Luke Goldberg
It’s already been a crazy busy year for Clover Holdings and it’s going to get even busier. Trust me. I spoke with Global SVP Sales and Marketing of Clover Technologies Group Luke Goldberg last week about what’s going on and he had a lot to share.
Arguably the biggest news and fresh off last year’s merger with MSE, is the creation of Clover Imaging Group, a marketing umbrella that encompasses all of the imaging companies within the Clover Holdings Group under one marketing umbrella
The new entity was actually introduced on March 11 at ITEX, and according to Goldberg, raises the company’s profile within the document imaging segment. “This positions us to powerfully partner with our customers all over the world and brings under one roof the acquisitions of the past 10 years that Clover has made, explains Goldberg. “When you take that collectively we’re able to encompass and account for every aspect of the imaging space within that umbrella from the empties side of the business to global manufacturing, to a full suite of solutions on the MPS side along with marketing support.”
What does this mean to its dealers and for the individual companies within the Clover Imaging Group?
“We’re now bringing a tremendously powerful value proposition to global dealers on the product side, solutions side, and collections side,” responds Goldberg. “If a dealer needs a product or service from three or four different entities within the Clover Imaging Group, the sales executive responsible for a given account can pull all those resources together for the dealer vs. having the dealer make five different calls for all these different products and services. The benefit to the dealer is access to all these products, services, distribution, and everything that we bring to the table combined under one roof.”
For the companies that comprise the Clover Imaging Group, Goldberg says there are no significant changes. “Nobody is placing purchase orders with the Clover Imaging Group, you’re still buying from the division you’ve been buying from, the difference being the division you’re buying from can now leverage the power of this combined organization and there will be more cohesion within each individual group and more cohesion within the whole,” says Goldberg.
Coinciding with that announcement will be introductions in the coming weeks for an array of new services and programs across all segments of the Clover Imaging Group. For example, expect MSE, one of the Clover Imaging Group companies with a reputation for producing a high quality, differentiated product that favorably competes with the OEM in terms of quality and output, to expand beyond product based solutions and to support what Goldberg describes as “class leading products with a comprehensive new suite of MPS solutions supported by unparalleled marketing support tools.”
Clover Imaging Group will continue to introduce various value-added programs, including MSE’s version of MPS Engineered Solutions, including a comprehensive ATF and TCO platform. Also on the docket is Marketing Platform 2.0, an umbrella of tools that includes a cloud-based marketing portal, Empower. This is a customizable web-based portal allows dealers to go onto the site and completely manage their entire marketing campaigns, including high-impact vertically driven end user facing videos and new product releases—all with three clicks of a mouse.
“It covers all aspects of their business, not just MPS and toner or consumables, but also managed IT, hardware, and workflow processes,” says Goldberg. “They can manage marketing for every aspect of their business and can customize it with three clicks and create their own campaigns. It’s not only going to help our customers drive business that’s directly related to what we do but to grow their business in areas that have nothing to do with Clover Imaging Group companies.”
Because the Clover Imaging Group companies don’t sell directly to the end user, success is dependent on the success of their dealers and resellers. “We grow only if our dealers grow,” states Goldberg. “I know everybody says that and talks about partnering, but to us true partnering is when you’re investing into the collective success of our industry and customer and offering tools that would cost a dealer tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars to develop. Something like Marketing Platform 2.0 and the Empower platform enable us to become the dealer’s outsourced marketing arm.”
MSE and the Clover Imaging Group companies also announced a partnership with PrintReleaf, a sustainability program that can be offered in conjunction with MPS Engineered Solutions and Axess. PrintRelief will run in tandem with Clover Imaging Group’s Managed Print business and will inform the end user about how many pages are being printed and how that directly relates to the replanting of a tree in five selected markets.
For example, when one of the company’s dealer’s customers prints 8,333 pages, Clover via PrintReleaf will replant a tree in markets such as Brazil and the Dominican Republic. It’s all certified and documented and Clover provides marketing material to certify the end user is becoming tree neutral, meaning for every tree that’s cut down because of their printing activities, it’s being replanted, reforesting markets in areas that have traditionally been deforested.
“It’s a powerful sustainability program,” states Goldberg. “Not only is it great marketing for the dealer, but the end user will have access to high level, impactful reporting that every month says ‘I printed 80,000 pages and replanted 9.6 trees and created ‘X’ numbers of jobs.’”
Ultimately, what these announcements cumulatively bring to Clover Imaging Group’s dealers is added value, something that’s key in a competitive market.
“The fact that we’re making these investments is a testament to our bullishness in terms of this industry and where it can go if you focus on quality and value instead of price which has been the main issue in our industry the last number of years. At all levels it’s become commoditized. You de-commoditize by adding value and bringing solutions like this that differentiate you from your competition.”
