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MSPs Get Serious About Selling Their Services To The Channel
12:00 AM EDT Mon. May. 28, 2007
From the May 28, 2007 issue of CRN
Page 2 of 3
Do IT Smarter's Begg and ClearPointe's Johnson both say their companies are getting out of direct service sales and are focusing entirely on the channel.
"We have a couple of legacy customers that we're in the process of transitioning across [to resellers of Do IT Smarter services]," said Begg, whose remaining direct service clients are mostly near his company's San Diego base.
ClearPointe has gone so far as to name a director of channel development, Bob Longo. "In effect, we have shut off direct client sales," said Longo. ClearPointe, he said, "is a Microsoft network service shop." Everything else, especially sales, is up to the channel partner.
"If a direct client comes to us, I'm clear with them that we don't have the resources to set up a whole network for you and we'll be doing that through a partner. That means they're upgrading the client networks and doing the sales. And that takes a lot of work. The care-and-feeding business aspects are theirs and we do the NOC," Longo said.
If all of this sounds like a blurring of the line between vendor and MSP, it gets even more fuzzy when you look at a distributor like Ingram Micro, Santa Ana, Calif. Ingram earlier this month announced a new third-party hosted NOC and help desk as part of its Seismic managed services offering. Those services will be powered by Level Platforms software and operated by Rochester, N.Y.-based MSP Synergy Global Solutions.
Then there are the MSPs that sell services built on proprietary technology. Just about everybody considers them pure vendors. Count the aforementioned Zenith Infotech in that group, as well as TriActive, which last month launched its TriMSP 2.0 program built on its patented MicroAgent technology.
"The company's been in the managed service business for 10 years, but it was direct cold calls to medical facilities only," explains TriActive Vice President of Marketing Ron Halversen. "But the company had built this multimillion-dollar NOC, and they looked at that and saw that there was an opportunity to sell these services to MSPs."
According to Halversen, Austin, Texas-based TriActive has some 70 MSPs in its TriMSP program.
"The list price is $2.25 per-desktop, per-month for the partner for the desktop management suite. If they only want patch management, that's $1.15 or so a desktop. We're finding partners who are going to revenue in 10 to 15 days [after plugging in TriMSP]. We've got a partner who's been to revenue in six days. Whereas before, they were putting out $50,000 [for software] and not getting to revenue in six months," Halversen said.
Companies with MSP roots now going after business in the channel aren't limited to providers of server and desktop management services. There's Connectwise, a Tampa, Fla.-based MSP that now sells its PSA tools to MSPs and other VARs. Tucan Technologies, based in Los Angeles, offers hosted e-mail, Web and backup services to the channel.
"We started as an MSP, but after a while it just made more sense for us to sell outsourced IT solutions to channel clients," said Tucan President Thom O'Bryon.
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