Just what exactly does it mean to serve a vertical market? It feels like we’ve had this conversation before, no? Maybe it seems that way, because one can swap out “vertical market” and exchange it for “managed service provider” or “managed IT services.” We hear the words in our ears, yet the vision and execution on the part of five individual providers can look quite different from one another.
Imagine we’re all in the business of selling kitchen appliances. We agree on what a refrigerator, stove or dishwasher looks like. Sure, the capabilities have their variances, and even the humble fridge is now falling into the grasp of artificial intelligence. But the roster of kitchen appliances has remained fairly static during the last 50 years.
Perhaps this is the tipoff—what was once accepted as the norm of a sector’s given providers is constantly changing. And the round peg that is the MFP does not easily fall into the round holes that are the health care, legal, education or manufacturing spaces. Software, configurations, programs and even applications help to connect part A into slot B, like a household appliance needs a water line, plumbing or electrical upgrades to function within your kitchen’s “workflow.”
It takes more than a dazzling account rep to dance his/her way across multiple vertical markets, all the while filling that pipeline with opportunities. It takes solutions and subject-matter experts, and a crew of committed employees on the front and back end. It requires the oft-overlooked skill of listening to the customer’s pain points and identifying potential entry points to provide those solutions. How committed a dealer is to serving a given vertical will go a long way toward winning jobs from competitors who offer that “me, too” competence without a firm understanding of a vertical’s challenges, not to mention a bit of foresight to envision how those needs will evolve moving forward.
Desired States
Brad Yocum,
Funcion4
Function4, based in Houston with offices in Texas, Louisiana and Oklahoma, takes the approach of focusing on processes that customers want to improve, then working backwards to discover what applications will best suit their needs. According to Brad Yocum, market director, the conversations are less about products, and heavy on current challenges and the client’s desired future state.
Historically, Function4 has been proficient in legal, financial and manufacturing, and in recent years the dealer has dedicated resources toward health care and education. On the medical end, Function4 brought on a specialist with a financial and auditing background and trained him to garner certifications in HIPAA and information security. Having that compliance and regulatory competence has enabled the hire to better understand the challenges medical organizations face and align them with the requisite solutions.
They’re pretty flexible, and we do a lot of the customization ourselves with the developers and IT analysts here at Function4.
Brad Yocum, Funcion4
Among the vertical-specific solutions, Function4 has found much success with apps for the educational space, including StratoQ, which runs on the Sharp Open System Architecture platform as an embedded app on the MFP. “Their connectors include integration with Google, and have the ability to have server-less printing built into the machines,” Yocum said. “They’re pretty flexible, and we do a lot of the customization ourselves with the developers and IT analysts here at Function4.”
Function4 configures apps that come with the Sharp, HP or Konica Minolta MFPs to customize them to the customer’s specific needs. For process improvement, Yocum notes that M-Files has been a backbone of information management and business process-improvement software. It is customizable for a variety of verticals, including financial, legal and manufacturing.
Subject-Matter Experts
Kelley Imaging Systems of Seattle has a balanced portfolio of vertically positioned clients, including health care and legal, and has recently enjoyed some major takedowns in the architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) market. The dealership has wrapped source matter experts around all of its key verticals to support its account representatives, and also has a team of in-house developers who work with various software packages, according to Brian Woodman, vice president of sales.
“Every door we walk through, we come across clients who work in line-of-business applications,” Woodman said. “A lot of these people are dealing with menial tasks, and we utilize our skill sets to integrate line-of-business applications with different types of software, so that they don’t have to leverage their internal labor component.”
The dealer recently enjoyed a $1.7 million takedown, a two-year process that saw Kelley pitted against artificial intelligence for the final nod. It’s a high-level, high-volume invoicing application that requires a great deal of line-by-line data extraction in an environment where 30 million invoices a year are being processed. Woodman said Kelley’s competency level and ability to get the client exactly what it wanted won the transaction.
Accounts payable automation is one of the dealer’s specialties, helping clients monitor how to get data into the AP platform and go through their approval process electronically. On the health care side, Kelley has enjoyed success with Epic EMR (electronic medical records). Kelley heled to develop an integration with RightFax to enable the platforms to work in concert.
“We have a lot of different hospitals that we support nationwide because of that level of expertise—we are the ones developing it and getting it to work,” Woodman noted. “Clients get the answers quicker when they work directly with us versus going through a 1-800 tiered approach through a manufacturer directly.”
Finding Gaps
At the beginning of the year, Kelley merged with CORE Business Services, a managed IT specialist based in Medford, OR. CORE counts health care as its largest vertical client base, so many of the conversations it has with clients are based around HIPAA compliance and security.
Scott.Anderson,
CORE
“When we walk into practices, there are a lot of gaps from encryption of mobile services to security protocol from a process procedure standpoint,” noted Scott Anderson, president of CORE. “We take an approach of having subject-matter experts with health care practice experience. One of our account managers used to be a practice administrator, which helps in consulting with our clients. Another was the IT manager of a large health care clinic. That level of expertise on staff really enables us to better serve these clients.”
When we walk into practices, there are a lot of gaps from encryption of mobile services to security protocol from a process procedure standpoint.
Scott.Anderson, CORE
Breaking into health care was not an easy proposition for CORE. The tough part was getting a reference from another client to help build its presence in that particular vertical. “Once we had that first client and added some resources around it, such as a subject-matter expert, then we were able to scale,” Anderson added.
GEM Market Urgency
Erik Crane,
CPI
It could be said that CPI Technologies is a product of its environment. The Springfield, MO-based dealer has a territorial span that primarily reaches into rural areas, where the largest employers tend to be government, education and medical (GEM). In honing its vertical expertise in the GEM markets, CPI President Erik Crane has come to appreciate the sense of urgency under which all three spaces operate. Thus, providing responsive service and a thorough understanding of the verticals has given them the edge in many a bid process. It helps that CPI Technologies has a vice president of sales with 21 years of experience under his belt.
You have to stay abreast of those things, and you have to know what the trends are, what the buzz words and hot buttons are.
Erik Crane, CPI
Continuous education is the key for maintaining vertical dominance, according to Crane. “As the directives of each one of those markets changes, new laws and new sources of funding are written and made available, so you have to play on those and find ways to make it easier for those clients to get your equipment and technology,” he said. “You have to stay abreast of those things, and you have to know what the trends are, what the buzz words and hot buttons are. You need to know what those entities’ responsibilities are now and going forward for your technology and what you can give them.”
From a solutions standpoint, Crane notes that the high degree of variation within each vertical negates the ability to offer cookie-cutter solutions. Security is a top area of concern, addressing every step in the workflow—from document creation to destruction/archival. He also cautions against using the “I can save you 30 percent” spiel with schools, which are more interested in streamlining operations and becoming more efficient. Also, the environmental aspect can’t be overlooked, as many organizations are striving toward boasting a negative carbon footprint.
Among the general solutions CPI Technologies employs, PaperCut is a highly leveraged solution for tracking documents and usage, along with FollowMe Printing by Ringdale, Print Audit for fleet management and DocuWare for workflow management. PrintReleaf certification addresses the aforementioned environment aspect of printing environments, as well.
Vince Colaianni,
TGI Office Automation
TGI Office Automation of Brooklyn, NY, is another dealer that has a strong presence in the GEM markets for the northeast and Florida, particularly Miami and Boca Raton. Vince Colaianni, director of sales development, notes the genesis of engagements is learning what challenges are keeping the customer awake at night, then working with vendors and partners to craft a solution from the ground up. Having been in business for more than 50 years, TGI’s experience enables it to quickly hone in on the recurring issues that face markets, such as education and health care.
Rolling with the Evolution
The evolving needs of clients help pave the path to opportunity, according to Colaianni. “It could be something as simple as making sure the security and functionality meets their standards,” he said. “It used to be that all the students had to worry about was getting a spiral notebook. Now kids are bringing their own devices to school, they want to connect to the network, and they’re getting their assignments via email or a web page. We need to ensure they can communicate with those systems and be secure in working with them. Needless to say, in the medical arena, HIPAA compliance and being able to track it is something that is changing and evolving with the times.”
Now kids are bringing their own devices to school, they want to connect to the network, they’re getting their assignments via email or a web page. We need to ensure they can communicate with those systems and be secure in working with them.
Vince Colaianni, TGI Office Automation
TGI can use solutions for tracking, controlling and monitoring across multiple departments within a client, and customize the MFP panels to conform to the needs of the end-user and enhance its ease of use. Among its top software solutions are DocuWare, PaperCut, M-Files, Nuance, Square 9 and Continuum, to name a few. The dealer also has its own set of branded solutions such as TGI Control, Scan, Track, Monitor and Convert.
“What’s so attractive about PaperCut is the ability for you to create this rules-based printing that allows you to be in control of what your employees or users are doing,” he said. “But it also allows them to recognize the specialty that they need to do. By giving them rules and controlling, you’re actually giving the people more freedom to feel better about knowing exactly what they have to do when they need to interact with our equipment.”
Imagine creating an app that can be licensed to other dealer partners and their clients for use on the ConnectKey-enabled AltaLink and VersaLink MFPs. Develop the app, have it certified by Xerox and then uploaded to the App Gallery, thus bringing it to an open ConnectKey marketplace. Then you can rake in the licensing fees.
Joshua Justice, JustTech
Joshua Justice is living the dream. He is the owner of JustTech, a La Plata, MD-based firm founded in 2006 that is an agent reseller of Xerox printers and copiers, along with MPS and managed IT. But it was his move into app development that put JustTech on the map, so to speak, far beyond its Maryland/D.C., Virginia/West Virginia stomping grounds. The apps have enabled JustTech to sell more devices and garner increased MPS revenue, as well as rake in the new revenue stream.
The success has been fast and furious. Owning the title of the first Xerox-certified Personalized Application Builder in the United States, JustTech has installed more than 40,000 of its apps worldwide, to the tune of more than $1 million in licensing fees. No one else has as many apps on Xerox devices.
“I never envisioned licensing or selling apps, but I got into it because I’m always looking for something new to drive value,” Justice said. “After we did our first app, the Support Connect app—which allows service and supply requests to be done through the device—Xerox partners came to us, wanting to know what it cost so they could have it for their customers.”
Garnering Steam
As the requests poured in, Justice developed a pricing model and a way to offer it to partners. Within three months, he signed up 15 partners with the app, and it has grown from there. Currently, JustTech has 20 apps, six of which Justice termed as mainstream. Its Firmware Connect app has more than 30,000 installs alone.
“What we always do is ask our clients what they need and try to focus on an app that can be used by the greatest number of people,” he said. “If it’s successful, we’ll put it on our website and send out an email blast to see if anybody would like to purchase or license the app.”
JustTech derives 90 percent of its apps-licensing revenue through other dealers, resellers and partners, who buy the apps for their clients. Justice has 220 global resellers that license one or more apps from him on a regular basis.
“We never envisioned some of the apps we’ve built would become so successful,” Justice admits. “It’s still relatively new to the marketplace. I can tell you our clients—especially Xerox clients—they’re pushing this hard. At first, people didn’t understand these apps could be accessed through the MFPs; they were reaching for their smart phones. It’s becoming something everyone is interested in now, and they’re seeing the value in it.”
Ramping Up Apps
Justice is advising dealers and resellers who want to embark down the road of app development to explore what’s currently available in the app gallery, then pick the brains of their clients to see which workflows could use enhancing. He finds that 70 percent of what clients ask for is currently available. Start off by working with one of the 20-odd developers certified and recommended by Xerox to explore a one-off idea for an app, he says, then perhaps move to an individual contractor if you have a number of ideas.
“As you see a return on investment from selling additional Xerox devices yourself and additional recurring revenue with MPS, selling these apps to the partners and customers will help you build up—that’s what we did,” Justice said. “You don’t have to jump right in and hire a team of developers at first. You need someone with a degree in development to assist or to build. Coding and developing is its own art.”
