Managing a multi-location company’s printing infrastructure is no small feat.
For large, national clients with locations throughout the country with dozens of devices spread among them, managed print services (MPS) is a complex and daunting mountain to climb.
That’s why many MPS providers, including our parent company, Green Office Partner, use PrintFleet.
PrintFleet is a cloud-based software program that provides real-time information on print device usage and maintenance status. It lets us track your clients’ devices in real-time, ensuring that their needs never fall through the cracks.
Print Partner works with hundreds of MSPs nationwide, cultivating relationships between them and Green Office Partner. We understand what it takes to handle a large, complex fleet of print devices, and we know that PrintFleet will help us get the job done.
In this article, we’ll review the value of PrintFleet, how we use it, and how it directly helps our clients’ businesses.
PrintFleet Device Usage and Performance Monitoring
PrintFleet is a data collection agent, (DCA), meaning that print vendors like us use it to collect information about how companies' devices are being utilized. Data is collected in real-time, allowing us to stay up-to-date on everything involving an organization’s print devices.
PrintFleet allows us to track device performance. If any machines have issues, the DCA will enable us to pick up on the malfunction immediately, often before the user even has a chance to report the issue.
This proactive approach to print support is designed to decrease downtime and maximize uptime.
PrintFleet also tracks usage, allowing us to identify underutilized machines or being pushed beyond their intended limits.
Based on our findings, we can suggest devices that better fit specific areas of the company.
PrintFleet’s usage and performance monitoring is integral to our print assessment process when onboarding a new client. In order to get the full scope of their printing needs and habits. Once the DCA is installed, we track their printing data for a few weeks before making recommendations on what products or services they need.
For more information on our print assessment sales process, read: What is a Print Assessment?
PrintFleet Device Toner and Supply Management
Managing print supplies is often the first thing that comes to mind when considering the role of a managed print service provider.
Clients are typically too busy with their business operations to pay attention to device toner levels. PrintFleet allows MPS providers to take that burden off clients’ shoulders.
When devices are running low on toner, PrintFleet sends an alert proactively. An order of toner is then delivered to the office, so there’s never a need for a last-minute emergency run to Staples.
The longer that Print Fleet runs on the customer network, the more reliable it becomes for predicting toner replenishment during busy seasons and finding other printing trends within the organization.
Running out of toner can lead to a very stressful afternoon for office administrators, and being on top of supply levels creates enormous value for the client.
PrintFleet can track other consumables beyond toner, including paper, ink, and others, depending on the device.
PrintFleet Reporting and Analytics
PrintFleet is excellent for tracking day-to-day print stats. Tracking a device’s usage, performance, and supply levels proactively allows us to service it. This saves time, as your client's print provider can resolve issues long before the user goes through the trouble of submitting a ticket.
But beyond tracking the device in the present, PrintFleet’s monitoring allows us to plan for the future.
Because PrintFleet is constantly tracking information, it can provide us with meticulous details and analytics of an organization’s long-term print trends. And this level of advanced tracking can help clients reduce costs, optimize their workflow and improve the office’s overall efficiency.
For example, if a device consistently breaks down multiple times a year, we can replace that copier with one more suited for large print loads. Or if PrintFleet finds that the client underutilizes a large, expensive device, we can replace it with a more cost-effective one down the road.
PrintFleet offers this information in neatly-organized packages that can be easily presented to leadership teams, allowing them to clearly understand available options that could help the company’s budget.
Daily statistics paired with long-term analysis make PrintFleet the full package.
Benefits of PrintFleet
Using daily device tracking paired with long-term reports and analytics, the benefits PrintFleet offers to your clients are plentiful.
Without a DCA like PrintFleet, most clients have little to no idea what they spend on printing.
Michael Guta from Small Business Trends reports that 64% of small businesses can’t track their print spending - and many don’t track the amount of time wasted on printing either.
“Another glaring statistic from the survey was the amount of time wasted with processes involved in printing,” writes Guta. “Waiting for jobs at the printer, running out of supplies, or going to printer shops to pick up documents add up to a considerable amount of time. The cost, of course, may not be visible, but it is there.”
With the level of detail PrintFleet provides, your clients can minimize their expenses. PrintFleet highlights areas where large, expensive devices are consistently underutilized.
And if machines are having frequent errors that cause delays or disruptions on document workflow, PrintFleet allows MPS providers like us to identify these trends quickly and proactively.
That way, your clients won’t waste precious time and money on issues they’d likely never detect without the help of PrintFleet.
In terms of saving time and money, the potential of PrintFleet cannot be understated.
Print Partner and PrintFleet
After reading this article, you now know what PrintFleet is, how it helps clients on a daily basis, and how it allows companies to plan strategically for their future.
PrintFleet is a versatile, flexible, and helpful tool for managed print services providers all over the country, and it makes our role as your clients’ print providers more effortless and more effective.
If you understand the value of PrintFleet, you know how much of a difference a managed print provider can make for your clients.
MPS is a demanding gig, and we understand that most MSPs don’t want to get tangled up in it. That’s why Print Partner is dedicated to partnering with MSPs to handle the print jobs they don’t want to think about.
When you work with us, your MSP can provide print solutions to your clients without changing anything about your current business model. Teaming up with Print Partner is an easy way to offer them enormous value for minimal effort. Just make the introduction, and we’ll handle the rest.
Plus, we’ll pay you! For each introduction, we pay our MSP referral partners $250, plus $1,000 for each copier sold and 5% of the referral’s lifetime print allotment.
So if you want to start providing quality print solutions with practically no effort while building an additional revenue stream for your business, then partner with us, a Print Partner you can trust.
