Building a successful managed services provider (MSP) business is about providing top-notch customer support and services and helping clients to improve their technology capabilities. However, to be able to do that, an MSP needs the right tools to support its customers.
What an MSP’s technology stack looks like may vary significantly from MSP to MSP. Internally, these tools might include remote monitoring and management (RMM), professional services automation (PSA), and other tools. It will also include those items that an MSP offers to its clients, such as networking, cybersecurity, hardware, and different types of technology.
Choosing these tools can be a make-or-break moment for an MSP. If there is a bad or less-than-ideal technology in the batch or if it is hastily thrown together, it may impact the MSP’s ability to provide these services to the customers’ satisfaction — potentially causing an issue down the road. That’s because, ultimately, it is through these tools that an MSP can deliver its services and technology value, backed up by the capabilities and commitment of its team.
Further reading How to Enhance Customer Experience
When building a stack, it is always essential to consider the customer first. What types of customers does an MSP want to sell to, and what technology will they need? This will vary significantly based on the size of the business or the industry. Additionally, an MSP business leader should consider the types of services those businesses need, so as to identify the technologies required to build out those capabilities.
Once an MSP has determined its customers' needs and the types of technologies that will deliver those capabilities, it should also consider how those technologies work together. Integrated technologies, either multiple capabilities available from the same vendor or solutions that can be integrated, can help ensure smooth delivery to customers as a single solution that is easier for an MSP and its team to manage.
Finally, cybersecurity is one area of technology that an MSP should pay particular attention to. Given the current level of cyber threats worldwide, an MSP must offer cybersecurity as part of its offerings to customers and evaluate any tool it provides to customers to ensure it is secure. MSPs should also ensure that they take these same precautions for their own businesses, given that attackers have also targeted MSPs in recent months.
MSP leaders should ensure that they aren’t onboarding so many tools that they can’t perform well with them, either internally or when delivering them to customers. While there are a lot of different technologies that MSPs may need in order to carry out all the services they want to deliver to their customers, it is also important not to have so many that they become unmanageable or difficult to keep track of. Additionally, although tools are helpful, they require training for the MSP teams.
An MSP should ensure it sells its stack as a solution, not just a collection of technologies. This can help a customer see the big picture, versus nitpicking technology by technology or trying to customize the stack themselves outside of what is currently available. This can create additional costs and headaches for the MSP.
There are many pieces and parts that go into building a successful MSP stack, as well as a profitable one. By ensuring that it is meeting the needs of its customers, integrating those products, and training its teams to deliver those technologies well, an MSP can help ensure a profitable future for itself, and a successful one for its customers.
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