- Describe your company – a high-level description of what your business does.
Pulse Technology is a family-owned technology company that has been serving businesses for more than 70 years. While managed print and office technology have always been a major part of our business, we have continued to evolve based on what our customers need.
Today, Pulse provides Managed Print Services, IT and cybersecurity, audio visual solutions, video walls and digital signage, robotics, and AI consulting. Our goal is pretty simple: to help our customers use technology better and make it easier for them to run their businesses.
We do not want to just sell a customer a copier, a piece of hardware, or another technology product. We want to understand their business, identify where they are losing time or money, and find a solution that makes an impact. We find that this approach helps our customers save money and have a better outcome over time.
- How does your organization execute within the managed print services (MPS) landscape, and what has been your relationship or involvement with the MPSA local and/or global community?
Our approach to MPS is centered around visibility, proactive service, and making things easy for the customer. Customers do not want to manage toner, track meters, worry about device downtime, or spend time trying to figure out why their print environment is not working efficiently. That is our job.
We work to understand the customer’s entire print environment and then build a program around their actual needs. That includes device placement, utilization, service, supplies, security, and ongoing optimization. Education is key in our work with customers, particularly in the initial phases of a program, where end users are accustomed to thinking that the $279 “big box” printer will be a wise and economical acquisition for their business. Teaching customers the “cost per page” way of evaluating equipment is a big part of an initial MPS program.
We have been active members of the MPS community for many years, being early adopters of MPS. Our participation in this community has helped us learn from others as well as share our knowledge and experience with fellow dealers looking to get more involved in MPS. We have mentored dealers and have spoken on the topic at a number of industry venues, including some peer groups. We find that many in our industry share similar challenges, and similar opportunities. We all do our best work when we share ideas and experiences. We believe you can learn something from everyone, and being involved in organizations like the MPSA helps keep us connected to where the industry is going.
- From your perspective, what is the most significant way your dealership is making a positive impact in the MPS market through the customers you serve?
The biggest impact we can make is helping customers stop looking at print as an isolated part of their business.
For a long time, our industry was very focused on the box. What device are we putting in? How fast is it? How many pages does it produce? Those things still matter, but our customers are dealing with much bigger technology challenges today.
Our advantage is that we can look beyond the copier. Because Pulse also provides IT, cybersecurity, audio visual, automation, robotics, and AI solutions, our team has a much broader view of the customer’s technology environment.
Our go-to-market strategy is based on asking more questions and understanding the customer’s business before recommending a solution. Sometimes the answer is managed print. Sometimes it is a workflow issue. Sometimes it is an IT or security problem. We have learned that if you focus on solving the problem instead of selling the product, customers recognize and appreciate the effort.
One of the biggest lessons we have learned is that communication and execution are everything. You can have the best technology in the world, but if the implementation is poor or the customer does not understand what is happening, you’ve failed.
We have also learned that you must be willing to change. Customer expectations are different today. They expect faster communication, more transparency, and proactive support. Our goal is to continuously improve customer experience and make it as easy as possible to do business with Pulse.
Our manufacturer and technology partners are an important part of that success. The best partnerships are the ones where the dealer and the partner are both focused on the end customer. When everyone is aligned around creating a better customer outcome, that is when the relationship really works.
- Can you describe a time when your organization had to adapt to a major shift in the MPS industry? What did you learn, and how did that experience shape the way you support your customers today?
COVID was probably the biggest and fastest shift our industry has experienced in a long time.
Overnight, offices emptied out and print volumes changed dramatically. Like many dealers, we had to look at our business and ask some difficult questions. If customers aren’t in the office and aren’t printing at the same levels, what does our value look like?
For us, it reinforced the importance of diversification and listening to our customers. We have always been proponents of diversification, but COVID brought the need into sharp focus for many dealers.
Even during and throughout COVID, our customers still needed technology. They just needed different technology. They needed remote support, cybersecurity, better collaboration tools, and technology that could support a changing workplace.
The biggest lesson we learned was that you cannot expect or wait for the market to go back to the way it was. You must adapt to the market that is in front of you.
That experience helped shape the Pulse of today. We continued investing in IT and cybersecurity and expanded into audio visual solutions, digital signage, robotics, automation, and AI consulting.
We still believe strongly in managed print. Print is not dead. But we also believe the traditional copier dealer must evolve.
The best practice I would share with others in the industry is to listen closely to your customers. They will usually tell you where the next opportunity is. Many of the solutions we offer today came from customers asking us for help with problems outside of traditional print.
If you have earned the customer’s trust, do not be afraid to find new ways to help them.
- Reflecting on our conversation, what do you see as the biggest opportunity for innovation and collaboration within the managed print community?
The biggest opportunities within Managed Print are AI, automation, and the way we use data.
Our industry has an incredible amount of data, but we don’t always use it as effectively as we could. Device data, service history, customer communication, usage trends, and sales information can all help us create a better customer experience.
AI gives us an opportunity to become more proactive. Instead of reacting to a service problem, how do we predict it? Instead of waiting for a customer to tell us their environment has changed, how do we identify that change and start the conversation? There is also a major opportunity for dealers, manufacturers, and technology providers to collaborate more closely. Innovation moves too quickly for everyone to operate in their own silo.
Companies willing to share ideas, integrate technologies, and learn from each other are going to move the industry forward.
- How have you benefited from the MPSA community? What are the biggest attributes? What improvements are needed?
The biggest benefit of the MPSA community is access to people who understand this business.
There are challenges in the MPS industry that are very specific to what we do. Being able to connect with other dealers, manufacturers, and industry leaders who have dealt with similar situations is extremely valuable.
One of the MPSA’s strongest attributes is the willingness of its members to share information and best practices. The industry is competitive, but there is still a real sense that we all benefit when the managed print market gets stronger.
Looking forward, I would like to see even more focus on the next generation of our industry. That includes AI, cybersecurity, automation, attracting younger talent, and helping traditional dealers understand how to expand beyond print.
There is a tremendous amount of knowledge in the MPSA community. The opportunity is finding even more ways to turn that knowledge into actionable ideas dealers can take back to their businesses and implement.
- What are the one or two key messages that you would leave the audience today so they resonate in the minds of our audience locally and globally?
The first message is simple: listen to your customers.
Your customers will tell you where your business needs to go if you are willing to ask the right questions and actually listen to the answers.
The second is do not be afraid to evolve.
Managed print is still an important and valuable part of our business, but our industry cannot define itself by the box. We need to define ourselves by the problems we solve and the value we create for our customers.
At Pulse, we believe our future is not about selling more technology. It is about using technology to make our customers’ businesses better.
If we continue to do that, the opportunities for our industry are enormous.
