State of the Industry

In describing the possibilities offered by artificial intelligence (AI) in a business context, there’s a knee-jerk temptation to go full-bore hyperbole. But it’s tough to keep the impulse in check when research firms such as McKinsey and Company say AI “has the potential to be as Read More

What’s the motivation to be an active player among dealers seeking to grow through mergers and acquisitions (M&A)? Let’s kick around some of the more obvious reasons: Is it the desire to scale to a certain revenue or profit level? Is it a quest to expand the geographic Read More

Imagine the following scenario. A prospective client from the health care space is visiting your dealership to learn more about the company, find out how it ticks and decide if you’re worthy of their business. They want to know how you treat your employees, see how engaged they Read More

It’s the dawn of a new era in the office technology ecosystem. The reset button has been pushed. What’s old is new (including the U.S. president), and what’s new is incredibly exciting (see intelligence, artificial). It might be said that both are absolute disruptors that will Read More

Former Microsoft tech evangelist and noted blogger Robert Scoble once observed, “Change is inevitable, and the disruption it causes often brings both inconvenience and opportunity.” Change has long divided people into two categories: agents (opportunists) and victims (the Read More

Perhaps the last thing an account rep wants to hear from a VP is the idea that the MFP isn’t the center of their dealership’s universe. Sales reps know how to sell them because they’ve been seemingly hawking them forever. The profit margin’s good, as are the residuals. Three- and Read More

Office technology dealers are finding it more expensive to cover payroll, but that’s hardly a stop-the-presses narrative. It’s a development that has touched every business segment. As if sourcing workers wasn’t difficult enough, the bottom floor of wages continues to escalate. Read More

While they have commonalities, such as productivity and ROI, there’s an interesting contrast between the worlds of MFPs and production print hardware. The former embraces the world of down-and-dirty printing where the information/data is the priority. In the other corner stands Read More

We generally view ancillary products as those being outside the main technology core, likely supplemental and less expensive, and possibly having a direct correlation to a cornerstone offering. Quite often they’re used as an enticement to convince clients to sign off on a much Read More

Any conversation about printing in the United States has to begin with Benjamin Franklin, the Founding Father who was so ridiculously profitable as a print shop proprietor that he was able to retire at the age of 42. Nothing screams success quite like spending your new-found free Read More

How would you like to pay? As consumers, it’s a message we’re bombarded with on a daily basis. The ways and means of completing a transaction have billowed to the point where cash has almost become the red-headed stepchild. We couldn’t possibly have envisioned a day when a phone Read More

Welcome to today’s trivia question. Here we go, gentle readers: what is the primary value proposition of the modern managed IT provider? Since I cannot hear you from where I sit, let’s workshop this subject and see if we can boil it down to a single talking point. Is it a Read More

For a dealer account representative, building an impressive (and lucrative) deal that only begins with an MFP is like organizing a parade. Think of the most impressive one you’ve attended and all the elements that combined to make for an epic experience. Consider the coordination Read More

One of the great attributes of the office technology dealer ecosystem is its resiliency. The reason many of these companies have been in business for decades (100-plus years in some extreme cases) is their willingness to recognize that technologies change and evolve. If your firm Read More

It’s been quite a while since the phrase “optimistic” was applied to a coming year’s business outlook, at least without the qualifier “cautiously.” Without giving into hyperbole, one can almost hear the office technology dealership humming the song “Feeling Good.” After three Read More