We've often spoken about your need to focus attention on finding new sources of revenue—especially now that you've gotten the cost side of your P&L under better control. The last time we talked about it, you defined the issue as, primarily, one of identifying attractive new business areas in which to invest or into which to diversify. We have a different suggestion to make. You have no need to look so far afield.

There is a highly profitable business in which you already have a dominant market share and a know-how-based competitive advantage—namely, all of your various after-sales activities. Demand is stable, entry barriers are high, and—best of all—opportunities for boosting revenue are plentiful. But you are not managing it as a business—either as a standalone profit center or as a part of your core operations. In fact, your people often pay little attention to pricing it and even less to adjusting their business system to match customer requirements better. As a result, revenue and profit opportunities go largely unrealized.

This is unfortunate, but not unusual. Yet the hidden potential is not hard to gauge. In most industrial companies, the after-sales...