Latest Blogs

Want a solid forecast, Create Demand!

By Pete Busam posted 18 hours ago
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Each week sales teams attend a status meeting where management exercises each member of the team for a status on accounts.  The reps do everything they can to justify their existence.  The meetings are typically not productive since they rehash what has already been provided in the past.  It sets the tone for the week and reps run from management when they seem them coming down the hall or the cell phone rings with caller ID that says “run”!  It truly is time that the management team gets focused on why sales are down and what is keeping the organization from moving forward. Well, let’s start with something simple.  Most organizations fail on a process to ...
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MSP Marketing. Tips For Social Media Engagement

By Galina Marcus posted 4 days ago
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Social media is a flexible tool that can be effectively used for your marketing, as we discussed in the previous posts of this series. It is inexpensive (or even free), it provides good exposure to the audience, it helps promote your services, and it boosts brand awareness. In this post, we talk about how to actively engage MSP prospects on social media. Most companies treat their social media activities as passive promotions. They make sure they have their three-four posts a day with relevant content and track the traffic generated by those posts. This can bring you some results and is not very time consuming, unlike actively engaging with your followers. ...
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What MSPs Should Focus on During Holiday Down Time

By Ashley Ogilvie posted 5 days ago
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Plans for the holidays? It’s time to make some. With Black Friday kicking things off as November came to a close, the holiday lull for many MSPs is starting to set in. While B2C companies anticipate the holiday buzz, B2B businesses like your MSP are often a little quieter. So how can you make the most of the quieter times around the holidays? You’ve got some options. In fact, the slow holiday season brings its own multitude of opportunities for MSPs to take advantage of as they prepare and press into the new year. We put some ideas together to help. The daunting documentation project you’ve been avoiding Documentation takes time, and it’s easy to get ...
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New Trends to Help Grow Your Managed Services Business In 2019

By Galina Marcus posted 13 days ago
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As an HTG Gold Member, we were honored to attend their November meeting in Orlando. This year’s event was especially significant for several reasons. Firstly, the HTG peer groups are now officially a part of ConnectWise events for MSPs all over the world. Secondly, this event highlighted some new trends and dramatic transitions most Managed Service Providers have to go through in order to preserve and grow their business. The recurring theme of the HTG event was adding SaaS services, including voice, cyber security, video conferencing, data circuits, and more, to an MSP’s portfolio. After all, the rapid rise of SaaS technology was supposed to make end-users’ ...
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Hello World

By Clayton Lee posted 16 days ago
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10 Print Hello World 20 Goto 10
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MSP Marketing How-To #10. LinkedIn Hacks for MSPs

By Yana Ermilova posted 18 days ago
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In my  previous post,  I outlined basic guidelines on how to start using social media for MSPs. Today, I want to focus on the specific importance of LinkedIn. As of   November 2018 , the total number of LinkedIn users is more than 562 million people. Now consider that 80% of B2B leads come from LinkedIn vs. 13% from Twitter and 7% from Facebook. Since this is where most of your B2B contacts will find you first, LinkedIn is considered a leading social media tool for B2B marketing. That’s why it is crucial for an MSP to have a strong LinkedIn presence. Here’s how to get started. Company Page If you haven’t done so yet, then you need to set up a company ...
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National Computer Security Day: Having the Security Talk with Your Clients

By Ashley Ogilvie posted 19 days ago
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Of course your clients care about their security, but do they know that you’re not the only one responsible for providing it? While security is at the forefront of your business practices, it may not always be for your clients. With National Computer Security day approaching on November 30th, there’s no better time than now to ensure you’re having the security conversation with your clients. Practice what you preach Before you start discussing computer security with your clients, make sure your own security practices are well ingrained into your MSP’s culture. In short, your clients can’t learn the benefits of something like Multi-Factor Authentication ...
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What to Look For in an IT Documentation Solution

By Ashley Ogilvie posted 26 days ago
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Ok, so you know you need to improve your documentation. Now what? In order to figure out what solution is going to work best for you, start by taking the time to understand what you want in a solution, and why. Here’s some things to look out for. Structured Documentation This is the big one. Without structure, all the documentation in the world isn’t going to help you. It just turns into information sprawl. So whatever your strategic objectives might be, you need a documentation system that has structure. Structure is what allows you to know what is documented, and it allows you to find it easily. In a perfect world, that structure is based on the needs ...
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Siegler's State of the Industry Update

By Mike Siegler posted 11-15-2018
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I had the pleasure of attending the Gartner Symposium & IT Expo and Channel Partners Evolution last month. The experience was enlightening and energizing. Both conferences shed light on macro changes in technology and the future of our industry. Below, I share some of my thoughts and insights. For me, a big standout today is the overall need for continuous, ubiquitous access to the Internet, and more importantly how the need for data is continuing to grow. “AI” Defined as Artificial or Augmented Intelligence, AI is permeating every business. Much like the Internet of Things (IoT) movement, this technology is changing how businesses operate, market ...
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CompTIA Podcast: Finding Your Place in the UCAAS Space, with Martin Tracey of LANtelligence

By Galina Marcus posted 11-15-2018
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As we at LANtelligence were preparing for our second annual "UCaaS as Part of Managed IT Services Business" survey, we've got a call from CompTIA's Managed Services Community manager Lisa Person. Lisa wanted to discuss the findings from the first survey we have conducted at the end of 2017 and learn about the changes we have seen happening in the MSP community throughout the year.  The timing couldn't have been more perfect! And as a result, we have recorded this episode for CompTIA Breaking Barriers with CompTIA's Managed Services Community podcast.  Listen To Podcast>>  As a Master Solution Provider in the premise and UCaaS space, Martin ...
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How to Take the Cybersecurity Leadership Mantle

By Ashley Ogilvie posted 11-14-2018
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Most people in the channel agree that cybersecurity is a major opportunity for MSPs, and building out a security offering is one of the best ways to differentiate. That is, until everybody else does it. Then the competitive landscape looks like a bunch of MSPs all wanting to be a “trusted security advisor”, and they’re all offering some variation of the same stack of services. How do you convince a small business owner who knows nothing about cybersecurity that you’re the one to hire? There’s two ways. One is to be a cybersecurity leader and the other is to pretend that you are. If you’re slick enough, you can do just fine pretending, but eventually ...
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Compliance and Security Survey from Axcient

By Kaitlyn Langer posted 11-13-2018
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Axcient's Chief Information Security Officer, Joshua Foltz, and Axcient's International Strategic AM, Helen McHugh, are interested in gathering feedback from the IT Nation Evolve International peer groups on three short questions regarding security, compliance and data privacy . We will incorporate your feedback into a new, user-friendly slide deck that you can leverage during security and compliance discussions with your clients. Our goal is to save you time during client conversations.  Please complete the survey here
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How to Reduce Stress in Your MSP

By Ashley Ogilvie posted 11-07-2018
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The less stress, the more success. It’s that simple, and yet statistics show it’s also incredibly difficult for businesses to achieve. The   American Institute of Stress   reports that job stress is the biggest source of stress for Americans, and outcomes include heart attack, hypertension and worse. 90% of Americans report some stress on the job, and 40% report extreme stress. On the other side of the border,   one in four Canadians   cite stress as the reason for leaving their job. If you run a business, managing stress matters. Today marks National Stress Awareness Day, and it feels like there’s no better time than now to dive into how you can reduce ...
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UCaaS Market Sees Growth, Recurring Revenue Streams

By Galina Marcus posted 11-01-2018
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Long-term growth, high margins, and recurring revenue streams make the UCaaS market a captivating opportunity for Managed IT Service providers. Although it’s forecasted to grow by double digits through 2023 , it’s not just the size of the UCaaS market that makes it attractive to MSPs. The North America voice landscape is in the middle of a radical disruption that is allowing smaller, emerging players positioning cloud-based solutions to compete and win against traditional voice incumbents. Customers are moving away from conventional capital technology purchases and embracing new consumption-based models. The pay-as-you-go nature of UCaaS fits the bill perfectly ...
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Activate Your Sales Team to Drive New Business

By Galina Marcus posted 11-01-2018
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By Joe Schiavone @LANtelligence In this article, we’ll be continuing to explore executive vision and the strategic acquirement of new business by Managed IT Services Providers. We’d like to share some more advice on distributing this vision down to the sales teams as they are a moving power for any new business for their companies. As a vendor, we often see situations where the CEO has already come forward with the strategic partnerships, but his sales force is dragging their feet or being resentful. Despite the new vendor’s efforts to create a comfortable place for the salespeople to learn and sell the new products or services and grow their company’s bottom ...
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Designing Flags in IT Glue

By Ashley Ogilvie posted 10-25-2018
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The flags feature in IT Glue adds a ton of functionality, in particular where business process improvement is concerned. The power of the feature lies in how open-ended it is: you create and deploy flags however best suits your business. But there is a risk of “flag sprawl” if you’re not careful, so let’s walk through a few pointers about designing and deploying flags. Some of this advice borrows from the study of information architecture, so it should be fairly intuitive. Universal or Organization-Based One of the first decisions you’ll need to make regarding flag design is whether you want to create universal flags or organization-based flags. Some things ...
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Webinar: Kiss Stale Documentation Goodbye, it's time for Automation!

By Vincent Tran posted 10-24-2018
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Kiss Stale Documentation Goodbye, it's time for Automation! Join us on October 25 at 1PM CST for a LIVE Webinar   - Register Here with Michelle Lenzen, our Partner Success Manager and Shawn Sailer VP of Managed Services Strategy Manual data collection is costing your team time, energy, and sanity. In this webinar, we'll share how you can start using automation to document your customers' environments during their onboarding process. Starting off on the right foot means giving your team access to accurate documentation that's always up to date. Automation is the answer. Together, we'll explore how you can automate data collection throughout the sales ...
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What Happens When A Financial Institution Goes Down

By Mike Siegler posted 10-18-2018
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Today’s world lives on the Internet. We expect most everything to be at our fingertips – whether it’s dinner reservations or online banking – we’re always on. Credit unions and banks, for example, rely on the loyalty of their members and customers for success. Those loyal patrons, in turn, depend on their services to be available 24 x 7 x 365. So, what happens when a service goes down? The Three-Day Outage… Canada’s largest credit union, Vancity,   recently experienced a three-day service disruption. Customers were not able to access their online accounts, check balances, pay bills or complete electronic money transfers. Due to this substantial outage, ...
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Social Media Tips for MSPs

By Yana Ermilova posted 10-16-2018
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Why is a Social Media Presence Important for MSPs? As we mentioned in our previous post, social media is an essential aspect of digital marketing nowadays. In the big pool of managed service providers, a social media presence will help individual MSPs stand out, increasing their business visibility and brand recognition. By sharing your knowledge and relevant content, you boost your reputation as a leader in your field. By having a social media presence, you make it easier for your customers and prospects to find you and connect with you. Which Social Media Platform Should I Use? If you don’t have a social media presence yet and are overwhelmed by the ...
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Explore IT Glue’s Documentation Tools

By Ashley Ogilvie posted 10-10-2018
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If you think you’re on your own in this   documentation journey , think again. We’re not just here to provide you with tips and tricks on how to get into a   documentation rhythm , we’re here to provide you with the tools you need to keep that rhythm strong. With that said, let’s dive in and explore some of IT Glue’s awesome documentation tools that work to transform the quality and efficiency of your documentation. Integrations We get it, great documentation can be a lot of work sometimes. But with our wide variety of integrations, we help take care of some of that workload for you. Our Development team consistently works to create and implement a variety ...
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