Understanding how managed service providers, or MSPs, operate is at the core of our business. After all, if they don’t succeed, neither do we. To aid in our ongoing efforts to better understand our partners, we recently surveyed over 1,600 MSPs around the world to learn more about them. We asked them about everything from their daily lives and business operations, to their channel predictions for the year.
With this research, we’ve gathered a wealth of statistics covering everything from the technology they’re using and business challenges they’re facing, to where they get their news and how many industry events they attend annually.
Today, let’s dive into some of the top challenges MSPs report that they’re facing in 2019.
- Marketing and Sales: The majority of respondents identified sales and marketing as their top challenge. When we took a deeper dive and asked MSPs why this was, they called out a lack of in-house resources and weak backgrounds in these areas as the main causes. So how can MSPs tackle this issue? The partners we spoke with advised fellow MSPs to consider partnering with an IT vendor who offers marketing automation tools or co-marketing opportunities to overcome this hurdle.
- Work/Life Balance: According to our partners, maintaining a healthy work/life balance can be a major challenge for all MSPs, but especially those who are newer to the industry. Often, the owner is forced to wear a number of hats and do some tasks they may not be accustomed to. The partners we spoke with suggested streamlining services and reducing the number of vendors you work with to ease the burden and make your job a little simpler.
- Revenue Growth: Increasing revenue is everyone’s goal for their business, but it can be a major roadblock for many MSPs. According to our partners, it’s all about turning various aspects of a company’s IT infrastructure into managed services to provide a stream of recurring revenue. Whether you decide to turn to managed networking or a variety of other services, you’ll be able to expand your service offerings and create a healthier and more reliable revenue stream.
- Ransomware and Cybersecurity: According to our partners, businesses often go to their MSPs after being hit with ransomware. To prevent this, MSPs should focus on educating their clients and becoming more proactive, to avoid threats like ransomware before they become an issue and threaten operations. Offering a proper BCDR solution coupled with antivirus or ransomware protection is a great start.
In addition to these top pain points, we also found that MSPs struggle with hiring, technology issues, profitability, and internal operations. To find out what other topics are keeping MSPs up at night, check out our 2019 State of the MSP report. The report features everything from the demographics of MSPs to how they spend their free time and more. Check it out today.
Michael DePalma is channel development manager at Datto Inc. Read more Datto blogs here.
