What Does ‘Managed Services’ Mean to Your Customers?

What are managed services? For many businesses, managed services are a great option for their productivity and efficiency, but only if they really know what it means. MSP allows technology contractors to monitor a business’s tech, not just their network as a greater entity, but also email and other parts of their tech.

Why would people want to use managed services for their IT solutions? Perhaps it is because in a recent survey over 60% of the respondents thought their IT could be better. The internet and ensuring a business’s representation on the internet are important when trying to meet the expectations of customers and prospect customers. A response that over 60% of all businesses think they could be doing better with their technology is a frightening number, so what can these companies do better?

MSP as Part of the Solution

One way to improve the responses of businesses is to provide them with MSP. For years, those who have used MSP have stated that they have changed because they were able to save money. They didn’t have to operate on a wait for it to break then fix it model, and they didn’t have to dedicate a salary to an IT person. Although savings are still important, and probably always will be for businesses, there are other reasons businesses are adopting an MSP model. 

Tied into the costs savings aspect using the MSP model are some other benefits that businesses don’t always consider cost savings, but they will save them money.

• Employees are more efficient and more productive. Sometimes computers do not run efficiently, they take longer to load, they lock up, and they have other problems. Someone has to either fix those problems, or the business will lose productivity. Even if a business doesn’t mark productivity in the cost savings column, it does make employees more efficient in their work.

Although it is almost impossible to really track return on investment for many changes a business can make, in this case many businesses responded that the ROI for MSP could at least be proved anecdotally if not proven quantitatively. People worked harder and production improved, even if they could not prove that it was because of a move to managed IT services.

• The compliance and security offered by having experts in IT is very important. In an age when big box stores, big banks, big insurance companies, and even political parties are being hacked, it offers piece of mind to know that a business is protected. Similarly, businesses may be well-intentioned with their efforts to protect their part of the cloud, or to protect their onsite data, but for those businesses that are on their own, that security often amounts to little more than trying to do the right thing and hoping. Using MSP helps give a business piece of mind by having experts in charge. These experts not only work to prevent hacking and malware, they also keep up with changes in technology; white and black hat changes.
• In the 21^st century, not having email is like working with both hands tied behind your back. What do most SMB’s do when their email goes down? Perhaps they cry, or they call “their guy”. MSP isn’t just about providing “regular” IT, it can be great for nearly all parts of your network including fixing problems before they happen, or before the email crashes.
• The problem is that too often people work on the use something, wait for it to break, then get it fixed. What happens if the thing that breaks is your car? You may have to walk to work for a while. What happens if that thing is part of your technology? You may not get any business done while the network is down. What could be worse is the business you are losing because customers, future customers, suppliers, and anyone else who needs to contact you cannot reach you. 

MSP can help fix the problem before things reach the state of all contact with the outside world being lost. The other consideration is when your hardware breaks down, it can take a week before a good mechanic can see you. When you simply wait for tech to break, it can take a while for a good IT person to get in. If that good IT person is contracted with your organization, they can often see those problems before they actually occur.

The Benefits of MSP

MSP can actually cost less than having an IT person on staff, and less than waiting for the break-fix solution. Fixing something before it actually fails is usually the cheaper solution. Downtime is minimized. Most IT firms that work on a contracted basis make certain they are available 24 hours a day, every day of the week and the year. If something happens in the middle of the night, they are working on a fix in the middle of the night.

For most small and medium sized businesses, MSP is a great way to protect their investment.