I hesitate to call this “the year” of managed print services, but it certainly seems like vendors, industry associations and managed service providers are rallying around managed print services. The latest example comes from CompTIA Breakaway 2009, kicking off this week in Las Vagas.

At Breakaway, VARs and MSPs will spot the Managed Print Services Pavilion during Technology Vendor Fair sessions on Aug. 4 and 5. And Tom Gall, value channel marketing director at Xerox, is set to give me an update on Xerox’s MPS strategy. I’ll report later this week with details.

More than vendors speaking to the media, we’re starting to see a managed print services ecosystem develop. One reason: Seven out of 10 MSPs are interested in managed print, according to a March 2009 reader poll by MSPmentor.

Growing the Market

Vendors, partners and entrepreneurs are gearing up to help solutions providers develop MPS revenue streams.

Recent examples include:

Perfecting Your Sales Pitch

Are managed print services guaranteed to succeed? Certainly not. Like all managed services, the difference between success and failure typically has little to do with technology and everything to do with sales/marketing strategies.

The sooner MSPs learn to promote the value of managed print services, the sooner they’ll earn recurring revenue from multifunction printers (MFPs) and related devices.

The discussion continues this week at CompTIA Breakaway in Las Vegas.

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