The past three years we’ve asked an assortment of players from the document imaging industry to share with us the trends that will be affecting their businesses in the coming year. Often, there’s a consensus on those trends, which often leads to a lot of repetition. This year we’re taking a different approach, asking various players throughout the industry to share what they have in store for the coming year to help their dealer and reseller customers be successful. Over the next four weeks we’ll be presenting their responses to “What’s New in 2015?” Here’s our first group of responses to that question.
“One of the greatest areas of growth that we see for 2015 will come from our holistic approach to doing business, with a focus on content management as one of our key directions in the coming year. While we are still in the hardware business, we will continue to deliver solutions that address all the processes around the document, including: print optimization; security and storage; file-sharing and mobile strategy; as well as the IT services that provide infrastructure service and support.” Kevin Kern, Senior Vice President, Marketing Konica Minolta
“EverBank Commercial Finance is re-naming its Office Products group, Office Technology, to better represent our ever-evolving industry and is expanding its originations team with IT specialists who have deep domain expertise in the products and services now being sold by today’s dealers and VARs.” Fred Carollo, GM of Office Products Platform, EverBank Commercial Finance
“In 2015 Strategy Development will launch a consulting program for smaller BTA dealers that might not be in a position to take full advantage of the intensive SD consulting engagement. The program will use monthly webinars to introduce and educate on specific areas of focus in sales management such as compensation, territory design, and benchmarks as well as a one-on-one monthly call with an SD consultant to discuss the dealerships specific questions on the subject matter. This program will be cost effective and highly valuable for dealers with under $10 million in revenue.” Tom Callinan, Managing Principal, Strategy Development
“We’re going to bring new solutions to the entire dealer channel collectively with our customers for MPS and address some of the problems that have historically plagued that marketplace.” Bryan Bonacum, Static Control Components
“In 2015 BEI Services and ENX Magazine will launch the Office Technology Service Excellence Award program, recognizing dealerships for outstanding service performance; any dealership can submit data to BEI Services for award consideration free of charge. In Q1 2015, BEI will launch our Technician Assessment program geared to help managers manage technician by setting goals focused to reduce services calls. In Q2 2015, BEI will launch the Manager Accountability Module that will set assist managers establish schedules addressing key performance areas within the service organization.” Bud Karakey, Vice President of Operations, BEI Services
“Products and training are the two big deliverables next year. We will once again support our products with road shows and trainings to make sure the dealers have everything they need to be successful.” Mike Marusic, SVP, Marketing, Operations & Service of Sharp Imaging and Information Company of America
“Print Audit will host the first Top 100 Summit. This unique event will be a gathering of business owners from the largest and most progressive office equipment dealers in the industry. The Top 100 Summit is not a trade show, but rather a working forum that will create a new business model and redefine how office equipment dealers will make money in 2015 and beyond.” West McDonald, VP of Business Development, Print Audit
“Muratec will help our dealers compete in the exploding industrial color label printing market in 2015. We’ll be launching a specialized solution that will enable dealers to bring professional-grade, affordable industrial label printing to their customer base for short-run, in-house label printing applications.” Lou Stricklin, Director of Marketing, Muratec America, Inc.
What our resellers can expect from us for next year? Continued expansion of the Value Line. After all, when resellers tell you, ‘You are making this business fun AND profitable again,’ who wouldn’t want to add to the capabilities!” Brad Roderick, InkCycle “Innovolt-as-a-Service. Innovolt now allows customers to protect all their valuable office equipment with minimal upfront expenditure, moving power protection from an upfront capital cost to an operating expense.” Brady Murray, Innovolt
“As I look to next year, I expect there will be new trends to take advantage of. First, I expect the delivery of security services, and in particular managed services, to be an increasing need among SMB’s and an opportunity for solution providers. Cloud has established itself as a leading delivery platform, and many SMBs will continue to embrace it, extending their abilities with further investment in mobile. Solution providers have the opportunity to deliver on another increasing need—business consulting services focused on delivering business outcomes over raw technical capabilities. I continue to remain bullish on the channel, and think solution providers are best positioned to take advantage of the continuing and coming opportunities. Dave Sobel, MAXfocus’s Director of Partner Community
