The Datamax Thinking Blog

Your 15 year old copier still works. Great. Is that costing your office productivity benefits that newer equipment could deliver?

If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

In many cases, that's not a bad rule to follow.

On the other hand, the copiers, printers, and other office equipment you use now might not be broken (they still work), but could do with some fixing anyway.

Research shows that law firms love Canon copiers.

You see a lot of natural combinations out there. Chocolate and peanut butter, steak and eggs, and wine and cheese are a few classic pairings. What doesn't fall so easily into place are the services that support a major business investment, such as your production printer and your digital copier.  

The pre-sales process goes smoothly, but you often find yourself left hanging after you sign on the dotted line. At Datamax, we put a lot of resources into the after-sales support process. Our technical support team works together with the top manufacturers, such as Canon, to learn everything they need to know for high-quality support. Our dedication to after-sales support has earned us recognition from Canon's Association of Technical Service Professionals (ATSP). 

Buying one, centralized multifunction printer for your office will save money, right? It's not as simple as that.

Centralizing your multifunction copiers makes a lot of sense. You don't need to buy multiple machines to cover all of the departments, the IT team can easily network and troubleshoot them, and you won't have employees wandering around trying to figure out where to get their copies.

This configuration works out great, in theory. In practice, you could end up with the MFP becoming the de facto water cooler. When staff makes their way to the digital copier to pick up their papers, they may take a socialization trip at the same time.

Take the time to get the right office equipment or your communications – internally and with customers – could suffer.

When companies buy printers or digital copiers from us, they're not all that interested in the actual equipment. What you actually get from the purchase is communication.

The point in time when you acquire a new print device is the perfect time to improve your workflow, provided your vendor has the expertise.

A business' copier fleet is very much a Goldilocks situation; too much or too little printing and copying capacity can create significant costs. If you print more than your fleet can handle, you are going to have to replace devices more often. If you have more capacity than you need, you are paying too much to the detriment of other areas of your business.

Multifunction copiers are a must-have device to improve process automation in your office and to support working anywhere.

Compare today's business environment to the typical office in 2000. Back then, everyone was locked to a particular workstation, and remote working was a rarity. Today, you can work from a computer to a tablet to your smartphone halfway across the world without any problems.

While technology advancements set the stage for many of these changes, the foundation is built on top of tech that's been around for decades. The multifunction copier, for instance, is an important part of moving to a "less paper" office.

You'll have a tough time delivering a quality customer experience if they have to wait around while you're on a grand adventure for hard copies.

Hard copy documents are talented at hiding away when you need them the most. You have to go on an office safari every time to track them, which cuts into the time you could spend on your work duties. Even a few minutes per day adds up. It's time to throw paper in the trash and get digital with your documents.

The modern Bates Stamping system has firmware upgrades and robust publishing features, which streamlines this process for your law office.

Previously, when you wanted to conduct Bates Stamping for legal documents, you had to download software or find room in the budget for an expensive piece of equipment. However, thanks to multifunctional copiers, this process is now much easier. 

Instead of struggling with difficult applications or investing a large part of your budget into a single purpose device, you can do Bates Stamping with the push of a button on your digital copier. This functionality is the kind of thing the legal industry dreams of.

If you focus on the number on the price tag more than what the photocopier can actually do for you, you'll end up paying more in the long run.

You have to operate with a budget professionally and personally. The same questions come up no matter what you're buying. How much should it cost, where can you find the best deals, and is there a more affordable way to get it?

Many people jump right to the cheapest copier they can find. They think it might match their needs, but their decision is purely price driven. Sometimes they luck out and get the right model with good build quality. Years from now, they're calling the copier "old reliable" and patting themselves on the back for their money-saving move.

However, this is not the case for most people.

These devices open up new possibilities for your company, whether you need to streamline document sharing or need to consolidate your equipment in the office.

Photocopiers are on the edge of extinction, only found tucked in the back corners of libraries and colleges. Multifunctional devices, digital copiers, and all-in-one devices have edged it out of the technology world. However, you still see "photocopier" applied as a catch-all term when people and businesses talk about the tools they need to support daily operations.

Many industries require print and copying functionality, but when they use the wrong terminology to say what they need, they may end up limiting their choices. You can't realize the productivity benefits of a machine when you make assumptions about what it can do.

All photocopiers could do was create copies of papers with heat and light. They served a useful purpose in their time, but modern technology brings an expanded feature set to the table.