What data do you need to reduce your print costs?

In order to manage something, it is necessary to understand it.

For small and medium sized businesses (SMEs), it has traditionally been very difficult to accurately estimate the total financial and environmental cost of office printing. Without this data, managers are unable to set targets for improvement. 

Without insight into the behaviours that underpin the financial and environmental costs of printing, it is difficult to accurately establish more sustainable print policies, or to make the case for investing in new hardware when necessary.

However, Epson’s new fully managed print service for SMEs (Print365), gives businesses affordable and flexible access to a live portal that records and analyses the data needed to improve efficiency.

Even small businesses now get an accurate and transparent breakdown of team members print behaviours, printing volumes, device supply levels, supply orders, servicing needs and more. The live portal is part of the Print365 package, and comes with all the advantages of the ‘on demand’ or software as a service (SaaS) business model, including:

Just in time supplies

Rather than being hosted on your servers, Epson’s live portal is hosted centrally and accessible via the cloud using unique passwords. 

We can now remotely monitor your printer performance and supply levels of consumables like paper and ink, without having to physically be at the client site. Thus office managers no longer need to worry about print supply stock levels or storage space. Instead Epson’s Print365 partners will automatically provide ‘just in time’ delivery of print consumables, as well as responsibly disposing of printer waste like used cartridges, when the portal indicates action is needed.

Improved analytics

The print portal is accessible online, rather than being a software solution installed directly into your server. A great benefit of central hosting is that software developments and improvements can be made centrally, meaning that at all times you have access to the latest analytics, tools and information, without having to buy updates or reinstall software.

A solution that grows with you

Like Epson’s other print solutions, the live portal is built for business. 

If your business expands rapidly there is no need to purchase new software or server space to expand the scope of the portal’s data gathering and analysis. The Print365 live portal can easily be extended or reduced to provide analytics for whatever number of managed devices your office requires.

Pricing

Traditionally only large enterprises have been able to benefit from the insights and savings generated by this type of solution due to the cost of the packages and the volume of associated pages.  However, the centralised, SaaS (software as a service) business model means Epson can offer more affordable access with packages and products tailored specifically for SMEs and their print volumes.

The full and transparent monitoring of print data gives you all the numbers you need

Above all though, the live portal enables small business managers to monitor and adapt their Print365 package to their office’s needs, by giving them access to transparent data.

For example, by analysing data on print usage it may become clear that staff are using a colour printer, simply because it is closer to their desk; or that a small number of team members are printing much more than their colleagues; or that paper is being wasted due to unnecessary single-side printing.

In each case, having access to data can help small businesses take action, by reconfiguring printer positioning in the office, conducting a simple discussion or training with employees to find ways to reduce unnecessary printing, or establishing print rules on company computers.

Print365 helps small businesses not only to cut the hassle and waste of business printing, but also to control and minimize costs, helping you to reinvest more of your budget in core business needs.

For more information, please visit: http://www.epson.eu/print365