MSPmentor

All the talk about the cloud over the past couple of years has obscured managed services to some extent. However, the managed services market remains in high-growth mode, and MSPs looking to increase revenues should be working hard to recruit new customers. But you’re going to need to do some education along the way.

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Compared to a lot of businesses, Nimsoft (my employer) is in a unique position in that we sell to two core markets, with hundreds of enterprise customers and hundreds of MSP customers. Over the course of my eight years with the company, I’ve worked quite a bit with executives in both markets, and that vantage point has helped me gain some insights into what makes a successful MSP/client relationship.

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Successful selling requires an understanding of the buyer’s mind, and most MSPs fail to develop a clear understanding of their customer’s true needs. Specifically, many MSPs don’t understand why buyers do — or don’t — buy from them. Great businesses take the time to understand their buyer’s psyche. Let’s delve a little deeper.

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Selling isn’t easy. However, if you adopt a systematic approach, support new technologies, and offer best-of-the-class services, you can really accelerate your sales. The following five points provide insights into such things and help you win new customers.

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Generally speaking, I think most MSPmentor readers have been building their managed services businesses for five to 10 years. But what if you were building that business from scratch right now? Here are 10 steps to consider for startup MSPs — though the steps certainly apply to established MSPs that are looking to rethink their strategies for the second half of 2011.

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Three top managed services executives are discussing sales strategies during a TruMethods SchnizzFest conference panel here in Philadelphia. The experts: Moderator Gary Pica interviewing masterIT CEO Michael Drake, Spade Technology CEO Myles Keough and ActiveCo President James Ford (pictured, left to right). So, what are their sales-driven recommendations? Here’s the update.

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Over the years, I’ve worked with a lot of MSPs to help them with their marketing efforts, and I can safely say that over all this time, I’ve never heard anyone complaining about excess marketing staff or budget. In fact, more often than not, it’s folks with management or sales titles that I work with, individuals who are taking time away from their “day jobs” to pitch in and support the business’ marketing objectives.

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As a local VAR and MSP, we’ve always had account managers at our business to drive new business and maximize the engagement with our current client base. In considering if my business should have account managers or salespeople, I’ve come to realize that it all hinges on WHAT you’re selling the most of: Products or Services?

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Gritty CEOs who take the transformational journey from VAR to MSP must creatively destroy the tried and true, the old and reliable, to rebuild around the unsure (sometimes overhyped) new thing. Done right, every aspect of the business undergoes some level of re-engineering. The entire back office operation is put in play – new legal agreements, SLAs and billing mechanisms need to be acquired or built from scratch. At the front of the house, products must be developed, service catalog and SOPs created, monitoring and ticketing tools bought, compensation plans rejiggered.

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In the classic reseller channel, sales and marketing back in the day consisted of hanging up a sign and waiting for customers to walk through your front door. That was fun while it lasted. Today, with the world becoming smaller and the marketing noise becoming louder, managed services providers like you have to fight through a whole web of marketing and sales options to make your impact. It is overwhelming, really. But don’t panic. Marketing and sales can be broken down into four major components. Here’s how to get started.

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Each Tuesday, MSPmentor’s Ask a Mentor service publishes a reader question and invites you to weigh in with recommendations. This week’s question comes from a Florida-based seeking some information on sales compensation strategies. Here’s the question and our reply…

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I had dinner last night with a few MSP industry insiders. One of them is a business intelligence expert. She spends her days focused on Google Analytics, lead generation and sales pipelines. Somehow, we started discussing early career moves. She mentioned her early experiences at the Olive Garden restaurant chain. To my surprise, she described how the Olive Garden measures employee performance (i.e., sales) and other daily business metrics. It made me think: If restaurant chains with college employees have mastered the art of the upsell, why haven’t MSPs?

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Increasing revenue without spending more is a tall challenge within your managed services business. But there are three potential ways to make that dream a reality. Here’s a quick guide to get your started.

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The greatest strength any one person can have is to understand their weaknesses. And if you’re a fledging VAR / IT Consultant that is looking to transition to an MSP, the reason you won’t be successful is that you can’t sell. Let’s have a grown-up discussion about the white elephant in the room. The reality is that you are an IT and tech person. You are really good at it and you’re Left Brained. I get it. None of us are great at everything. You gain your customers through referrals and the good work that you do.  You bill here and there, but it’s a lumpy process and you’re always off to the next fire. You have no time to think about building your business.

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Take a moment to think about how you want to start the New Year, as 2010 is coming to a close and you’re prepping for 2011. You’ve had personal New Year’s resolutions, probably even kept some of them. I propose four business resolutions for managed services providers, VARs and solutions providers; these are actionable and vital to the success of your IT business in 2011.

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Between end of quarter sales activity and the rum-pum-pum-pum of the holidays, Web 2.0 time is at a real premium. So help a blogger out.  Here are 25 top of mind, discovery-type questions that I like to use in order to qualify potential sales leads. What about you?  What are your favorite customer probes?  Let’s go for 50 and help each other get ready for a killer 2011.

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How can MSPs and IT service providers better manage their finances, motivate their sales teams and maximize their profits? Coreconnex‘s Frank Coker and Service Leadership Inc.‘s Paul Dippell provided some eye-opening answers during the Tigerpaw User Conference in Dallas today. Here are their top six financial tips. I don’t often say this but this particular blog entry is one that you should print and re-read a few times. Take a look.

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Back in May 2010, I wrote a blog post called “Selling the Real Value of Managed Services.” Now I’m back for an encore because sales strategies — what works, what doesn’t — is the core issue facing aspiring MSPs. I believe it’s key to understand what you are really selling to your prospective clients in order to bolster your sales efforts. Let’s take a look. So let’s take a closer look at what you may be doing wrong… and what you can do right.

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Regardless of the combination of managed services you offer to your clients, your success hinges on your ability to clearly demonstrate the value of those services.  You can have a killer software lineup, 24 hour service, and an iron-clad SLA, and you’ll still find prospects who hem and haw over everything from price to minute implementation details.  However, there are a few common objections that frequently come up in sales conversations with SMB owners. Here are the three most common objections and how to handle them.

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The managed services gold rush has created a cottage industry of consultants and organizations that are assisting MSPs with marketing, sales, mergers, acquisitions and other strategic business tasks. Three recent examples include MSPexcellence, MSPXchange and Ulistic’s MSP Marketing initiative. Here’s a closer look at each organization and its backers, plus a broader update on the coaches and pundits assisting MSPs with their business efforts.

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What’s the most logical place to find new revenue? One obvious tip: Check in with you existing customers and upsell them new services. But in many cases that’s easier said than done. What you really need is a simple, repeatable upsell strategy that you can use across your entire customer base. Here it is…

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I have observed the very best MSP sales pros in action and I have witnessed the very average MSP sales “wannabes” perform at a much lower level. What do winning MSP salespeople do — day in and day out — to separate themselves and their companies from the competition? Here are five behaviors that separate winning sales pros from the rest of the pack.

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When it comes to lead generation for managed services providers (MSPs), what’s really effective and what’s just hype?  It’s an age-old question that has riddled the channel for years and left many to take a shotgun approach to marketing and advertising, or even worse, to rely on their vendor and distribution partners for leads.  Either way you look at it, nobody is winning.

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