORKS DEFINES YOU

What makes your heart sing?

How would you define yourself?

I encourage you to become your own Sherlock Holmes. Become interested in what grabs your attention and tugs on your heartstrings.

Stop looking in the dictionary for words that define you.

Getting to know yourself allows you to tap into the road of happiness as this is critical to your success as a sales professional. Your beliefs, your attitude and your daily routines are mission critical.

Understanding yourself can mean recognizing your shortcomings. It's about putting them on display for others to judge.

Yes, this means getting extremely vulnerable. This starts with looking in the mirror and saying to yourself, "This is me. This is the real me. This is who I am."

If you struggle to ask yourself deep questions, then you will struggle to ask your clients deep questions?

BECOME COMFORTABLE WITH BEING UNCOMFORTABLE

Becoming comfortable with being uncomfortable is what ferocious self-honesty is built upon.

I encourage you to think about this one...

How can you become ferociously self-honest if you struggle to deal with any discomfort in your sales life?

Those of you who are willing to take risks, step out of your comfort zone and create some discomfort, will reap the biggest rewards.

Let this one sink in for a moment...

If YOU, can't challenge yourself to improve then how can you challenge your clients to improve?

John Simone nails it,

“The key to wisdom is knowing all the right questions.”

What questions are you asking yourself on a daily basis?

The questions you ask yourself affect the sales life you lead. The questions you ask yourself literally determine what your mind focuses on, which triggers certain thoughts, actions, and inactions, ultimately affecting your sales results.

When you can ask yourself empowering, deeply reflective questions, it shifts your mind to a whole new level and sets into motion the thinking and actions to jumpstart your sales life.

"I think self-awareness is probably the most important thing towards being a champion."

Billie Jean King

I understand, I get where you all are coming from. Every day, I walk in your shoes. I am fully committed to helping your sales team integrate social aspects and heartfelt strategies into your current sales process to grow new business. I want you to get results. This is why I am passionate about doing this the right way, the genuine way, the authentic way! It's about understanding value before visibility.

Selling From the Heart is making a difference! I poured my heart into every page of this book and I think you're going to love it. You can find it on Amazon in paperback, kindle and in audio. You can click on the book image below and this will take you to Amazon.

In a world full of empty suits, I'm passionate about helping sales reps succeed by getting valuable before they get visible. I help sales teams understand the true value they bring to the market.

I appreciate getting the opportunity to share my stories. Integrating the use of social and sharing my story on LinkedIn was my “game-changer” in the highly competitive office technology world. With great pride I transform, challenge, coach and inspire sales teams to grow new business by helping them share their story and how they communicate it out by integrating the use of social inside the sales process. You can follow me on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and on my podcast by clicking on Selling from the Heart.

The Week in Copiers Five Years Ago

Last Week of May 2016

Memorial Day Weekend is finally here and the weathing is miserable!  Fifty-two degress, wind and rain for the last 16 hours and that's the forcast for another 24 hours.  At least I can catch on my my P4P Stuff.  Remember that this weekend is to honor those that have made the ultimate sacrifice for our country.

Enjoy These Copier Threads from 5 Years Ago This Week!

There I was going back and forth with the client trying to figure a way to get the deal done for a couple of production devices.  Seems what ever I tried was not working. I even reached out to others in the Print4Pay Hotel community for help with how to get bring this deal home.  All of the suggestions were not working and then the client told me "I need to get this deal done so I can go rescue the cat!".  What, the cat wtf **** does that cat have to do with ordering the damn copier I thought?  You want to order the copier so you can rescue a cat I asked. The reply was "yes, let's get this done now".

I guess the cat, the copier and the rescue escapade didn't sit well with me and that's when I realized it was all a really vivid dream.  When I made my way downstairs this AM I told me wife about the dream and she stated, "there was something going on because I heard you talking in your sleep trying to cut a deal".

Well, I guess the cat is now out of the bag and this isn't the first time I've been accused of trying to cut a deal in my sleep.

Even those these are dreams there have been times when a dream helped me figure out a way to get an opportunity closed.  It was more about looking at something from a difference perspective and I guess the subconscious part of my brain figured it out for me.  Mind you it does not happen often and the dream I had last night was wild and will not help to close any working opportunities today.

On the other hand the part about reaching out to others within our community is something to take note.  Sometimes as sales people we think we're understanding the client needs and wants but something went missing during the sales cycle.  I guess the moral of the dream is if you think you need help then you do and should reach out to others for help.

Curious to know if anyone else has been accused of cutting deals in your sleep.  If so I think it would be great to hear some of those stories.

-=Good Selling=-

Sponsored by

May 22nd, 2021

Arcoa Group

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The CIA to stop using fax machines

• The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency announced it will retire its secure fax machines that it was using to share secret information with its private contractors
• Will instead use new Gray Magic special encrypted email network

Lead for IT Asset Services in Missouri

• Follow this link https://oa.mo.gov/purchasing/b...ract-document-search

Ransomware Operational Costs

(Webroot claims of ransomware victims that 49% were unaware of the infection for more than 24 hours) reported on webroot

• 9% Less than one hour
• 43% less than 24 hours
• 43% less than 24 hours
• 28% 2-3 days
• 14% within a week
• 4% within one month
• 3% over a month

ABBYY solution company receives $$

• ABBYY, with US headquarters in Milpitas, CA, is provider of OCR, document capture
  and process automation solutions
• Announced it received a “significant investment” from Marlin Equity Partners of LosAngeles, CA

MSPAlliance Updates MSP/Cloud Verify Standard to Address Cybersecurity and MSP Assurance

• MSPAlliance® announced the newest release of its Unified Certification Standard (UCS) for Cloud & Managed Service Providers
• UCS v.21 adds more detail around existing Cybersecurity coverage within the standard, including further mapping to frameworks such as CMMC and ISO 27001
• Less than 3% of the MSPs worldwide possess an MSP Verify (or equivalent) certification or audit
• MSPAlliance® is a global industry association and accrediting body for the Cyber Security, Cloud Computing, and Managed Services Provider (MSP) industry

20 jobs forecast following merger at city firm Intuity Technologies

• Reported on Galway Bay fm
• 20 new jobs are forecast to be created at Ballybrit firm Intuity Technologies
• merger between Intuity Technologies and Roscommon firm myITdepartment

Lead for IT Services in Illinois

• $75K opportunity
• Click link for info http://apps.mwrd.org/ContractA...ails?contractID=2232

IDC predicted that four hundred billion fewer pages would be printed in 2020

• Demand for managed print services has fallen sharply during the Covid pandemic
• estimations came after IDC predicted that four hundred billion fewer pages would be printed in 2020 than previous years - the equivalent of seven football fields-worth of paged every minute
• Maruggi told CRN that, while there's a lot of speculation about how badly the print sector will be hit in the aftermath of the pandemic, Apogee is working with the assumption that it will lose around 15 to 20 per cent of normal print levels post-Covid

ATCO Australia Pivots to the Cloud with OpenText

• OpenText™, announced ATCO Australia has moved their information management solutions to the OpenText™ Cloud
• ATCO Australia is an energy company responsible for developing, building, owning and operating energy infrastructure assets
• "With OpenText Cloud Managed Services, we no longer have to maintain infrastructure or worry about upgrades and patches," said Chris Marshall, General Manager IT at ATCO Australia
• OpenText, The Information Company™, enables organizations to gain insight through market leading information management solutions, powered by OpenText Cloud Editions

TPx Awarded Most Promising in SMB Cybersecurity in the Coveted Global InfoSec Awards at RSA 2021

• TPx, announced it was recognized with the Most Promising in SMB Cybersecurity award from Cyber Defense Magazine (CDM)
• To see the full list of winners, visit http://www.cyberdefenseawards.com/
• TPx is a managed services provider focused on the success of small- and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) with approximately 25,000 customers in more than 50,000 locations across the U.S

ReachOut Technology Remains Bullish on Infrastructure and Cybersecurity; Seeks to Acquire 75 ...

• According to Pew Research, 64 percent of Americans have an online account involving health, financial or other sensitive data and nearly two-thirds of those have experienced some form of data theft
• roughly half (49%) of all Americans feel their personal information is less secure than it was five years ago
• a full 70% of Americans expect that the U.S. will experience a significant cyberattack on its public infrastructure in the next five years.¹
• In recent years, ReachOut Technology has quietly been acquiring local Managed Service Providers (MSPs) and private security companies across the U.S.
• Founder and CEO Rick Jordan has committed to a goal of actively acquiring 75 in the next 24 months. J

Toshiba Tec is hacked with ransomware

• A Toshiba Corp. unit said it was hacked by the DarkSide ransomware group
• Toshiba Tec, which makes products such as printer/MFPs and is valued at $2.3 billion, was hacked by DarkSide
• Claims “that only a minimal amount of work data had been lost”
• "There are around 30 groups within DarkSide that are attempting to hack companies all the time, and they succeeded this time with Toshiba," said Takashi Yoshikawa, a senior malware analyst at Mitsui Bussan Secure Directions

Ricoh Canada's Document Processing Services Chooses ancora Software to Enhance their ...

• ancora Software, Inc., announced that Ricoh Canada's Document Processing Services has signed an agreement to use ancora's flagship product ancoraDocs to enhance their Intelligent Capture ServicesA
• ancoraDocs is available either on premise or as a true multi-tenant cloud service hosted by ancora on Microsoft Azure
• "We are really happy to sign an agreement with Ricoh Canada's Document Processing Services group," said Noel Flynn, CEO at ancora

WBM Technologies Wins HP's North American Smart Device Services Award for Predictive Analytics in Print

• WBM Technologies (WBM) was named HP's top partner in North America in the area of Smart Device Services

• award acknowledges WBM's innovative and proactive use of remote monitoring technologies and predictive analytics

HP rehires Christian Slater for security push

In past, company ran video ads featuring actor Christian Slater as a hacker named “The Wolf” who access company data by hacking into printers and MFPs

• Has brought him back for new set of ads to promote new HP Wolf Security solutions
• New focus on potential security vulnerabilities from remote workers using devices at home
• New report published with results of latest survey:
• • 45% of IT decision makers say they have seen evidence in their company of compromised printers being used as an attack point in past year
  • 86% have concerns around the security of their home printers
  • 1.5 attacks per minute on endpoints connected to Internet, including
    printers and MFPs
  • 91% plan on making endpoint security just as important as network security
• HP Wolf Security solution offers:
  • Self-healing firmware
  • In-memory breach detection
  • Threat containment via virtualization
    • • Cloud-based intelligence
      • Remote recovery from firmware attacks
      • Threat data collection
      • Alerts
      • Next-gen anti-virus
    • Is offering online training and resources for dealers to sell new solution
    • Is planning a series of virtual “road shows” for dealers and their customers

HP sells printer/MFP plant to Sharp’s parent

Business Korea magazine reported that HP Inc has sold a laser printer/MFP
manufacturing plant in Weihai, China

• The buyers is Foxconn, aka Hon Hai Precision of Taiwan, which is the owner of Sharp
• In 2017, HP bought the printer/MFP plant from Samsung for $1.05 billion
• The Shandong plant will continue to supply HP with LaserJet branded product
• (unknown if plant will also be used to make Sharp-branded product, or how this will impact HP’s other supplier, Canon)

CGI to continue modernization of Department of Interior's mission-critical National Trust Information ...

• CGI announced an award from the Department of Interior's (DOI) Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) for continued enhancement of its Trust Asset Accounting Management System (TAAMS)
• BIA leverages TAAMS to administer and manage natural resources on 55 million surface acres and 57 million acres of subsurface minerals estates held in trust by the United States for American Indians, Indian tribes, and Alaska Natives

Bell Techlogix earns spot on CRN® Tech Elite 250 and MSP 500 lists for second consecutive year

• Bell Techlogix, announced that CRN®, a brand of The Channel Company, has named the company to its annual Tech Elite 250 , Security 100 and MSP 500 lists for the second consecutive year
• The Tech Elite 250 list is comprised of solution providers in the U.S. and Canada who have the highest level and most certifications from Amazon, Cisco, Dell, HPE and VMware
• Fifth year Bell Techlogix has been named to the Tech Elite 250. The Managed Security 100 spotlights MSPs with cloud-based security services expertise.

NetDocuments Cloud Platform Records Unprecedented Q1 2021 Growth

• announced unprecedented growth in Q1 2021 (1Q21), continuing its record setting sales momentum
• 1Q21 was a record first quarter for new customer acquisition representing 27% growth over the previous largest Q1, and the biggest non-Q4 quarter on record
• Company continued its record growth within the small-medium law firm segment, recording 84+% growth, and a record 1st quarter 2021 in new corporate legal accounts, representing a 163% increase compared to Q120

Cybersecurity Update

• Colonial Pipeline Company, headquartered in Alpharetta, Georgia, was hit by
  ransomware and forced to shut down its fuel pipeline operation that spans 5,500 miles from Houston, TX to Linden, NJ. This may cause a further spike in gasoline cost.
• Judge Eldon E. Fallon sentenced Edward Tolliver of New Orleans, LA to 124 months in federal prison for making and selling fake credit cards using stolen identities he acquired from Dark Web sites.
• SmileDirectClub, headquartered in Nashville, TN, notified an unknown number of patients their PHI may have been exposed after “systems outage”
• Owners of Tesla beware! Two researchers are warning that a hacker can use a specially equipped drone to remotely hack into and take control of the Tesla car, using the TBONE exploitation.
• The federal Department of Health & Human Services’ Office For Civil Rights reported:
• • March there were 1,116,997 patients that had their PHI exposed due to breaches
  • April has 2,121,186 patients impacted
• Flashpoint is reporting that Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps is behind ransomware campaign using a hacking group called Emen Net Pasargard.
• The Rochester Community Technical College of Minnesota notified 5,392 students that their info was exposed after cyber security incident.
• Check Point Research is warning that billions of Android-based mobile devices are exposed due to a security vulnerability in Qualcomm’s Mobile Station Modem chips
• Dell Computer announced it has patched flaws in vulnerable firmware that shipped in millions of laptops, tablets and desktop PCs since 2009.
• Peloton Corp., headquartered in New York City, NY, is notifying millions of customers of its Peloton fitness equipment that their info may have been exposed due to newly discovered vulnerability.
• Aprima suffered outages of its cloud-based EHRs due to ransomware attack on MednetwoRX data center in Dallas, TX.
• Lourdes Hospital of Binghamton, NY notified an unknown number of patients that their PHI was exposed after its CaptureRX pharmacy claims processing solution was hacked.
• West Penn Hospital of Pennsylvania announced that former employee, Guy Caley, was convicted of 44 felony and 45 misdemeanor counts for illegal actions which exposed the identities of patients.
• Mandiant Threat Intelligence is reporting of new security vulnerabilities found in Intel and AMD computer processor chips, that bypass fixes that companies issued to correct the past Spectre and Meltdown hacking attacks.
• Wolfe Eye Clinics of Iowa notified an unknown number of patients that their PHI may have been exposed due to cyber attack.
• SEIU 775 Benefits Group of Washington notified 140,000 patients that their PHI was exposed after cyber attack.
• Nexelis Group, headquartered in Seattle, WA, notified an unknown number of patients of Pacific Biomarkers that their PHI was exposed after malware attack.
• Medtronic, with US headquarters in Minnesota, notified an unknown number of patients that their PHI may have been exposed after cybersecurity incident.
• Rx Pharmacies, headquartered in Tri-Cities area of Washington, notified an unknown number of patients that their PHI was exposed after email phishing attack.
• Truesec Security Consulting is reporting that the Russian government is backing Evil Corp., a cybercrime organization.
• The US State Department has fined Honeywell Corp., headquartered in Charlotte, NC, after some of its employees allegedly leaked plans for the F35 and F22 Raptor and other aircraft designs to the Chinese government.
• Health Aid, headquartered in Parma, OH, notified 140,000 patients that their PHI was exposed after cybersecurity incident.
• Scripps Health of San Diego, CA notified an unknown numbers of patients that their PHI may have been exposed after a ransomware attack.
• Midwest Transplant Network, headquartered in Westwood, KS, notified 17,000 patients that their PHI was exposed after ransomware attack.
• Gifford Health Care of Vermont notified an unknown number of patients that their PHImmay have been exposed after a cybersecurity incident.
• Faxton St. Luke’s Healthcare of Utica, NY notified 17,655 patients that their PHI may have been exposed after cybersecurity incident.
• Orthopedic Associates of Dutchess County in New York notified 330,000 patients that their PHI was exposed after cybersecurity incident.
• BakerHostetler published ransomware report:
• • Average initial ransomware demand is now $4,583,000
  • In healthcare, average ransomware payout is $910,335
  • Average forensic investigation cost = $58,963
  • HIPAA fines range from $100,000 to $6.85 million

• The Alaska Court System was forced offline after cybersecurity incident.
• Netskope Security is warning that ransomware could be inserted into a network by usingnmalicious Microsoft Office files. The malware could be embedded in MS Excel, MS Word, MS PowerPoint, etc.

You've heard it from me over and over and that's as long as you work hard and put in the effort good things will happen. Now they may not happen on your timeline however in the long run the work and the effort will pay off.

It was about three years ago when I started posting IT, MSP, MSSP and Document Management press releases on this site.  Over those years the news from those press releases and the verbiage used in them has slowly helped me to better understanding of the IT world.  When you couple that with the awesome training that Stratix offers on a weekly basis it became clear to me that sooner rather than later I would have my first managed IT client.

Today I received my first managed IT order for 10 users from an existing account and while it's not a medium nor huge client,  it's a start.  Sometimes it's more about ability to knock one down to build the confidence and then the other domino's can fall in to place.

Did I have help?  You bet your sweet butt I did and I couldn't have done it with out the members of our IT team. 

The Future

While I'm a little late to the game I can see the pay-off for younger rep because of the monthly residual for each client acquired. While the sales of copiers only pay you once every three or five years the managed IT is a gift that keeps on giving each and every month for as long as you have the relationship with your client.  I have two clients that I have a forty year relationship for copiers, and then another 15-25 for thirty years and I can only guess at the rest.  Imagine selling managed IT services for forty years and the residuals?  Now I'm thinking I was born thirty years to early!

After Memorial Day I have second appointment with a much larger company to see if we can finalize a proposal we introduced about four weeks ago.  At this time I think we have a good shot winning and that's because of the vision, the team and the IT stack that we bring to the table. 

I'm not giving up at selling copiers because there is still quite a bit of demand but you can bet the ranch that I'll be telling more clients stories about IT news that I've read.  The Columbo in me comes out with that last question before I leave, hey did you happen to hear about XYZ company that........which means a new conversation starts

-=Good Selling=-

The Week in Copiers Ten Years Ago

Last Week of May 2011

Tomorrow is the last day of the month for me in May.  I have one small order to book, however that still leaves me $7K short of my monthly quota. I still have two $60K opps out there however one has been in the weeds for three weeks and the other opp is in the weeds for a week.  Both will get calls and emails, and after 41 years of doing this I still can't fathom why and existing client or net new won't give you the courtesy of an email or a phone call.

Enjoy these awesome threads from 10 years ago this week