Managed Print Services Practices Managers: Are You Selling MPS Internally ? - Over and Over again.

"She not here, she got married..."

"Married?"

"She at the church, she got married to Oily bo-hunk..."

"Married?"

"Married!, sheesh..."

I guess I shouldn't be surprised. I mean, when it gets right down to it, selling managed print services is not that much different from selling any service. It is just that the people doing the selling are different.

For now.

The message for MPS, MSP, and Help desk services sales is no different than selling Fax servers, scanning, email, accounting systems, or luxury submersibles.

There is a pattern, a rhythm, and a cadence for the approach, presentation, and engagement, we know this.

But what about selling internally?

Sure, selling a 1,500 device, Stage 1,2, & 3, a national account is tricky. But it's nothing compared to your talk track around your own coffee machine.

How do you convince YOUR help desk people?  How do YOUR bench techs respond to MPS?  And what about your BDM's?. Don't forget upper and executive management.

My one word?  Redundancy.

Yes, over and over - your talk track remains on message. 

Even when you Talk the Talk every, single, day, as soon as your principals read an introductory Managed Print Services article or hear one of their colleagues mention MPS, no doubt, they will recommend you talk to them or read the such-n-such article. 

Never mind the fact that you've been published more times than they have and have been talking about MPS for 4 years...anyway.

As the MPS Champion, we get to tell them again and again, even though, at times, it seems Lost in Translation.

We get to re-explain:

1. Or repeatable revenue, that varies each month and is not 'per device'.
2. the 'meter reads' as a process?
3. the difference between "1 hour response, 4 hour onsite" vs. "Time and Materials" vs. "Warranty" work
4. how it is that if your technician is on the bench, he isn't costing as much a technician tied to T/M.
5. Technician specialization without tiers.(1,2,3)
6. One call, close-rate.
7. Ink, toner, and parts inventory,

Get used to saying:

1. "...cost per image, we bill every month for the number of images our clients' output..." 
2. '...yes...our margins will be around 42-49%..."
3. " ...when we provide hardware, yes, we can lease the equipment..."
4. "...my service calls, MPS calls, do not get trip fees..."
5. "...our SLA's are real, 1-hour response, next day onsite..."
6. "...yes, that's right, we need to get meter reads, every month..."
7. "...no, I'm serious. Our techs have parts with them...we call that "trunk...stock..."
8. "...no, really, your prospects have heard about MPS..."

- and then repeat it again.

Sometimes, during that first client interview, (when everything is possible) I go back to the first MPS article I published: "Culture Does Matter".  In that narrative, I reflected on how MPS affects more than invoices and costs.  How my client's employees will be touched every, single day by MPS. 

This is a significant change.  And people hate change.

So too is it changed for the provider, the MSP or dealer.  MPS will work or be ground into the dust of bad memories by corporate culture.

As the MPS Champion, it is our responsibility to sell, sell often, and sell internally.

That's right 'evangelize the MPS Possibilities.'

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