Opportunities arise when solution providers help customers navigate the details of copier contracts.

One of the biggest managed-print-services opportunities available to solution providers comes when they encounter a customer that's coming to the end of the contract cycle for its copier fleet. Replacing that contract with one based on new multifunction products (MFPs) not only garners new hardware sales but can also establish an ongoing and predictable stream of consumables, as well as maintenance and service fees. According to industry research, 80 percent of the printers and MFPs sold today aren't bundled with these add-on services.

So how can solution providers stack the odds for having customers say goodbye to copiers and hello to a new managed-print-services relationship? One way is to focus on the exorbitant and often hidden costs lurking in traditional copier contracts.

"It's really incumbent on the reseller to understand who they are selling against and to understand what the competition is doing," says Daniel Forsch, business development manager for Hewlett-Packard's Smart Printing Services, a hardware- and consumables-replenishment program available as a contracting vehicle to solution providers.

Contract "Gotchas"

Copier competitors have long sold cost-per-page solutions that include revenue-generating gotchas that may surprise customers and offer a chance for solution providers to discuss alternatives.

To begin this process, solution providers should first point out penalty charges common in copier agreements when end user volumes are under or over contract specifications. When price-per-page plans are set at 8,000 prints per month, for example, customers will be charged twice or three times more if they produce 5,000 or 10,000 pages, which may be the result of seasonal business variations. "Customers may think they are paying only a certain amount per image, but they may be paying for pages they don't even print," Forsch says. "Secondly, because the payment is going to vary widely from month to month, customers don't have predictability and transparency in typical contracts."

Hidden fees for color can be another cost trap with copier contracts. Solution providers should help customers uncover the agreement's definition of a color page. For example, if the output is a page of black text with a URL highlighted in blue, some agreements charge customers the full price for color, Forsch says. Better arrangements are those that match charges to color-coverage percentages or contracts built around consumables replacements, not per-page fees, he adds.

Today's document management systems, which may create electronic files rather than hard-copy output, may also expose companies to new cost drains. Some contracts levy a standard "click" charge even when someone scans a document into the system and sends it to a folder on the network, never producing a printed page. Forsch says.

Finally, solution providers can take advantage of the substantial price differences between $10,000-$12,000 copiers and MFPs costing $4,000 or $5,000. Noting that all leasing arrangements amortize hardware costs over the life of the contract, Forsch says, "Customers need to realize that somewhere in their copier contracts they are paying for that more-expensive device."

Additional resources

For more details about HP's Smart Printing Services program and for additional sales strategies, see http://hp.com/go/ipgpartnerexpressway.