Tagged With "Knowledge Base"
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Re: What's the weirdest place you've sold a copier to?
About to hit 17 years in the industry now so seen a few.. Sold a scanner to a strip club, I was new to the industry and just a teenager at the time - made the mistake of asking what they wanted to scan Had a "serviced" copier in a massage parlour (inherited the install base so I cant take credit for this) Sold/installed copiers/MFD's to both of the last two Prime Ministers offices/houses Installed a fax machine INSIDE a jail, there was a very dusty gap and some cables on the desk so I asked...
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Re: Will outside Sales Rep's go away?
I’m a little late to this party but had the thread open since it was posted. As a 35 year old i straddle the “millennial” and old school gap (in my opinion haha). There is value of ordering things online that can be commonly used or even basic electronics. But if it’s anything above basic, I still believe talking to someone even if on the phone, pays dividends. We recently bought a new vehicle for my wife and explored for weeks online our options, the new vehicles options, what the price...
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Re: Print Copy Tool versus Plotworks
John, The PrintCopy Tool compares pretty favorably to Plotworks. I attached two documents to this post. The Product Support Guide lists differences between the two products. The PowerPoint has screen shots of all the settings in PrintCopy Tool. I hope this helps.
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Re: When is Net New Business not Net New Business?
I've always learned the two terms separately: Net New Business: Placing an MFP into a new account that had no existing MFP Competitive Knockout: Displacing a competitor's MFP with your own Base Upgrade: Upgrading one of your current MFP's Base Net New: Adding a new MFP into one of your current accounts The terms would be based based on the department. So for your car dealer example, you would be an existing account for their service department but net new business for their sales department.
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Re: When is Net New Business not Net New Business?
Originally Posted by Czech: I've always learned the two terms separately: Net New Business: Placing an MFP into a new account that had no existing MFP Competitive Knockout: Displacing a competitor's MFP with your own Base Upgrade: Upgrading one of your current MFP's Base Net New: Adding a new MFP into one of your current accounts The terms would be based based on the department. So for your car dealer example, you would be an existing account for their service department but net new business...
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Re: Ricoh & Epson = "perfect together" NOT!
I'm wondering how the new KIP 800 series are doing. Many of my existing base w/ 5 year old + Ricoh's are asking if Ricoh will have something similar soon. Sounds like they won't? I can't believe that they aren't doing any R&D on it !!
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Re: Charge for IT support
Thanks for the replies. We will probably do an opt out as well (as opposed to an opt-in), and base the charge on a % of total m/a billing. This is not so much to increase rev., but to cover costs and get clients accustomed to paying for the service.
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Re: Up=Coming China Tariffs on Copiers parts & accessories
These are two listing that I found on ustr.gov site: 8443.99.20 Parts of printer units of subheading 8443.32.10 specified in additional U.S. note 2 to this chapter 8443.99.45 Parts and accessories of copying machines; nesoi Subheading 8443.99.20 following parts of printer units of subheading 8443.32.10: (a) Control or command assemblies, incorporating more than one of the following: printed circuit assembly, hard or flexible (floppy) disk drive, keyboard, user interface; (b) Light source...
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Re: MPS and Linux HELP!
So some clarification first. PaperCut absolutely does support Mac. In fact, it is the only cost recovery/print control solution that I know of that actually installs in an all Mac environment. (Server and Client) It also is the only solution I know of that installs in a Linux environment. So both of your issues are solved with PaperCut. I included the install guides for Mac and Linux to get you started.
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Re: Color MFP Trends, Tactics, etc
I havn't seen one placement of the frontier in my territory yet. But that doesn't mean they aren't out there. I see the whole copier industry making a shift to A$ devices in the next 24 months or less, they have too. Price is the driving factor, I've heard it all about A4's, such as "A4's can't hold up to heavy volume", oh yea then why do I see laser printers with hundreds of thousands of prints on them and they weigh under 100lbs? Heck, I just came from an account that has 180K on a Ricoh...
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Re: Savin SPC221SF and scan to email
This link takes you to the knowledge base. Art, can you post the documentation? Or, tell us how to get to it? Thanks!
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Re: Savin SPC221SF and scan to email
Question How do I use Scan to Folder on Windows? Answer Documents scanned using your device can be sent over a network to a shared folder. To use Scan to Folder, follow these steps: Note: To send scanned documents to a shared folder on a computer, the correct user name, password, and directory must be set. Files can be sent to folder destinations on the following operating systems: Windows 2000 / Windows XP / Windows Server 2003 / Windows Vista Mac OS X Destinations must be registered via...
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Re: Is selling at cost the future for print hardware?
Merlin -- you are absolutley right...like any business there are several costs. but you never know if a dealer had special terms with a their manufacturer to order x amount - or if they were trying to acheive a certain level to hit their quoata or win some award? Really hard to speculate on a business model which we don't know anything about. But the one thing that I do know is that - these idiots are everywhere..... And quite frankly -- the people who want that type of partnership would by...
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Re: Is selling at cost the future for print hardware?
Interesting approach to the sales process. Strikes me the next promo is for 10% below sticker price...of course unlike cars, manufacturers don't put a sticker price on MFP's to advise the public what the price is supposed to be. At this point we find the margin we are able to obtain on most sales of hardware barely covers the cost of sales for the product...any business profits come from services bundled around the hardware, either connectivity plans, support plans, supplies for colour etc.
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Re: Weekend Industry Notes from 11/08/09
Not correct, this is an A4 device only and will not print 11x17 click here
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Re: Letter about Canon & Ikon/Ricoh
ComDoc in the state of New York is trying to do the same with there Ricoh base. The State of New York just sent out this memo, that states no new orders can be place for Ricoh products or service. Here is the memo.
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Re: Ricoh Introduces the Aficio MP 2851 and MP 3351 Digital Imaging Systems
Makes sense. Do you know if the $7,600 and $9,250 apply to the base SP models. If so, what are the SRPs for the SPF models? About $1k more? There are almost no generational improvements in these outside of App2ME, standard PPDM, and the optional keyboard so I cant see much higher prices. Plus it looks like RPCS is gone. Is that the end of host-based printing for Ricoh?
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Re: Ricoh Introduces the Aficio MP 2851 and MP 3351 Digital Imaging Systems
They actually did away with offering spf models and the fax option just gets added to the base model, which includes s/p. GIntel's and mmelrod's comments regarding the changes are pretty much the case. Pricing is pretty much the same as the prior models configured as sp models. Yes, the same will hold true for the 40/50 series, not sure how soon to launch though. Attached is the SIG that details all 4 units.
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Re: Ricoh Pro C720
Ricoh Americas Corporation announced today the official launch of the Ricoh Pro C720/C720s, a production class multi-functional color system and the latest addition to Ricoh’s Pro series of products, designed specifically for the production environment. This flexible system targets corporate and commercial professional print environments with demanding application needs. The Pro C720/C720s has a robust duty cycle of 320,000 images per month, and runs at 72 pages-per-minute (PPM) regardless...
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Re: Here's the deal
Base unit for the Pro907 is 737 pounds. What finishing features does the Canon offer that the Ricoh does not?
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Re: Ricoh Ikon Letter
Now that you raise the subject of Consumables, Ricoh allows IKON to purchase heavily from KATUN. IKON has always been notorious for buying non-OEM parts and supplies at deep discounts, which is one of the reason they had a poor reputation for service. Yet, it also helped IKON steal many a deal. Possibly, this practice will change for Ricoh products and they will only source Third Party Aftermarket for theie Canon base at this time.
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Re: Ricoh Ikon Letter
Old Glory, you are way off-base regarding profitability to Ricoh on an $8,000 sale through the dealer or through their direct channel. When Ricoh sells to the dealer, the dealer is responsible for all ofthe end-marketing expenses related to the brick-and-mortar + sales rep expenses. When Ricoh (or other mfrs) run their own branches, there is a tremendous amount of overhead associated with that operation. Hence, this is one reason why Ricoh's dealer division, while smaller, was the only part...
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Re: Does your Copier Service Contract still reflect 1970's Analog Copiers?
Over my 15 years as a Sales Manager to 23+ independent dealers, I have seen many situations where dealers simply has far too simplistic service contracts that had not been updated ever. They mostly involve billable Pro Services, unstable Power Supply, two competitive vendors trying to flip each other's Service Contracts and Fuel Surcharges. (I have a large geographic territory with lots of driving.) I once sold two connected copiers to a law firm. They decided to upgrade from Novell 5.0 to...
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Re: Annoying generic business speak
You either change your people...or you change your people. One throat to choke Org chart Peel back the onion Touch base
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Re: What will come of this?
but how much of that is "me too" to protect the base from xerox or someone else offering those solutions... the document solutions might keep the fox out of the hen house for a while. Consider that one of their core beliefs is that business is conducted through documents, so they have an array of document solutions - where IT companies think in terms of managing data not documents. From a resource perspective, imagine how cumbersome erp software would be if it was document driven rather than...
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Re: Panasonic's A3 Exit
I ate up a Panasonic A3 deal today. I convinced a current Panasonic A3 customer, they had no where to go one year fron now and flipped them to five Toshiba's worth $68k plus $69k BOP. Don't delay hunt down Panasonic A3 base today!
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Re: Colortrac Inc. Distributes its SmartLF Wide Format Scanners via Promark Technology
Colortrac Announces Financial Results and Growth in Scanner Sales Colortrac Inc. Colortrac has achieved record unit sales, revenue, and profit in their financial year ending April 30th 2010. Not including new business from OEM agreements, worldwide unit sales of Colortrac brand SmartLF large-format scanners increased by 24 percent over the previous year. Colortrac's consolidated result (unaudited) shows that group revenues increased by 42 percent to GBP £7.3 million, with a corresponding...
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Re: Ricoh NEW PRODUCT RELEASE - C3001, C3501, C4501, C5501
What specifically are you looking at regarding MSRP? From what I hear the price went up because the units now come standard with DOS and encryption for the harddrives. If you take the base cost of the replacement units and add the costs for the DOS this shoudl be the new costs.
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Re: Sharp to Introduce Five New Copier/Printer Models, Including a Digital Full-Color MFP
Art...it adds about $500 over the base unit. But that is nothing compared to what you get in return if that meets the needs of the end user.
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Re: Contract: Dept. of Ecology spent $250k on copies never made
Does most of the business world really have *no* minimum amount of copies included? Obviously, including 30% more than you are going to run is a bad idea, but if a minimum is set at a reasonable level, it's easier to budget your expenses. Also, reconciling those overages on a quarterly or semi-annual basis would help even out the peaks and valleys.
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Re: Twas the Plotbase Message Event@428
AVG = know issue at install. Afterwards, it works fine. And that system restore was exactly the right thing to do. In this case, it was likely the service thowing the password for the local account that it was using. The only thing I would have done different is see if the local admin password the Plot Base was installed under had been changed.
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Re: Konica Minolta (US) Acquires IT Company
Konica Minolta Business Solutions U.S.A., Inc. (Konica Minolta), a leading provider of advanced imaging and networking technologies for the desktop to the print shop, today announced the company has acquired All Covered, Inc. (All Covered), a leading provider of Managed IT Services to the small- and medium-size business (SMB) market. A nationwide technology services organization, All Covered delivers a diverse range of services including proactive server management, remote monitoring, cloud...
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Re: Lexmark Dealer MFPs vs IT Channel MFPs
Yes, I meant cartridges for non-BSD models. You are also correct regarding the XS models compared to the X. They are completely identical in every sense, aside from the fact that the BSD models are only available in the base configuration. For example, the Lexmark X464de is the same as the X463de with a fax board added. To sell the BSD version (XS463de) with a fax, you would have to add the fax versus ordering a pre-configured model.
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Re: Dealer Management Software
I have been an independent consultant for the office technolgy industry since 1994 and in the industry since 1981. My primary focus has been on the OMD software system. eAutomate is a competitor of OMD which has been around for over 20 years. My experience with eAutomate is very limited (mainly word of mouth from industry collegues) but I have been told that the service contract invoicing (the profit bread and butter of the industry) and financial modules are not as flexible or capable as...
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Re: Ricoh Ends Relationship with Ratio
New update on this one. Ricoh will be continuing support on existing plot bases up to the latest Ricoh version. However, there is a new player. Ratio US is starting up again. They are releasing new product to support the new PDFs from Adobe and update the Plot Base software. However, this will not be done in connection with Ricoh. Ratio US will have it's own versions and they are no longer supported by Ricoh.
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Re: Drum Yields
A short discussion about copier vs printer yields. The document is a bit old but the main points are still valid.
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Re: Emailed request for quote????
I have probably done each of these options at some point in time...well except the quote at retail. I wouldn't want the perception to be that we had outrageous pricing. If the machine was entry level with a company that had little additional potential, I would respond with something like "a Doctor who prescribes without seeing the patient would lose his license and you take your job just as seriously." If it is a business that I would like to penetrate I would low-ball it and include nothing...
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Re: Sales Manager Advice
I would be more concerned about the conflict of interest that can occur when he/she can make more on personal sales. All of a sudden, potentially big or profitable accounts "become" his creating a rift between them and their reps. The only accounts I would give the Sales Manager are pet or problem accounts and I would only pay him what he would have earned had one of his reps sold it. I other words, his sales become part of the team sales of which he gets a percentage. I assume there would...
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Re: pay question
General rule that I always base it on is 10% of combined annual hardware and serv/sup revenue. Somebody selling $25,000 in hardware a month and then having a service base of $25,000 per month should be generating a gross income of about $5,000 per month.
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Re: Ricoh's move into videoconferencing
And so Ricoh being a new entrant to this field with zero base is a good thing how?
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Re: Q. How does your company handle networking charges?
1st 90 days, all inclusive, with no time limit on hours required to get the customer to say they are happy. Thereafter, billable at $95.00 per hour onsite. Dealer, Canada
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Re: canon dealership
Curious if you've competed against Canon for years or whether their presence in your area is rather limited. While there is a lot of overhead to consider (parts, inventory, training techs, training sales etc.) would there be a large base Canon MIF where you could gain a greater share of market with your offerings - if your strength is customer service and growth then look hard but if you're only good at maintaining present customers maybe continue to strive for the lead dog position. Canon...
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Re: Copier Compensation Plans
This was emailed to me from a P4P'er who wishes to remain anonymous. Art, This past April I had the opportunity to leave the industry but I have kept an eye on it since then. This topic definitely perked my interest because I feel like I was both the beneficiary and victim of a Gross Profit Comp Plan at my last gig. I have been on both sides of this topic, Revenue & GP plans, and I never made more than $51K in a given year and yet I was always 100% of plan. My final year under this GP...
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Re: HDD Wiping/Reformatting
Amanda, Just formatting the Hard Drive and reloading system Software is definitely not enough to meet the due diligence requirements because the data can still be recovered by a knowledgeable person with forensic software. Even though it isn't easy to do, it is possible and that is enough to make it unacceptable to most companies. The need to reload System Software is a two edge sword. Since only an authorized dealer can "legally" have, and install, System Software it protects the Dealer's...
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Re: Comp Plan Poll
Above a base salary. I am paid as follows: A flat % of the total revenue based on the Gross Profit. The higher the GP the flat % is increased. Once GP is higher that 15% I am paid a % of the GP in addition to the previously mentioned Flat % of Revenue. this is on hardware revenue only not aftermarket. Which is the reason that aftermarket is spiraling downward. Comp us on aftermarket and watch click rate go back up.
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Re: MPS Billing Question
As you have already speculated, there are many different ways to charge for MPS. Our most common is CPC(includes consumables, maintenance kits, service and helpdesk) with a minimum based on projected volumes determined by a print assessment. We also do deals that are not CPC, but the customer pays per cartridge for toner, and everything else is covered under a base charge per machine. Again, you must understand their volume for it to be profitable. I have seen some pretty convoluted billing...
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Re: Booking Deals w/buy-out of existing leases
Good thought....but that would never happen. Most of the time in a stream of payment situation I take the number of months left and subtract 1 or 2 depending on the situation then I use that to base the buyout. That will knock down the buyout...especially when they are paying $300-$400 a month. This will make a big difference when figuring the lease. That can actually win the deal. The big wigs do not believe in the stream of payments and prefer to wait until the lease is up.....guess what...
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Re: SP5200 Series. What's your plan???
Old Glory....do you have matrix you follow for volumes and cpc costs which may or may not include base charges? You mentioned $90/qtr min but how what is the volume band? Wow I am very surprised that they ship with a starter cartridge in a commercial system. The Canon 1700 series comes with 15,100 high yield toner out of the box. The drum yields 116,000. Very tough box to compete against. I have sold 3 in the past 2 weeks.
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Re: Got A Situation! What would ou do?
Why would you want to switch brands to a product you would not be authorized to service and would likely not have an inventory of parts or the tech knowlege base to properly service. Just seems like a recipe for more trouble.
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Re: New Color Cost Per Page Poll for 30-44 ppm COLOR
I don't base my pricing on per page. I base it per click ( click is 8.5x11 or 8.5x14 image 11x17 is 2 clicks). Then my rates are progressive. I charge a base of $50 per month plus .07 per click. If they run 1k then their cost is .12 per click ( $50 divided by 5k equals .05 plus the .07 equals .12). If they run 5k their cost is .08 per click. If they run 10k their cost is .075.