The Greatest Opportunity Ever Sold

After two years of slight increases in copier placements and images, the industry will again enter a period of decline, albeit at a rate much slower than we experienced in 2008/2009. Many industry players have dipped their toe in the waters of MPS but there is still significant opportunity for the channel to adopt a more aggressive approach to gaining share in MPS. Think about this, the revenue from service and supplies of office printers represents five times the revenue of service and supplies of segments II through V copiers. So if a company had the same market share in MPS as they do in the office copier space their MPS revenue would be five times their copier revenue. I can count on one hand the copier dealers I know of that are on an MPS revenue trajectory that will eclipse their “copier” revenue, yet 5X would represent parity in market share! So we continue to view MPS as the greatest opportunity for revenue and gross margin gains in the industry. This gigantic revenue opportunity will continue to be a growth area for Strategy Development as companies look for transformation experts with a proven track record to help them get their fair share.

Tom Callinan

To support our MPS consulting we’ve redesigned our MPS sales training and added an advanced track to our rebranded Fundamentals of MPS Sales Workshop. We have added a director of learning and development to the Strategy Development team to lead our training efforts. We’ve also added a highly acclaimed Selling With Success program for the sales professional to complement our MPS and Sales Management educational experiences. We will now offer our training programs onsite for larger dealers as well as through the BTA. We compliment our sales training with Service Management University, Business Planning—a comprehensive program for the senior team, and a portfolio of webinar based training in sales and service operations.

Since November of 2010 we have researched the MNS space. In July, 2011 we had our first engagement with a large dealer to launch MNS and we are rolling out a comprehensive consulting and training program in February of 2011. MPS is still the greatest opportunity for the copier dealer and it is critical that a company gain competence and market share in that space before entering adjacent markets like MNS. Nevertheless, there is a demand for MNS from larger dealers and early adapters of MPS and we positioned ourselves to be the premier consulting firm in the MNS space. We are excited to again be able to help the dealer community capture new revenue and profits.

Finally, our goal is to form a new industry peer group in the second quarter of 2012. We are not looking to compete with any of the current peer groups but we believe we can offer a large benefit to those dealers that are “locked-out” of the current portfolio of groups because of competitive issues, and more important we can offer a different perspective and experience for members. Strategy Development’s core competency is helping companies improve their operational results, or as we say “taking it beyond the model.” We want to help a group of progressive and like minded dealers take their business beyond the model. Look for more on that in March.

Scott Cullen
About the Author
Scott Cullen has been writing about the office technology industry since 1986. He can be reached at scott_cullen@verizon.net.