Reading on an iPad, Kindle or good ole Paper: Which is faster?

7/2010 

A study has been conducted: What's better to read on, an electronic device or paper?

"Summary:

... people reading long-form text on tablets find higher reading speeds than in the past, but they're still slower than reading print..."

Uh oh...maybe Print Isn't Dead, yet...

This study looked at 32 participants, each reading an article that on average required 17 minutes, 20 seconds to read - a Hemingway short.

The media included an iPad, Kindle, PC monitor, and a printed book.

I have cut and pasted right out of the article by, Jakob Nielsen.

"Results: Books Faster Than Tablets

The iPad measured at 6.2% lower reading speed than the printed book, whereas the Kindle measured at 10.7% slower than print. However, the difference between the two devices was not statistically significant because of the data's fairly high variability.

Thus, the only fair conclusion is that we can't say for sure which device offers the fastest reading speed. In any case, the difference would be so small that it wouldn't be a reason to buy one over the other.

But we can say that tablets still haven't beaten the printed book: the difference between Kindle and the book was significant at the p<.01 level, and the difference between iPad and the book was marginally significant at p=.06.

User Satisfaction: iPad Loved, PCs Hated After using each device, we asked users to rate their satisfaction on a 1–7 scale, with 7 being the best score. iPad, Kindle, and the printed book all scored fairly high at 5.8, 5.7, and 5.6, respectively. The PC, however, scored an abysmal 3.6. Most of the users' free-form comments were predictable.

For example, they disliked that the iPad was so heavy and that the Kindle featured less-crisp gray-on-gray letters. People also disliked the lack of true pagination and preferred the way the iPad (actually, the iBook app) indicated the amount of text left in a chapter. Less predictable comments: Users felt that reading the printed book was more relaxing than using electronic devices. And they felt uncomfortable with the PC because it reminded them of work.

This study is promising for the future of e-readers and tablet computers.

We can expect higher-quality screens in the future, as indicated by the recent release of the iPhone 4 with a 326 dpi display. But even the current generation is almost as good as print in formal performance metrics — and actually scores slightly higher in user satisfaction..."

See the study here.

Click to email me.

Toner For Tablets - March, 2012 "The New #iPad Will Kill Printed Documents"

Originally posted, March 4, 2012

"One of the iPad's biggest competitors has been paper," said Nick Bilton, a tech columnist at The New York Times, "and now this is better than paper."

So many books and so little printing-

I was somewhat dismayed to learn Britannica is no longer going to print its encyclopedia.

I was a bit vexed when I read that printed,  pulp-erotica isn't as hot as it once was.

My confusion cleared upon discovering the hottest thing on  E*Readers is ladies' romance/erotica - women and their dirty little Nook's. This makes perfect sense; nobody can tell what you're reading while sucking a caramel macchiato, head down on a Kindle.  Poor Fabio.

Even Conde Nest is moving out of print and into the online subscription business.

013 - We Are #MSFT's Worst Nightmare

First published, 1/9/13 on Walters & Shutwell. Softly edited, May, 2024.

The War is Over: WinTel is dying. How do I know? The growing pile of HP technology in the corner of our room tells me so.

Don't get me wrong - I am not a Cult of the Mac, graphic designer types. The last Apple computer my family owned was an IIe back in 1980.   My father, the teacher, got a massive teacher discount.  I barely touched the thing.

I grew up on DOS 2.0-4.0(the one with the square mouse pointer) my first job was with an Inacomp selling B2B, computerized accounting systems.

In addition to Great Plains,  I sold the difference between "IBM-DOS" and "MS-DOS". We despised MACs for their ease of use and lack of business applications.

I sold IBM PS/2' with OS/2. I was there from the beginning of the War. I was there when IBM, like Cleopatra on her barge, left the field of battle open to the clones and Steve Jobs.

A couple decades later, I was a Crackberry advocate and 'droid proponent.

I sold HP9065(Konica) copiers to IT directors back in the day because they loved that little blue logo. My managed print services practice was built around the Edgeline (cold sweat at night) - again, IT loved the logo.

So, yeah - I drank the Koolade for decades.

A few days ago, we brought into the office an iMAC. We use it with multiple iPads, a 2-month-old Mac Book Pro, an older iMac, iPad Mini  and iPod Touches.  

In the corner of the room sits an HP InkJet printer next to a half-empty box of A4 paper. The case is at least five years old and still contains a few original reams.

We don't print much.

On top of the printer is what I call, "the world's largest laptop, in the world" - some HP huge contraption that I am sure was great in its time but has also been downgraded to kid duty.

There is a Compaq/HP laptop stashed somewhere and soon to join the "pile of HP" is my last PC, ever. A very nice, HP, steel thing-a-ma-bob with so many .tmp files loaded on it, I should just take it into the woods and shoot it out of its misery.

But I won't. I need it for the picture.

We didn't wait for DOS 8.0 because we knew it was going to be a dog.

We didn't wait for all the new tablets, Droid or otherwise, because we knew they would never, ever be an iPad with the Retina display.

We didn't run out and grab the latest E-reader either  - who wants a reader when you can get an iPad mini? Who?

Not many.

Conversely, corporate America did wait. But by the time they saw what they waited for, the Kool-aid had lost its sweetness.  DOS 8.0 won't save anyone, it will remain planted in the past - #MSFT's last attempt has fallen short.  Xbox to the rescue?

Our house is now a house of Mac.

No patches, no blue screen of death, no drivers, no long boot times, and no eye fatigue.

For me, it wasn't how good my eyes felt the second I started using the iPad, that convinced me of MSFT and the PC's death.

It wasn't the zillions of cool, available, and affordable productivity apps or the fact that all my contacts and music are sharable without the headache that tipped the scales.

Just because my computer is now a pleasure to work with, easy to understand, and powerful enough for NASA, I could still see an HP or Dell somewhere in the future. In a public library or someplace.

The convenience, ease of use, and increased productivity of the Mac hadn't convinced me totally of The Fall.

The thing that clinched it, the one observation that pulled it all together, that last nail in the coffin was a little device that fits in the palm of my hand.

A technological marvel.

Like the penny in Somewhere in Time - Apple's Magic Mouse snapped every second from 1980 into the present. Boom, here it was, full circle.

The last item MSFT will see as it fades to black is the first object that set Apple apart:

The Apple (Magic) Mouse.

"Alas poor #MFST, we knew you well..."

"Dear Steve, I've never owned a Mac, or an iPhone and I don't have an iPad..."

I don't even know you, but you seem to know a great deal about me.

So Steve, thank you for my Droid X.

Thanks for forcing Microsoft to integrate a mouse, even if it was on DOS 4.0.

Thank you for getting IBM to utilize 'preemptive multi-threading in OS/2 even though it was a doomed OS.

Thanks for pushing the 3.5" floppy.  Thanks for letting all the peripherals that attach to the Lisa automatically connect.

Thanks for AppleTalk.

Thank you for seeing I really only wanted three or four songs from an album.

Thank you for disrupting the music industry - giving us Lady Gaga and incredible, mind-blowing live shows. (figure it out)

Thanks for recognizing a dwindling need and not allowing the iPad to print.

You beat the PS/2 and helped IBM find a new way.  

You destroyed the music industry and helped them find a new way, giving us immediate access to the music and artists we, the people, wanted to hear, at 99 cents a pop.

Sony, because of you, experienced the stink of defeat, the folly of internal business silo and they found a new way.

#AppL & #IBM: Keep Em Separated?

8/2014

"...IBM and Apple sittin in a tree...K-I-S-S-I-N-G...first comes love, then comes marriage, then little Siri-Watson in a baby carriage..."

The last #APPLE announcement was revealing in terms of technology because of the A7 chipset and the deal with Beats.  The upcoming #APPL announcement this September , has much in store, here are just a few:

1. New iPHONE 6
2. The A8
3. New wearable(s)
4. Yosemite 
5. IBM

iPhone 6
By now, we know the new iphone is always awesome. This time, the new phone will set extend Apple's lead in the market, all others will begin to look old-fashioned.  The timing is right for upgrades but some who bought the 5 last year will be slamming phones on Ebay looking to replace with a 6.

Why?  The new processor.

Y O S E M I T E

The buzz and anticipation around the op-sys roll out would be enough of an accomplishment for any major, technology company.  Imagine how happy #MSFT and all those Windows users would be if their OS were 50% of what Apple brings.  Yosemite is going to set the bar so high, others will get nosebleeds contemplating the dire situation.

Why?

Yosemite will blow the doors off of every other operating system - EVER.

I've seen things - the square mouse that was DOS 4.0, the smooth, out of this world, not ready for prime-time, pre-emptive multitasking OS/2 from IBM and the shear marketing and social goliath called Windows 3.0(1).

When I look at all the Mac OS/X, the actual operational tasks melt into the background - which is exactly what you and I want.  Thoughtless operation.  Support me, no matter how many applications I open.  Don't make me learn about .TMP files and wait 20 minutes for my machine to start up.

Why in  the world do any of us know what the phrase, "blue screen of death" pertains too?  Why should I know this?

I want to be able to share my current app on my MacBookPro, iPad and iPhone automatically -handing off to each device as needed. Impossible? No. El Capitan? Yes.

I want to answer my phone on my MBPro - madness? Half Dome? Yes.

You know what else, I'd like the same op-sys on all my devices...jus saying.  Craziness? Well, yes and coming.

The transparency between apps and platforms, dare I say the "non-fragmented", congruent approach of Yosemite is one of the biggest shifts in technology, ever.  As with most Apple products, the device or operating system does not try to dictate our personal workflow - it pairs up and works with me.

Why do I need to tell Windows I don't want to upgrade in the middle of every Powerpoint presentation?

WeAReAbLeS

Healthkit, iWatch, whatever...love them or hate them, #Apple is about to crack the seal on the atrocious healthcare system.

How about I get to keep all my health records, secured in my iPhone?  And how about instead of going in for tests, or scans, my watch is monitoring all that 7x24, data ready to be shared when I want with whomever I want?

Yeah, that's coming.

GUESS Who's Coming to Dinner? IBM.

The very first rivalry in the personal technology realm was between IBM and Apple - it was more  of a feud, really.  If you wanted to add up numbers and create DBII applications(what?!!), you owned a PC.  A 'clone' if you couldn't afford an IBM Model 70.  On the other hand, if you considered yourself 'artsy' or academic, a MAC was your status symbol.

Back then, it seem the two would never meet.

It's different now.

The last two powerhouses standing are getting together; soon the accounting firms,  engineering companies and manufactures will all be sporting "iSomethings".  CRM's,  materials planners and project managers will be flicking charts all over the place, from iPAD to AppleTV, to the iMACs in accounting.

This is transactional communications transforming into BI - is a another vista, waiting out there for everyone.  But that is for another set of blogs.

Wow.

iPad-Head-Girl and Cosmo for Men

There is something here - a bit creepy, and yet..alluring.

It's a marketing stunt promoting the new iPad App for "Cosmo For Men" - Cosmopolitan for men.

Sometimes irony needs to hit you right in the middle of the forehead - but do you see it here? Or should I get the "2x4 of Awareness"?

It's an advertisement, on iPads, for an app, for what used to be, and still is, a print magazine...!

Full, flippin, circle.

And don't get me started on the more than apparent 'stealth' application...

"I love you, Miss. Robot..."

Mobility Print is Dogma. DOTC calling it. No. No way. Nope.

11/2011

The final gasps of a dying niche - print/clicks/marks on paper.

Mobility Print, means I can print from my Droid or TouchPad from almost anywhere.  But, for me, the numbers are not all that impressive:

Print a hard copy in a hotel? Sure, 12 pages a year.

Print my airline tickets? Sure 52 pages a year.

My mother printing my aunt's recipe for stuffed turkey? Sure, 11 pages a year.

Print a map? Okay, another 13 clicks.

That's 87 pages. In a year. At 12 cents/image, we're talking about a buck a year.

Print People Magazine at home? Nope.

Download a .PDF from Scientific American, for 99 cents? Possibly.

Applying this to the B2B world, when Alaska Air issued each pilot an iPad, they replaced every, single flight manual for every jet in their fleet.

Mobile print philosophy would argue that if the iPad had the capability of printing, each pilot would go home and print a manual the night before a flight.  Wha, wha, whaaaaaaaaat?

Guess who is most interested in mobile print? Go ahead, guess.

End Of Summer, End of Days - What Next?

The 23rd of September, fall equinox, was the last day of summer up here in the northern hemisphere.

The Spring Equinox seems like decades ago.  Remembering the Turn that was Summer 2011 one can barely imagine what the next 3 months will bring.

What about the next 12 months?

Unemployment is still up.

Gold is way up.  HP down.

Since 2007, that will be five years ago pretty soon, the only aspect of our world that has steadily increased is the use of technology.  Our technology has forced the growth of content faster and faster.

There isn't today and there never will be, a paperless office - Less paper, but never paperless.

The social networks carry more and more.  Netflix is chewing up bandwidth,  FB has become mundane.  Tablets shipping everywhere, $99.

The Apple store at Fashion Island was packed on a Tuesday afternoon.

Droid, Win8, HP is out, no their in, no their out, wait...we don't know, iPad 2, iPhone 5, thin client, zero client - and the cloud.

That always growing, ever changing "cloud" - Google, Salesforce, Box, on and on.

What about managed print Services(MpS) or selling copiers?  With all this cool stuff going on, you're selling copiers?

Really?

Three Ideas for Copier People Selling Managed Services

The move into managed services is well on its way and traditional copier reps are getting caught in the middle between selling boxes and selling services.  Pundits and consultants lament "copier people cannot sell managed services" unless they attend a day of specialized sales training.

It is true, I've seen plenty of managed services or IT sales destroyed by copier sales reps - from Cali to N.C. I've written about a couple of instances.

The thing is, for all the challenges and failures, the rep is not to blame. We train them to always be closing, find pain and twist, to hunt, take-down, close, trap and "increase share of wallet" - armed with this mentality, its a miracle anybody sells anything, let alone a nuanced offering like managed services.

So, as a copier rep, what can you do to secure more managed services contracts/agreements?  Should you heed your sales manager's advice and  treat help desk like a fax board?  Does your OEM offer any clues? How about a few days of off-site training followed up with a phone blitz?

"No...no...no..."

Don't Believe the Analysts, Articles or OEMs: Paper Is Not Relevant

3/16/2016

There once was a clever advertisement floating around stressing the futility of going totally paperless. The example was a world without toilet paper.   When the pro-paperless character requests toilet paper, his partner slides a tablet under the door showing a picture of a toilet paper roll.

Cute.

My response to the metaphor is a bidet; no paper is required.

The fight for paper has been raging since 2007 - around the same time, managed print services started going mainstream. Over the last few months, amid the news of Lexmark selling, Xerox diverging, HP splitting, paper plant closures, and the massive consolidation of the dealer channel, it's odd to see more blogs and articles with titles like:

"Print Lives"
"Paperless office remains a pipe dream for many"
"Why paper still rules the enterprise"

Article based on information from as far back as 2009, the year before the iPad.  Oddly enough, manufacturers of devices that scratch marks on paper, fund these studies.  That's right, the people yelling "paper matters" and "the death of print has been greatly exaggerated" are the same folks profiting off the sale of copiers and printers. Huh.

Surveys sponsored by print OEMs are receiving press coverage like:

"According to a new, independent survey of over 3,600 European employees commissioned by Epson Europe, 64% indicated they’d prefer to read reports and brochures on printed paper, citing the ability to ‘share/handout’ (53%), ‘read’ (44%) and ‘edit/annotate’ (41%) as key factors."

-IDM,  January 29, 2015

How can a study "commissioned" by one of the largest printer concerns on the planet be promoted as 'independent'?

Does one need to draw you a picture?

Everything from green printing, security, and print big data, to mobile print, is getting a spike of media attention - artificial buzz created by well-funded marketing departments.

My response to all this "paper is still relevant" talk is Bravo Sierra. Poppycock.  Horsefeathers.  Bollocks.

Bullshit.

I'm saying this to the copier sales folks, the managed print services practice managers and salespeople, the toner crews, and everyone in the trenches - listen deeply to the noise, do not ignore the propaganda, and analyze the content with a dubious eye.

Remember, your prospects DO NOT READ THESE ARTICLES.  Unfortunately, ownership and sales management are consuming this tripe like it's 1999.

Nod your head when these reports are regurgitated during your Friday evening sales meeting and smile whenever one of your colleagues exclaims with glee, "Print isn't dead."

Clients don't want to be tethered to a copier, chained to a printer, or slave to toner cartridges.

"And in your heart, you know I'm right."

The dirty little secret?

Our OEMs knew this back in 2007 and have been concocting it ever since.  Progressive manufacturers are reducing sales acquisition costs with a virtual channel; take a look at HP Instant Ink. 

Considering most of the buying process is completed without a sales relationship, and today's machines rarely require service, how relevant is a local dealership?

Now is the time to side with your prospects - sure, sell the shortsighted ones a copier or two - but keep your eye on the horizon.  Dive into all the training you can and develop your personal brand.

The wave is coming, be ready to jump.

Click to email me.

KINDLE DEVICE UNIT SALES ACCELERATE EACH MONTH IN SECOND QUARTER; NEW $189 PRICE RESULTS IN TIPPING POINT FOR GROWTH

SEATTLE-July 19, 2010-(NASDAQ: AMZN)-Millions of people are already reading on Kindles and Kindle is the #1 bestselling item on Amazon.com for two years running.

It's also the most-wished-for, most-gifted, and has the most 5-star reviews of any product on Amazon.com.

Today, Amazon.com announced that Kindle device unit sales accelerated each month in the second quarter-both on a sequential month-over-month basis and on a year-over-year basis.

"We've reached a tipping point with the new price of Kindle-the growth rate of Kindle device unit sales has tripled since we lowered the price from $259 to $189," said Jeff Bezos, Founder and CEO of Amazon.com.

"In addition, even while our hardcover sales continue to grow, the Kindle format has now overtaken the hardcover format. Amazon.com customers now purchase more Kindle books than hardcover books-astonishing when you consider that we've been selling hardcover books for 15 years, and Kindle books for 33 months."

This is What HP Should Do with TouchPad/WebOS: "Execute Order 66"

Give more TouchPads away.  And by more, I mean to give another 500,000 away.

Quickly put together a Mega-Cloud, now.  

Call it the "MacGyver Cloud"; duct tape, paperclips, hope, and a prayer - whatever it takes, string it together.  

In this cloud, give away 6-month subscriptions to the Wall Street Journal, HBR, LeopardONE, MPSInsightsPro, LuLu, TMZ, on and on.

Bundle all of it in. Free.

Hook up with Verizon and get on their network, into their stores.  Hell, buy Verizon.

Get every remaining print publisher on the phone, in a Halo room, or to the West Coast and offer up an advanced conduit to 1 million customers, through MacGyver. Negotiate for a percentage and target Amazon/Borders; the Nook and the Kindle.

Spark up the TouchPad plants.  Rationalize, re-calibrate and reorganize PSG around generations of TouchPad.  Get this new team out there selling MacGyver and giving away TouchPads through every channel.  EVERY CHANNEL.  Sell it at 99 bucks - through Walmart.

Call the second model, "TheNext" and release a Leopard print version.

Buy a f*cking advertising agency, not another technological oddity.

I'm not done yet.

Managed Print Services Was Here: Big Data Business Intelligence

From imaging to content to the cloud to Big Data to Business Intelligence to Mobile Business Intelligence.

May 2012-

We're moving from marks on paper to the clouds, all the data is moving off the paper files.

But the data is just data, unusable.

In the old days, we would 'crunch' the numbers either manually or on a spreadsheet.

Today, there is an app for that; instead of the numbers getting crunched on paper, it's being presented on a screen.

Typewriters and impact printers - are gone. Carbon paper, white-out - gone.

Add cubicles, office furniture, water coolers, uniform rental programs, IT departments, factory floors, inventory shelving, hi-los, truck docks, and pallets to that list.

Then take away the roads, parking lots, air conditioning units, and tons of paper.

And all those useless meetings. Gone like a freight train. Gone.

How so?

The answer is in the palm of your eleven-year-olds hand...

It's this new thing called Business Intelligence (BI) and BI's up-and-coming younger brother, Mobile Business Intelligence (MBI).

What is mobile business intelligence?

Here's the short version:

Mobile business intelligence is a set of tools that allows data from multiple databases to be connected, sliced and diced, and presented on your PADD, iPad, Android, or iPhone.

The data is live, sync'd, and in the cloud.

Your information is represented in pretty, colorful dots, bars, and graphs on a single pane.

For a decade the "remote" or "mobile" workforce has referred to the corporate sales team.

Executive management was still chained to the machine: Mainframe, Mini, Micro, PC, Laptop, or Notebook.

The C-levels were tied to devices because that's how they kept in touch with corporate data (JD Edwards, SAP, etc); converting that data to information and the information into intelligence.  Business intelligence is why they got paid the big bucks and the corner office with all the trappings.

Enter MBI.

Today, not only can the executives open and send emails, read magazines, and check spreadsheets they can look at live inventory levels, orders entered, web traffic, and conversions - from any spot on the planet, even at 37,000 feet.

Without teams of number-crunchers, accountants, middle managers, or MBAs.

But wait, there is so much more.

Big data. "Big" like we in the soon-to-be-defunct imagining industry have never seen.

Big as in every single page that has been generated from every single device ever sold. Big as in every single book, magazine, newspaper, blog, website, status, invoice, check, financial report, inventory sheet, delivery receipt, and email ever generated - BI taps into that and mobile BI lets me do it from the beach.

In Bali.

Don't think this only affects the imagining/copying/printing function - no, this reflects the changes in everything.

Because the growth of Big Data is not going to rely on humans entering the data - machines will talk to machines on the intake side of the process and machines will talk to machines during the data-crunch stages - ultimately presenting an intelligent and relevant representation to a person.

The human.  Yes, we're still part of the process, we've just shifted the 'grunt' work to the machines in the cloud, while we toil away on the beach.

Is Your MpS Locked In An Eight-Track World?

9/2011

"Does this look like the past?"

Did you catch the Rolodex? The ashtray? One could sell Edgeilnes outta the back of CougarVan.  LOL!

Yes, this is an advertisement for MicroSoft and the private cloud. Again with the cloud. The MpS metaphor still holds - do you see it?

Is your MpS "locked in an 8-track world" - are you simply providing toner and service, an outdated plan, from the back of a van? LOL!

There's nothing wrong with sticking with the classics, unless all you have is the classics - then, not so much.

S1/S2 are classics.

I'm not suggesting you hire a complete EDM team or bring in CISCO or even become an iPad dealer(Doh!) - just expand a bit beyond the run of the mill DCA installation - get out of the powder blue vest, shave the fu-man-chu and for god's sake, put some product in your hair - yeah, that's right, leave the love-van and get into BeMod.

BeMod software lets you get away from the box, and into the process.  Into how end users behave, how they print - what the end user prints in addition to how many of what comes out of a printer.

Not sure about getting all involved with another piece of software?  Makes sense.

Try this: run a quick report on a medium sized fleet.  Look for percentage of 11x17.  It will between 0.05% and 2% of total output.

Now look at the fleet; calculate the percentage of the fleet A3 capable?  Whatever percentage it comes out to be, can you determine the amount of money this client spent on A3 capability that they never needed?

If 50% of the devices will handle 11x17 and the percentage of actual A3 is 2% - can you see or are you stuck in the past?

See More, see Deeper.  You don't need to go out and buy any fancy software tool, that would be good, but not necessary.

Two eyes, one brain, and a spreadsheet...

BYOD Policy

Click to email me.

What Will Happen to Managed Print Services When Aliens Land on Earth?

9/2014

Long ago, before the Star Wars Generation grew old, people who discussed alien planets, time travel, robots with brains, or life created in a petri dish would be labeled as "off", "introvert", odd, strange, socially awkward, clumsy, etc.

Not today.  Today, it's not so geeky to talk about anything in the context of science fiction.

Signs -

In the 2002 movie "Signs" Mel Gibson plays a reverend who after losing his wife, rejects God and Faith.  Aliens play cat and mouse for a few days utilizing crop circles as navigation symbols.  The invasion is concentrated around these designs; Mel's family lives on a farm and has recently been a victim of other worldly graffiti.  As more and more indicators reveal themselves families begin to suspect the worse.

The movie is a tapestry of past, present, and future events all woven together leading to the ultimate ending where all the pieces fall into place; hindsight is 20/20.  Everybody saw the signs, but nobody put them all together until the very end.

With this in mind I pose this question with all seriousness and grace - in a cold and analytical manner:

Do you See The Signs?

If not, let me point out a few of the Crop Circles in our cornfield:

• Recharger: Gone
• Lay-offs: Prevalent, secular
• 3D Printing: The latest 'Adjacency' does not make marks on paper
• IBM sells off Servers - "...its the Cloud, stupid..."
• Dealers offering Coffee and Water Services - no, really, its true
• Old Content - We're telling each other the same thing again and again, expecting new results
• Self-implemented MpS engagements; fewer clients need our services
• MIF reductions - If your numbers are up, you're simply trading MIF with a competitor
• Financial: Sharp, Panasonic, Kodak, HP - if the exchange rate wobbles, look out
• Show attendance:  ITEX, Recharger, BTA; each was much bigger than they are now
• Paper plants closing: International Paper announced the closure of one of its biggest plants in 2013 - primary output was 8.5x11
• IBM sells off SDN - googlitize it
• IPad: Almost as many sold as cases of paper, just kidding, but you get the point
• E Signatures - from car loans, to insurance forms, to lease payments everybody is doing it except you
• Google sells off Motorola - patents more valuable than the hardware
• Kids these days - all Thumbs and not a newspaper to be seen
• Lawsuits - desperation; it's like hoping for a penalty when you are down 3 points, late in the game.

There Are Two Groups -

"People break down into two groups when they experience something lucky. Group number one sees it as more than luck, more than coincidence. They see it as a sign, evidence, that there is someone up there, watching out for them. Group number two sees it as just pure luck.

Just a happy turn of chance.

I'm sure the people in Group number two are looking at those fourteen lights in a very suspicious way. For them, the situation isn't fifty-fifty. Could be bad, could be good. But deep down, they feel that whatever happens, they're on their own.

And that fills them with fear. Yeah, there are those people. But there's a whole lot of people in Group number one.

When they see those fourteen lights, they're looking at a miracle. And deep down, they feel that whatever's going to happen, there will be someone there to help them. And that fills them with hope.

See what you have to ask yourself is what kind of person are you? Are you the kind that sees signs, sees miracles? Or do you believe that people just get lucky?"

Or, look at the question this way: Is it possible that there are no coincidences?"

"Swing Away, Merrill"

What signs are you ignoring?  Do you see crop circles, but blame the "kids down the street" for little late-night shenanigans?

Is it a coincidence that International Paper is shutting down paper plants, that HP refers to IPG as the "once cash cow", newspapers and magazines shift away from print, that industry show attendance dwindles, MIF falls off lease, and dealers now provide toner and coffee services, all while hardware margins shrink?

It's not so cryptic. The more difficult conundrum is figuring out which group you're in...

"Do you believe it because it's true or is it true because you believe it?"

#HP $HPQ to Cull PC's & Printers: New Company Called, "HP, Inc." - Get It?

"Ah ! well a-day ! what evil looks
Had I from old and young !
Instead of the cross, the Albatross
About my neck was hung."
--- Coleridge

In 1991 Lexmark was formed when IBM divested its printer and printer supply operations to an investment firm. On November 15, 1995, Lexmark was publicly traded .  Today the company is trading at $41.59 has a revenue around $3.7B and about 12,000 employees.  Back in the 90's, Lexmark boasted a revenue of nearly $2.0B.

IBM was in the midst of one of the greatest corporate transformations in history.  The company was in turmoil; internal leadership changes, intense competitive pressures, economic headwinds and a fractured self-image.  They didn't know who they were, what they did or how to do whatever it was they were going to do, better.
Crazy times, the 90's.

Today, another great technology firm finds herself in the throws of transformation - HP offers everything from servers, clouds, PC's, laptops, printers, supplies and services. But its not enough.  More accurately, its just too much. What IBM grew through, HP is now experiencing - you can't be everything to everyone.  If that were all, it would be bad enough, but its worse.  HP, Microsoft and the rest of the WinTel realm can no longer dictate demand. Their rule is not as relevant as in the past.

Take printers, for example.  HP brought the laser printer into the business world and for a decade or two, HP was synonymous with printing.  But in 2007, the winds of change were upon us.  No matter how much marketing tries to accentuate the shift from toner to ink, black and white to color, desktop to mobile, hard copy print will never rebound;  sinking more resources against the tide is folly.

What made HP great, is holding her back.  Print is the albatross.

Some will herald the move as great strategy - it might be - for sure, this is a responsive tact, not one that bends the market to HP's will.

Nothing, not even the company who brought the laser printer to nearly every desktop in the land, can reverse the trend.  Printing is dying.  Not because we've all decided to stop killing trees, or understand printing decreases the ozone layer or bringing on the next ice age.  HP is a victim of the shift in How We Work:

• No more desktop PCs
• No more servers
• Fewer laptops
• We do not print the same
• We communicate differently
• Fewer printers
• Almost no copiers

Today, we communicate under glass more than ever before. Generations of young adults live in a world without PC's, rotary phones, black and white TV, newspaper delivery or a printer.  Like generations before them understood life with electricity, they've never known a world without the internet.  Why in the world would they ever want or need to print anything?  Why?  Ask them.

Tablets, smart phones and new workflows, oh my.

"No one in the printing industry, or outside it, had any idea that the iPad would come along and destroy three- to four-thousand-year-old human traditions concerning paper," explained Gary Peterson, chief executive at Gap Intelligence, a San Diego-based research analysis firm.

No one except us...here.

In light of this expected turn, to all the paperless deniers, I ask this:

• If employees print 10,000 images each/year...
• If mobile print is a viable option...
• If global print volumes are rising...
• If OEMs can re-establish the relevancy of print...

then...

• Why did International Paper shutter it's biggest, 8.5x11 sized paper producing plant if print volumes are increasing?
• Why did HP layoff 40,000 employees when the second coming, mobil print or ink, is just around the corner?  Think of layoffs as The Rapture.
• Why is less than half of Xerox's revenue generated through equipment sales?
• Why would a leading copier manufacturer build an erasable copier?
• Even without printing capabilities, Apple still sold more than a dozen iPads

Denial.

"HP profits are reliant on selling "consumables" like inkjet cartridges, so the company can't be eager to see that business sidelined by the new prominence of tablets and smartphones. Even though mobile device make it easier to skip the printer in some cases, for example with electronic boarding passes and mapping apps, McCoog doesn't see printing as an endangered business.

Yeah, right.

What does this mean to all of you selling copiers and MpS?  Keep doing what you're doing, your resume clean and enhance your PERSONAL ACUMEN every day.  The change isn't coming, it is already here and you've got to improve yourself beyond the box and away from marks on paper.

Perhaps two decades from today, we'll look back and remember how HP built a great print business, sold it off and turned into the technology powerhouse Bill and Dave envisioned.


1991 -

The Death of Print, Predictably, Sooner than We Think

"Book Sellers, defend your lonely forts!" - John Updike, 2006.

Newspapers, except possibly the Wall Street Journal, are not the only organizations facing the same fate as buggy whip manufacturers.

"By the end of 2012, digital books will be 20% to 25% of unit sales, and that's on the conservative side," predicts Mike Shatzkin, chief executive of the Idea Logical Co., publishing consultants. "Add in another 25% of units sold online, and roughly half of all unit sales will be on the Internet."

In his book, "the cult of the amateur", Andrew Keen reflects on the demise of the record store - blaming the internet.

Keen pines about record stores like the Tower Records that spanned three blocks in New York's Greenwich Village or his beloved record store at the corner of Bay and Columbus in San Fransisco. How, ultimately, change came to this world of hidden imports, ad hoc concerts, U2 and Madonna sightings.

Like the music store, book stores, the brick and mortar type, are doomed.

What has all this got to do with Managed Print Services?

If you are seriously asking, leave right now, and never come back to this blog again.


A New Business Model -

This year, publishers agreed to implement an "agency model" for digitally distributed content. The publisher receives 70%, e- book sellers 30%, of the digital price.

Seems publisher can read the writing on the wall - change is a necessity for survival.

The Gorilla in the room, Apple, is poised to rule the publishing channel as it already does the music channel with iTunes.

Consider Barnes and Noble -

In mid-March, Barnes & Noble's named a new CEO.

This new CEO is a veteran of the digital world and is seen as a change agent shaking things up, hiring from e-commerce and technology companies.

His talk track includes the phrase, B&N is "as much a technology company as we are a retail company."

Change or die.

Newspapers are dying, books are changing, retail is evolving - Is it any wonder our little industry, MPS, is considered a $60 Billion market?

Consumers are demanding easier, more portable mechanisms allowing them to read/acquire information and entertainment.

These consumers not only own iPads, DROIDs and netbooks - they have jobs; they work in offices, they interface with paper every day.

How long will it be before they expect to receive the company newsletter, financials, invoices, statements, medical records, mortgage documents, kid's report cards, DMV documents, tax filings, credit card and utility bills, and the latest King novel, etc. on their iPad/Slate/Droid/Kindle?

Change is. This may be "new" to you, to me, to us. But this isn't anything we started, the fire's been burning since the world's been turning, we're just the latest to enjoy.



Click to email me.

Pascal's Triangle & The Digitization of the Office - 1/3/2014

2014

In the Beginning -

The workplace has been evolving since the beginning of time. We've moved from farms to churches to castles, to high-rise office buildings and mega-cities. As communication shifted from handwritten documents to print to electronic, so too, did the office and the way we conduct day-to-day business.

Some consider the process started sometime in the 90s - while others imagine true digitization kicked off with the advent of the IPad. 

My observations and research reveal the shift has been occurring since the late 1600s starting with a device invented and built by an 18-year-old, French kid. The mechanism performed addition, subtraction, and multiplication through the manipulation of gears and dials. The teen was helping his father calculate bigger numbers when performing French tax accounting. 

#Copier Sales People: Three Tips to Selling Managed Services

2014

It isn't that difficult...to sell managed services.  As a matter of fact, selling managed services is a lot easier than convincing a 'board of elders' to lease your new color device...with saddle stitch, no less.

First things first,  if your leadership is so wrapped up in themselves they think:

A) copiers will be around forever or
B) Managed services is akin to adding a duplexer or fax board

- keep your resume up to date.

Unless you're in some backwater market where they still lease copiers for 72 months, hardware sales are about to fall off a cliff (slight exaggeration).  Maybe your guys don't see it coming - it is already here, so the sooner you get your personal act together about services, not hardware, the better.

Just between you and I, there are hundreds of hints and tips around selling managed services.  In the end, the advice is nothing more than a shuffle of what you've already been told.

There isn't ONE training course, consultant or "MNS" expert who will mention any one of these tips:

1.  Stop being afraid

2.  Forget everything you know about hardware

3.  Ignore your quota and in some cases...Ignore your boss

Your Fears

If there's one thing I've seen from coast to coast is whenever somebody on the copier side starts to talk about Managed IT Services,  they backtrack into, "well, I need to know more about that business before I dive in..."  Horse Pucky.

Who would buy a product which openly insults?

We're taught to believe that the computer guys know so much more than we. We've got memories of feeling dumb because we called IT only to have them come up, reboot and head back.

"Reboot?  That's it????!...arrrrg..."

IT folks were strange, anti-social, and difficult to understand.  They fixed our problems and they made us feel like dummies.

Stop worrying about what you think you don't know, stop Facebooking and use the inter-web to learn about what CIOs think is important.

"You know what Mr. Prospect...every, single, copier is exactly the same..."

Yeah, we used that line all the time at IKON.  Of course, we sold almost every brand back then...

The same goes for servers, cloud, backup disaster recovery, switches, firewalls, help desk, anti-virus - your prospect does not care how many awards your hardware has earned.  They do not care how much you've invested in R/D or how long you've been in the industry.

They don't...and when your OEM rep tells you to build credibility by dropping their name, let the words go in one ear and out the other.

Tell your prospect how your stuff solves problems.  Printers, copiers, luxury submersibles and can openers solve problems.  If you can find a problem duplexing solves, I'm sure you can find an issue BDR(googlitize it) addresses.

Stop Selling and Start Solving.

Ignore Your Boss  - "On the 1st of the Month we Sell Solutions. On the 20th, we push boxes..." 

Careful here.

If I had a dime for every sales manager I've met, that wasn't worth a dime, I'd have a lot of dimes - a March of Dimes, actually.  I'm not saying ALL sales managers are worthless...and I know YOUR manager is Fortune 100 material.  I am not recommending you blatantly mock your boss - not overtly - just understand his perspective.

Here's the deal, typical sales managers are compensated on the team's hardware sales and most dealerships are driven to quota by their OEM - it is the way of things.

When you hear your manager say things like, "Everybody better start learning MNS, because these copiers aren't going to be around for long...""its a numbers game, kid..." or "you can't sign deals on the phone..." or "...why don't you get a new car/suit/wife/credit card/house..." take it with a grain of salt.

Don't get me wrong, if this style matches your core values, stop reading and get back to those 100 dials, 10 contacts, 1 appointment - there's a church out there dying to buy a copier!

Otherwise, let's talk about you.

I've always said and felt that pure managed print services has little to do devices and nothing related to logo's - its a service, not a cartridge or machine.  Managed services is an extension of the same ideal, its a service not a server or firewall.

Most managers do not understand this because they are not compensated for services.  Indeed, some ignore services all together figuring that's "the service department's responsibility" - point, missed.

I know you didn't grow up wanting to be a copier rep - NOBODY DOES.  I understand how difficult it can be describing what you do to your parents - been there, done that, got the therapy to prove it.

And here we are, in the heart of the jungle...

Do anything to improve yourself every, single day.  Polish up on your knowledge of the Cloud, nod during your next sales training session, and then go buy my book.  Write in the margins, read it from your iPad on the bus ride home...(?).  Cut and paste passages into emails and Tweets - put the cover on your desktop.

Cloud stuff here.

tDOTC Managed Print Services PowerPlayer of the Week, Month or Year...

It's not the upper right quadrant.

Nor is it a distinction hashed out between the twelve members of the MPS StarChamber.(if there were such a thing, which there isn't)

Nobody mentioned will advertise on DOTC. No PowerPlayer will sponsor studies with DOTC.

It is an idea born out of cool contemplation; Sunday morning reflection.

The recipients will by be of my choosing - my judgement alone, my opinion, my calculations, and my view of how they either determine or voyage along, the MPS Path.

Good or Bad, Positive or Negative, a DOTC PowerPlayer may effect for good, or impact from evil.

I'll call em out, and serve em up - with Sprinkles.

This week - Robert Newry, co-Founder at newField IT.