Comments on: Are MSPs Loyal to Their Platform Providers?

By: jauerbach

jauerbach — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 22:43:54 +0000

I’m just not willing to outsource our line of business applications to a third party at this time, due to the sensitive nature of the data that we are exposed to.

It wasn’t so much a financial decision when we switched products since we knew we had to make a change. Training is the biggest cost for us and we would have to do that anyway. Our monthly payment to the software company we now use is less than what we were paying with our original provider. We also feel like we are getting so much more…

I don’t look at the investment we made in the other product as a lost one. It got us this far….

By: Joe Panettieri

Joe Panettieri — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 19:51:26 +0000

@jaurbach: Why are you deploying it internally? What’s the business driver for the move? Would love to hear more about your decision to deploy.

By: jauerbach

jauerbach — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 04:41:41 +0000

We are deploying internally.

By: Joe Panettieri

Joe Panettieri — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 02:38:33 +0000

@Ken: 170 for 170? Hard to argue with that batting average…

By: Ken Vanderweel

Ken Vanderweel — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 01:27:29 +0000

Hi Joe, yes, 170 of 170 of our MSP partners have remained loyal to Nimsoft, none have defected to another platform.

Ken
http://www.nimsoft.com

By: Joe Panettieri

Joe Panettieri — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 01:22:41 +0000

@Ken: Just double-checking … you’re saying 170 of 170 (all) of your MSP partners have remained loyal and none have defected to other platforms?

@JeffA: Are you deploying the new platform internally or turning to a partner to host it for you? Just curious.

By: Ken Vanderweel

Ken Vanderweel — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 21:06:27 +0000

Our experience at Nimsoft, and our recent MSP partner survey results, indicates that a [functionally rich] monitoring tool/platform can most definitely make a difference.

Here are two of the 25 survey questions we asked our partners;

1. Using Nimsoft NimBUS, what new lines of managed services have you offered in last 18 months?

Network (routers/switches) – 58.1% (25 respondents)
VoIP/UCM – 23.3% (10 respondents)
Virtualization – 32.6% (14 respondents)
UNIX (HPUX, AIX, Solaris) – 32.6% (14)
iSeries AS400 – 7.0% (3 respondents)
Netware – 2.3% (1)
Database – 41.9% (18)
Common commercial applications; Exchange, AD, Citrix, etc. – 39.5% (17)
Industry specific applications, i.e. Finance apps, Healthcare apps, etc. – 30.2% (13)
End-user monitoring – 44.2% (19)
SLA monitoring – 74.4% (32)

2. For the question above, please indicate if these new lines of managed services increased quarterly revenue by more than;

50% – 6.9% respondents
40% – 3.4%
30% – 10.3%
25% – 20.7%
10% – 58%

We’ve been fortunate that none of our 170+ MSP partners have moved to an alternative platform provider, our first MSP partner came on board in 2003 and is going strong in 2008. I would argue that our partner retention is in large part due to the opportunity and competitive differentiator that our NimBUS monitoring product presents to MSPs, equally important for retention is our partner support where we consistently receive very high marks. Superior, functionally-rich product, and partner support excellence has created a win-win-win scenario for Nimsoft, our MSP partners, and our MSP partner’s customers.

Ken
http://www.nimsoft.com

By: JeffA

JeffA — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 20:56:45 +0000

We are changing platforms because we feel that our current platform company has poor development processes and their support has deteriorated as a result. It’s been a challenging migration.

Our current software has more functionality than the product that we’ve decided to migrate to, but I think the new company has worked out the kinks internally and delivers an all around better experience with the software. We’ve found their support to be very good and they have learnt from their past mistakes regarding software roll-outs.

By: StuFinancesTech

StuFinancesTech — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 19:28:26 +0000

Joe and other experts, are cloud issues affected with a platform switch? Just curious as to how that might be affected so please excuse my ignorance if I’m the only one that doesn’t know .

Stu

By: Stuart Selbst

Stuart Selbst — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 18:25:22 +0000

What a great thread. Taking a look back at when I had my MSP business, I evaluated 7 RMM tools before I purchased one and then within 6 months, I left that one and went to Kaseya through SecureMyCompany.

I hear from a number of new and veteran MSPs everyday who are looking at the solutions that we offer at SecureMyCompany. They are frustrated with their current tool and want something else. One of the things that I tell the MSP is not to build their business around the RMM tool, but to build a business
and then use the tool to service their customers. Once they grasp this concept, the get a better understanding of the business of IT and how to be a successful MSP.

Stuart
http://www.securemycompany.com