Another Swipe at Salespeople From the IT World: Telecom Sales People Are Funny

Sales Stories are standard conversation pieces at watering holes all over the world - always have been, always will be.

How often have we sales people made fun of "idiot customers" and remember that time we spilled coffee on the prospect's desk.

Or when we put that open, felt-tipped pen in our pocket, latter realizing while we were presenting, a spot of black ink expanded on our shirt, distracting the prospect and propelling our presentation into the annals of "funny sales stories".

It is interesting to see what the guy on the "other side of the table" thinks and what he thinks is funny.

Over at The Industry Standard, Johna Till Johnson, Networld World, pieced together this narrative about "...the sheer entertainment factor of the "dog and pony show" as carrier salespeople and sales engineers present their responses to the RFP..."

An excerpt:

"...The carrier obligingly scoped out a scenario, including a managed router connecting into the MPLS network, and a parallel Internet router connecting into the Internet (over a separate local loop). The carrier then added a Session Initiation Protocol trunking card to link the site PBX into one of the routers. The only problem: it plugged the PBX into the Internet router, not the MPLS one — arguing the customer needed to "keep the MPLS network available for data..."

My response - "huh?" Why is this funny? Did I miss somin?

The post is short - so go over and check it out if you like, here.

My favorite nugget is this statement, "...Carriers often invest a lot of time and energy in these presentations, typically bringing a half-dozen employees in to extol the wonders of their company..."

I have often wondered why competitors and at times, my own management, feels the need to bring an army of "presentors" to a client meeting.

Many times, it is quite comical.

Click to email me.

HP = MPS Powerhouse...in Portugal...

"HP Portugal currently holds more 50% of all contracts for Managed Print Services, and focused its strategy in large companies and leaving the market share of medium and small enterprises to their partners...operates a fleet of about 2,500 machines with 8 to 10 million printed pages per month..."

Seems they understand the difference between "operational" and "capital" costs...


Full article translated, here.

US Air Traffic Patterns

Lexmark "Lands" BASF for Managed Print Services: Wasn't BASF MIF for Lexmark?

If so, then isn't it just a "conversion"?

I stripped this off of the Business Lexington site.

BASF chooses Lexmark to optimize its print output management.

submitted by Staff - May 14, 2009 | 02:35 PM

May 13, 2009 -- Lexmark International (NYSE: LXK) today announced a multi-year global services agreement with BASF (BASF SE (ADR)). The contract, as part of a Managed Print Services initiative, will enable BASF to reduce its output costs significantly in a sustainable manner, and improve its document processes.

Following a rigorous competitive review, Lexmark was selected because of its thorough approach to total cost of ownership, its worldwide service and support capabilities and its comprehensive set of product features.

BASF is the world's leading chemical company: The Chemical Company. Its portfolio ranges from chemicals, plastics and performance products to agricultural products, fine chemicals as well as oil and gas. With its high-value products and intelligent solutions, BASF plays an important role in finding answers to global challenges such as climate protection, energy efficiency, nutrition and mobility. BASF has approximately 97,000 employees and posted sales of more than €62 billion in 2008.

Managed Print Services is a business model that allows companies to control their print infrastructure, rationalize the hardware they use, and take advantage of an ongoing service level agreement with a strategic partner to deliver continuous improvement.

Lexmark works with companies around the world to optimize and manage their print infrastructure. The printing company's 'Print Less, Save More' message resonates with large, multinational organizations who wish to reduce their paper use, improve process efficiency and reduce costs. With so much to gain from a controlled and less-costly printing infrastructure, more and more companies are turning to Lexmark to support their needs.

Photizo Group Announces MPS Program Benchmarking Study Objective evaluation designed to help dealers find best program partners

Lexington, KY – May 13, 2009 – The Photizo Group today announced the MPS Program Benchmarking Study™ to provide dealers with objective assessments of competing managed print programs offered by vendors and infrastructure providers. This helps dealers make good business choices and promotes profitable, long-term MPS relationships.

The Photizo Group specializes in analysis of the printing and imaging industry and is the market’s main source for ongoing business intelligence about the burgeoning Managed Print Services opportunity.

The Photizo Group is the thought leader for Managed Print Services, providing insight to the manufacturer, dealer / reseller, infrastructure provider, and end user communities.

“Dealers are often at the forefront of MPS engagements and relationships, and they are confronted with an increasing number and variety of program offerings. While there are a number of excellent MPS programs available from vendors, the dealer community has no clear guidance on which programs are right for them based on their specific needs. Different dealers require different programs, but until now, there have been no credible third party assessments of various approaches relative to MPS requirements. This new study provides neutral guidance to help dealers identify vendors best suited to meet the needs of their organization, based upon their stage of MPS adoption,” said Ed Crowley, Founder and Senior Partner of the Photizo Group.

The MPS Program Benchmarking Study begins with the “ideal” deliverables needed for a particular dealer given their stage of MPS adoption, and then maps vendor programs against this standard. The dealer’s stage of MPS adoption is evaluated based upon the proprietary “Hybrid Dealer Adoption Model” developed by the Photizo Group. The evaluation establishes a baseline by matching the dealer’s stage of MPS adoption against the MPS capabilities that are required based on the typical expected customer engagements. The customer needs criteria are based on the lifecycle of the MPS engagement, according to the popular MPS Adoption Cycle developed by the Photizo Group.

Program evaluation criteria include items such as infrastructure assessments, hardware break / fix service, remote device monitoring, and integrating device monitoring into a billing system. The evaluations for each item are positioned on a sliding-scale analysis.

Then the study objectively analyzes program features and execution to determine how well a vendor’s program components as well as support activities addresses each stage. By compiling the individual factors, the study evaluates and scores each overall program relevant to the vendor’s ability to deliver the capabilities needed for that engagement.

According to Mr. Crowley, “We are providing MPS vendors with an opportunity to sponsor the study. While we require final say on all criteria and analysis, we do encourage input into the definition of the criteria for the study. We have been pleasantly surprised by the response to the study, and in fact, we have already surpassed our initial sponsorship targets. Once again, I believe we have identified a key need in the industry and stepped up with a unique solution.”

Other sponsor benefits include:

· The complete report (150-200 pages) detailing results for all vendors

· Nominating customers for validation

· Special pricing for reprints

The report will be available for purchase by dealers in late July. For more information about the upcoming MPS Program Benchmarking Study and sponsorships, contact Photizo at (859) 873-4518 or info@managed-print-services.com.

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