What MSPs Can Learn About Sales From Copier/Printer Companies

By Pedro Pereira 1

If there’s one thing copier dealers have perfected, it is the art of selling, and if there’s one thing MSPs struggle with, it is how to sell their services.

Charging a recurring fee for services, as opposed to invoicing for repairs and implementations, requires sales reps and their companies’ owners to approach the business differently. MSPs, especially those with a background in the break/fix world, have had to figure this out along the way, sometimes through painful trial and error. For copier dealers, however, the recurring revenue model is a way of life because their businesses have always depended on recurring fees.

“They created the concept of recurring revenue,” says Mike Cullen, vice president of worldwide sales and business strategy at managed services vendor SolarWinds N-able. “They understand recurring revenue better than anyone else in the industry.”

And that’s one of the main reasons SolarWinds N-able over the years has targeted copier dealers to recruit as partners. Copier dealers have been a key component in the vendor’s efforts to broaden its reach; it’s a strategy Cullen says continues to pay off. From a broader perspective, N-able’s experience with providers of printers, copiers and imaging services illustrates the potential of managed services to create new business opportunities for different types of providers, be they copier dealers, telecom agents or IT channel companies.

Cullen has first-hand experience in the copier/printer world, having worked as vice president of sales for IKON Office Solutions before joining N-able. He says the migration to managed services for copier dealers is a natural progression. “They have great sales people, and they’ve got very firm and dynamic sales models. They invest in the sales model as part of their go-to-market strategy.”

Copier companies, he says, have large, formalized solution-oriented sales departments with dedicated sales reps. On the IT side, the approach to sales often is quite different. “You find thousands of IT companies without dedicated sales reps.”

IT service companies typically are founded by technical people. They prefer to focus on the technical aspects, and many would be the first to admit sales and marketing doesn’t come naturally to them. This can prove a detriment to growth, and if weren’t for word of mouth, a good number of IT channel companies would never expand beyond their first handful of clients.

Technical Help

Their sales prowess notwithstanding, copier dealers lack the technical know-how of their IT counterparts. Converting them to MSPs requires guidance. “We’ve always done a lot of hand-holding,” says Cullen. “That’s what separates us from our competitors. We’re totally committed to the success of our partners.”

SolarWinds N-able has developed a comprehensive suite of resources to help with the conversion. The vendor helps its recruits set up technical support services, provides them with staffing plans, facilitates partnerships to fill gaps in their offerings, and offers guidance on how to price services according to market conditions. “We have to help them cross the chasm to become MSPs,” Cullen says.

It’s not that copier dealers are ignorant of all things technical, Cullen points out. They know how to connect devices to the network but need assistance in areas such as how to set up, staff and operate a helpdesk. They can handle Tier 1 technical support and all communications to the customer, but they may need a partner to handle Tier 2 and 3 support, he says.

When SolarWinds N-able approaches copier dealers as potential recruits, typically they are already thinking about a transition to managed services, Cullen says. That’s because the market for copiers, printers and multifunction devices is on the decline, with online applications and mobility increasingly replacing paper. The dealers know they have to diversify or face extinction.

For them, managed services are a perfect fit. MarketsandMarkets predicts managed services will expand at a 12.5 percent yearly clip through 2019, giving MSPs plenty of opportunity to grow. That’s the kind of opportunity that copier dealers need.

Pedro Pereira is Massachusetts-based freelance writer with two decades of experience covering and analyzing the IT channel and technology. He can be reached at [email protected].