U Print – Printing Solutions

Background

U Print is a managed print solutions provider supporting businesses across the UK with everything from printer cartridges and home office devices to fully managed print contracts for large corporate environments. 

Founded in 2010, the business supplies and maintains printers for organisations ranging from small professional firms to large-scale operations, where U Print manages multi-floor print infrastructure. 

Under the leadership of Ray McDonald, who joined the business in 2010 and completed a management buyout in 2020, U Print has continued to evolve alongside changes in workplace habits, particularly the shift towards hybrid and home working. 

Today, Ray oversees all operations while remaining heavily involved in sales and client relationships nationwide, making efficiency, time management, and quality conversations critical to the business. 

The Challenge

Before working with YLM, U Print faced ongoing difficulties in building a reliable and sustainable sales pipeline. 

For many years they had relied on in house sales personal for lead generation, an approach that had become increasingly costly and unreliable. Over the years, significant investment was made into recruitment, salaries, company vehicles, and onboarding, often only to discover months later that results didn’t justify the spend.  

While they did have the occasional win, many focused on low-value orders rather than the long-term managed service contracts that U-Print is built around. This led to wasted time, inconsistent pipelines and frustration around return on investment.  

Ray also explored digital marketing routes, getting a company in to update their website, and focus on SEO and Google Ads. They said the team did a great job but operating in a such a highly competitive industry meant that the cost per click was extremely high and produced very few conversions into meaningful leads.  

What U Print needed was a lower-risk alternative to traditional sales hiring, one that delivered qualified, relevant conversations rather than high volumes of unproductive meetings, while also giving Ray confidence that his time wouldn’t be wasted.

Results

Since partnering with YLM, U Print has seen a clear shift in both the quality and structure of its sales pipeline. 

Rather than focusing on appointment volume, YLM prioritised qualification and relevance, actively reviewing calls and filtering out opportunities that weren’t commercially viable or ready to progress. This ensured that meetings placed into Ray’s diary were aligned with U Print’s ideal clients and services.  

As a result, several new clients have already onboarded, including one larger transaction that alone covered around 6 weeks of YLM’s marketing costs.  

Alongside these wins, U Print has a strong forward pipeline, including organisations tied to existing contracts that won’t expire for 12-24 months but are now warm, engaged, and well positioned for future conversion.  

Working with YLM

From the outset, Ray found YLM’s approach refreshingly different from traditional sales and marketing providers.  

Clear onboarding, transparent reporting and regular performance updates made it easy to see exactly what was happening at each stage of the campaign.  

Monthly reports showed which leads were hot, which were being nurtured and which were longer-term opportunities, making the pipeline simple to understand and manage.  

Having the option to listen back to calls also gave Ray reassurance that conversations were being handled and qualified properly, without creating extra work.  

Overall, working with YLM has helped U-Print save time, avoid unproductive conversations and grow the business, without the cost, risk or ongoing management involved in hiring sales staff.  

Would they recommend YLM to others?

When asked if Ray would recommend YLM to others Ray said “Of course, I already have”