Today's infrastructure monitors reduce the cost and complexity of documenting customer implementations and usage patterns
Solution providers that work to “right size” printing and imaging infrastructures for their customers understand the importance of assessments to analyze individual needs and resources.
Accurate assessments require two steps: The first requires analysts to physically view customer workflows (see “Hands-On Assessments Remain Essential”).
But just as important is a comprehensive accounting of all the installed devices and their rated capabilities. The results often shock clients. “Customers just don’t know what they have,” says Richard Piper, CEO of FMAudit, a vendor of assessment tools. “Our rule of thumb is 3 to1: If a customer says it has 100 printing assets, we assume it really has 300 or more.”
Poor estimates come from large numbers of single-user printers, unauthorized purchases, and inaccurate recordkeeping. Fortunately, a number of tools for assessing printing and imaging resources are available and many offer newly updated features to help solution providers more effectively sell hardware and services.
Printing and imaging OEMs offer comprehensive tool suites that perform assessments and aid in managing printing resources. Xerox’s CentreWare provides Web-based reporting on cross-vendor networked printers and multifunction products (MFP) running throughout an organization. Solution providers that sell service contracts can use the tool to configure hardware, perform diagnostics, monitor usage and balance workloads to keep individual devices from being over- or underused.
Expanded assessment capabilities in the latest version of Hewlett-Packard’s WebJet Admin simplify gathering data about multi-vendor printers and MFPs. WebJet Admin also provides a wide range of diagnostics and management tools. A new report generation plug-in in the new version aids solution providers in analyzing user- and application-level assessment data.
Third-party tool vendors offer their own assessment technologies. FM Audit sells three tools based on a common data-collection engine that locates printers by their IP (Internet Protocol) addresses and then records serial number, manufacturer, model and usage information. The newest offering is WebAudit, a browser-based meter collection tool that solution providers can run remotely to track usage for service-contract customers. Because WebAudit connects via the Web, solution providers don’t need to install any software at a customer’s site. The product complements two other assessment tools: the Viewer USB, a USB “thumb drive” primarily for pre-sales assessments, and On Site, software installed on a customer workstation for post-sales and fleet-management insights.
PrintFleet Inc. also markets a variety of assessment tools, including PrintFleet Auditor, which aggregates information from printers and MFPs to create a snapshot of resources and monitor usage patterns over time. PrintFleet Asset Tracker helps solution providers manage device inventory information by department, serial number, location, and other criteria.
In addition to collecting raw data about printing and imaging technology, solution providers can team these tools with reporting software to develop total cost of ownership analyses and other valuable selling aids.
Capella Technology’s MegaTrack Job Accounting Monitor records printing and imaging costs and helps solution providers optimize asset utilization and deployment to reduce hardware, training and support expenses.
DocuAudit International’s Proposal Wizard software maintains a database of printer purchase and supply costs. The software can create reports to augment proposals to customers showing cost comparisons of existing versus proposed printer implementations.
Detailed usage data and in-depth cost analyses provide compelling documentation for solution providers selling new contracts. “We can go to a customer and say, ‘This printer at this age is costing you so much per page,’” says Dave Brownlee of CamCorpUSA, a Lakeland, Mich., solution provider. “And then say, ‘Take a look at this area. These are the reasons why you should consider making a change.’”
|
