Businesses asking - what should we offer
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In your business, are the systems currently virtualized? Do you have a robust phone system? Are you using VoIP? I bet that in your own organization there are many items that can be greatly improved, and as you improve those, you can say "Hey we can do this and that and offer this."
All because of the experience from doing it. Certainly you'd want to become an expert on the subject matter, but that comes from working with a product.
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@DustinB3403 said:
I'm just playing devils advocate, don't take it personal.
Here, SW are good places to find sources of "enlightenment" (for lack of a better word).
Be prepared to be severely "enlightened" here. In a good way, though. If you want and can handle it.
It might just turn your IT world upside down. Also in a good way.
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@DustinB3403 I just virtualized our servers but not our desktops. I have been asking to upgrade our phones, but to have the money to do so I need to get some more customers. Great advice though. Thank you.
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@BRRABill I have been spending more time on SW, it is a great tool.
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@adamevans4 said:
@BRRABill I have been spending more time on SW, it is a great tool.
This place in like real time texting. It's nuts. In a good way.
I'm like a broken record...
in a good way
in a good way
in a good way -
So you've virtualized your servers on what Hypervisor. Is there a need for HA? How was the system designed. Hopefully not like what's described here.
Think of what your business is running on today, give us some things to discuss.
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I'm not sure what @adamevans4 is asking for is the specific keys to anyone's kingdom.
As I mentioned when we started out on our MSP journey, we thought we'd just be managing computers. We were unaware there is an industry of 24/7 monitoring that drives most of the revenue. The things we THOUGHT we would be doing, no one really does. It's all about getting a view into the systems and going from there. We knew we wanted to help people with their computers, we just didn't know how. We found about about RMM, picked an RMM vendor (N-Able), and it all rolled from there.
What size company are you typically going after, for your client base?
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@adamevans4 said:
So we were traditionally a document center but have since started providing computer repair services. Now we are providing support to small businesses in the area. I were many hats in this organization and working hard to grow the business. I guess knowing the right questions will make finding answers easier. So from my initial topic I have received some great feedback and I value everyone's time. Going forward I will start paying closer attention to the needs of my customers and look to expand our services from there.
I guess a better question would have been "what services are you offering your customers now to help them improve their IT and help them do business better or more efficiently?"
We offer all IT services. Everything a Fortune 100 IT department would have.
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@adamevans4 said:
@DustinB3403 I just virtualized our servers but not our desktops. I have been asking to upgrade our phones, but to have the money to do so I need to get some more customers. Great advice though. Thank you.
Don't have the money to? How can you afford not to? Since it costs less to be VoIP the idea that you can't afford to doesn't make sense.
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@scottalanmiller it generally doesn't cost money to keep something that is working as is. So long as you don't have to put money out to maintain its current state.
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The thing with VOIP, though, is often even after buying a new system and phones, it's still cheaper than the old POTS system and gives so much more functionality and flexibility.
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@DustinB3403 said:
@scottalanmiller it generally doesn't cost money to keep something that is working as is. So long as you don't have to put money out to maintain its current state.
That is generally true but does not apply to VoIP where all of the cost is external.
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@BRRABill said:
The thing with VOIP, though, is often even after buying a new system and phones, it's still cheaper than the old POTS system and gives so much more functionality and flexibility.
Yup. Average ROI happens in one to two months. It's effectively instant money savings.
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I am not in the MSP business like many of you, but I have worked with different MSPs on the customer side. IMO it's not about the services you offer out of the gate, it's about building a relationship with your clients. You build a relationship by doing good work as @scottalanmiller mentioned, providing documentation, and offering services and products with detailed information and relevant recommendations.
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Also if you go the RMM route, most of them have extensive programs to help you select what you want to offer, figure out how to price it, and also how to present it. It's amazing the resources companies have for you to build you business and reach your clients.
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As a customer, price is definitely not the main focus. Any competent IT department and upper management understands how bad cutting costs can be. That being said, we don't want to overpay either.
My dad worked in TV repair and he worked for different shops during his career. He always told me that really cheap or really expensive (gouging) generally coincide with incompetence within a company. If you are confident in your industry there is no reason to undersell yourself and no reason to oversell yourself since your competence will get you repeat business.
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@IRJ said:
As a customer, price is definitely not the main focus. Any competent IT department and upper management understands how bad cutting costs can be. That being said, we don't want to overpay either.
My dad worked in TV repair and he worked for different shops during his career. He always told me that really cheap or really expensive (gouging) generally coincide with incompetence within a company. If you are confident in your industry there is no reason to undersell yourself and no reason to oversell yourself since your competence will get you repeat business.
I would agree, generally, if and only if I (as the customer) knew exactly what I needed, and the general price range for a service.
Price is always a focus, maybe not the main focus, but still a very important one. As the saying goes "Pick Two. Fast, Cheap, Good. "
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@DustinB3403 said:
@IRJ said:
As a customer, price is definitely not the main focus. Any competent IT department and upper management understands how bad cutting costs can be. That being said, we don't want to overpay either.
My dad worked in TV repair and he worked for different shops during his career. He always told me that really cheap or really expensive (gouging) generally coincide with incompetence within a company. If you are confident in your industry there is no reason to undersell yourself and no reason to oversell yourself since your competence will get you repeat business.
I would agree, generally, if and only if I (as the customer) knew exactly what I needed, and the general price range for a service.
Price is always a focus, maybe not the main focus, but still a very important one. As the saying goes "Pick Two. Fast, Cheap, Good. "
See my above post about building a relationship. Generally a good customer is going to go with the MSP that they have a relationship with. There are exceptions to the rule since MSPs aren't experts in every area.
For example, our MSP isn't an expert in SQL. Instead of trying to be a google warrior on the subject, they don't offer the service. We went with someone else who specializes in SQL for that project, but we are back to our main MSP for our other needs.
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@adamevans4 said:
@DustinB3403 I just virtualized our servers but not our desktops. I have been asking to upgrade our phones, but to have the money to do so I need to get some more customers. Great advice though. Thank you.
What about your phone system do you want to upgrade? The number of lines you have? the switch? the phones themselves?
VOIP and SIP only applies if you're talking about upgrading the lines and assumes the current system supports SIP.
If he's talking about the phones/system, that won't be free (for the phones).Hopefully his phone setup is less complicated than mine.
