The evolving nature of technology drives constant change in the business culture, and how we view printing must change along with it.
Businesses view printing as a part of "what we do." We print emails and file them away into folders in cabinets, sometimes never to retrieve them again. We print documents over and over — "version 1," "version 2," "version 3" — and so on until we finally have a finished product we are happy with after using costly paper and toner that we didn't need.
We've all been guilty of practices like these at some point. The problem is that these practices often seem so inconsequential at the time that we don't realize the impact they make on the bottom line.
According to Gartner, roughly 3% of businesses' yearly revenue is spent on generating documents. However, printing is still often an unmanaged or under-managed expense.
Luckily, there’s a more cost-effective and efficient way to print.
Let’s learn about print management software solutions to help you better understand how to control this often-overlooked business expense.
A Brief Introduction to Print Management Software
Print management software offers rules-based printing and print-tracking capabilities that allow you to quickly:
- Track usage on a group level or the user level
- Calculate the actual usage and total-cost-of-ownership for your entire print fleet, including desktop printers, multifunction printers, and any other output devices
- Control costs by enforcing rules-based printing
- Bill-back specified printing projects or jobs to your clients
- Implement secure-release printing from any networked output device
Pricing for these solutions is typically scalable to your needs. Scalable pricing for print management solutions is primarily based on these factors:
- Number of users
- Maintenance and support
- Number of print servers
- Number of secure-release printers
- Number of MFPs requiring authentication
Remember, cost should not be the only factor determining which solutions are right for you. It's also important to consider the ease of implementation and the financial impact. When deciding which MPS solution is the best fit for your company—based on your specific needs and uses, one solution may be more cost-effective to implement and produce more cost-savings for you than another.
Advanced Print Fleet Management Made Easy
Implementing the right print fleet management software solution helps you control and cut costs and allows you to streamline and improve your business processes. Businesses should partner with an experienced MPS provider to determine which software solutions suit their needs and budget.
At Meridian, our strategic partnerships with world-renowned print management software manufacturers such as Equitrac and Papercut let us scale managed print solutions for any business. Our carefully curated relationships increase our depth of knowledge and enable us to provide you with the innovative solutions you need to maximize productivity.
Editor's Note: This post was originally published on February 16, 2016, and has been updated for accuracy and current best practices.
