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IT and Managed Services Newsletter
MSP University helps MSPs succeed...period.
January 2010 |
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| Welcome to MSP University |
Happy New Year!
New Year's Eve is on December 31, the final day of the Gregorian year, and the day before New Year's Day.
New Year's Eve is a separate observance from the observance of New Year's Day. In modern Western practice, New Year's Eve is celebrated with parties and social gatherings spanning the transition of the year at midnight.
Many cultures use fireworks and other forms of noise making in part of the celebration.
In the United States, New Year's Eve is a major social holiday.
In the past 100 years the "ball dropping" on top of One Times Square in New York City, broadcast to all of America (and rebroadcast in many other countries), is a major component of the New Year celebration.
The traditional time to make New Year's resolutions is New Year's Day. What are your plans for your business this year?
A New Year's resolution is a commitment that an individual makes to a project or the reforming of a habit, often a lifestyle change that is generally interpreted as advantageous. The name comes from the fact that these commitments normally go into effect on New Year's Day and remain until fulfilled or abandoned.
More socio-centric examples include resolutions to donate to the poor more often, to become more assertive, or to become more economically or environmentally responsible.
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| FREE MSP University Membership! |
 Have you created your FREE MSP University account yet? Just browse over to www.mspu.us and sign up to receive access to IT and Managed Services webinars, tools, forms and collateral to help you transform or improve your IT practice with valuable resources in areas of business operations, HR and hiring, sales and marketing and service delivery, project management and help desk operations.
Learn how to:
- Revolutionize your existing business model
- Transition existing break-fix customers to Managed Services clients
- Market to the right prospects and close Managed Services business
- Choose the right tools and technology to maximize your efficiencies as an MSP
- Build closer relationships with vendors and fulfillment partners
- Grow your revenue month after month, year after year
How much annuity-based revenue is your IT practice currently generating?
What is your company worth?
What are your plans for improvement?
Evaluate your options as an MSP with our FREE membership offer - why wait any longer?
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Select Image For a Boot Camp Preview!
Held in Orange County, CA on February 3rd-5th, our first Boot Camp of 2010 will be our best event yet, hosting well over 100 solution providers and nearly 30 of our sponsors' staff members. MSP University's Boot Camps provid direct, actionable training and tools to help our attendees implement business improvement and transformation strategies the moment they return to their organizations. Click here to find out how to attend our next 3-Day Boot Camp for FREE (a $2,995 value)! TRACK 1 - IT SOLUTIONS AND MANAGED SERVICES CEO OPERATIONS
TRACK 2 - IT SOLUTIONS AND MANAGED SERVICES SALES 101
TRACK 3 - IT SOLUTIONS AND MANAGED SERVICES SERVICE DELIVERY
Based upon MSP University's successful business, technical and sales and marketing methodologies, our comprehensive Boot Camps provide attendees the knowledge they need to operate profitable practices, shorten sales cycles to close more business faster and deliver services and solutions efficiently and more profitably.
Give us 3 days, and we'll give you the tools and techniques to transform your IT practice into an effective, repeatable revenue generator.
Attendes to MSP University's IT Solutions and Managed Services Operations, Sales & Marketing and Service Delivery Boot Camps receive:
- 3 Days of intensive IT Business, Sales & Marketing and Service Delivery Training
- 4 Reference Books and their companion comprehension tests
- Service Leadership Index™ Solution Provider Fundamentals Profitability Benchmark
- DISC Behavioral Profile
- Boot Camp On-Boarding Call
- Interaction with over 100 peers and IT Manufacturer, Vendor and Fulfillment Partner Sponsors
And much, much more...
Thanks to all of our Sponsors for our February Boot Camp - we couldn't do it without you!
Platinum Sponsors
Gold Sponsors
Silver Sponsors
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We're proud to announce that MSP University has acquired larger facilities on the second floor of our building, and recently completed our headquarters move. With 25 current full-time staff dedicated completely to your success, and 2 more in the hiring process, it was high time for an upgrade!
Pay us a visit next time you're in the area at:
7077 Orangewood Avenue, Suite 223, Garden Grove, CA 92841
We look forward to your visit! |
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Last time
we determined how to calculate the full burden for our billable
 employees. So how do MSPs take this formula and determine the
profitability of their service desk? Let's work through this together.
First you'll need to understand how to calculate full burden of your billable staff. Once you understand this, it is actually pretty simple to calculate profitability of your service desk and its staff.
Let's say you have 25 Managed Services Agreements averaging $3,000 each for a gross invoice amount of $75,000 per month.
Next let's assume you have 3 service desk technicians whose full hourly burden is $132.31/hr.
Finally let's estimate that for the last billable month, your
service desk technicians spent 150 hours managing service desk requests
and proactively patching, updating and optimizing your clients'
endpoints.
Let's summarize:
- Monthly Managed Services Billing = $75,000
- Service Desk Full Hourly Burden (3 x $132.31/hr) = $396.93/hr.
- Hours of service delivered last billable month = 150
Now let's do the math. Multiply the hours of
service delivered during the last billable month by your service desk's
full hourly burden to determine your full labor burden for the service
desk for the month:
150 x $396.93 = $59,539.50
Now determine your margin. Use a quick online calculator like Algebrahelp.com's here (you'll need Java installed to run it - where was this site when I was in school!) to discover that $75,000 is 25.97% greater than $59,539.50, so you've made an ok, if not terrific margin:
Margin = 25.97%
If this is your true profit from your service
desk, you've got some work to do in reducing costs and increasing
efficiencies, as best-in-class MSPs are realizing upwards of 60% margin on their deliverables!
Join MSP University for FREE to learn how to reduce your IT practice's costs, raise efficiencies, improve sales and increase the value of each sale! |
| MSP University FREE January Webinar Course Highlight |
Maximizing Service Delivery Profits During Economic Downturns...
2010 looks to be another year of belt-tightening for businesses. How will our economic outlook affect Managed Services Providers, and what can we do to weather the next 12 months to grow our businesses and become more profitable than we were in 2009? In this timely Webinar I discuss how to reduce costs, increase revenue and leverage existing client relationships in order to sell more solutions as a Trusted Advisor during times of economic uncertainty.
This Webcast focuses on how the recession will affect your customers and prospects, and what you can do to weather the next 12 months to grow your business and become more profitable than in 2009.
This discussion includes 10 key takeaways that will help you increase your profits in 2009 and beyond.
Click here to watch this informative Webinar (log in with your FREE MSP University credentials)
Browse to www.mspu.us/courses to download my companion White Paper titled "How to Maximize I.T. Service Delivery Profits During Economic Downturns" and access dozens of additional Webinars, forms, tools and collateral developed to improve your overall business operations, sales & marketing effectiveness and service delivery efficiencies - equaling increased profitability. |
| How Evolved Is Your MSP Business? |
"If you stop for a minute to think about everything it takes to run a Managed Services practice it can get pretty daunting. In fact, an IT services operation is among the most complex businesses to manage. In order to achieve a state of predictable profits and even modest growth, your business needs to be running on ALL cylinders. Everyone on your team needs to be coordinated like a well-oiled machine to effectively SELL, IMPLEMENT, DELIVER, and BILL your managed services efficiently, and flawlessly.
The Challenge Of Organic RootsThe vast majority of IT service shops are created by entrepreneurs who love technology, but somehow found themselves running a business. They have little to no formal business training and are likely to "bootstrap" their businesses based on "gut feel" rather than through a pre-planned business blueprint with lots of financial backing.
Processes are developed "on the fly" and based on trial-and-error, or are adopted based on past experiences at other companies. Services are based on what you and your team know how to do, and the tools you use to run the business are more often than not things you can get for free. Sound familiar?  Where Do YOU Fall On The IT Service Evolutionary Scale?It's surprising, but according to a recent study, about 5% of IT service firms still run their businesses with manual systems, relying heavily on personal memory and notes on pads. Another 15% still rely heavily on spread sheets and white boards to manage their business, and 25% have cobbled together their business management systems with stand-alone software applications and/or home-grown solutions. About one-third of MSPs are getting by using one of several general purpose CRM tools. But the top 25% of all MSPs rely heavily on purpose-built, commercial applications that integrate all of the key MSP business operations into a single application. These MSPs - both large and small -- are at the top of the IT services food chain, and the ones that are doing well, even through last year's tough economy. Five Steps You Need To Take Right NowIf you are not satisfied with the performance of your people and your company, it's probably because you're not running your business with the right system. Here are five things that will get you started in the right direction.
- Focus on Where You Want to Be. It doesn't matter what you use today to run your business. If it's not a purpose-built IT business Management System, it's not going to help you establish, track and manage the key processes and metrics you need to reach your goals.
- Get Your Business In "The Cloud. "That's where the technology is going, and you need to lead your clients by example. Take advantage of a hosted business management platform.
- Identify And Tackle Your Most Important Business Issues First. While an integrated system covers ALL parts of your business, it's too much to digest all at once. Implementing this type of system is a journey. Find your biggest pain point and start there.
- Tap Into A CommunITy. The best business management systems have large online communities built right into their platform, giving you a direct access to tens of thousands of your peers, who can help you out.
- Don't Put It Off. This might take a while, but you can start the process right now. Click here to get a one-on-one personalized review of your business and a demo of the leading hosted IT Services Management platform.
24x7x365 Network and Service Monitoring
The peace of mind that accompanies a fully monitored environment is invaluable for any business. Because the demands on today's organizations are increasingly global, monitored services should be 'globalized' as well.
How are you doing in the areas above? What are your clients saying about your services? Do you feel like you are out front and leading your clients or do you think that they are pulling you along? Are you the change agent or are they? An annual check-up in this area would be a good way to make sure that you are doing and providing the things necessary to keep your clients satisfied and asking for more. |
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MSP University Industry News |
Here are just a few of the accomplishments MSP University achieved in the month of December:
- MSP University delivers Managed Services Service Delivery Training at the ITA Fall Collaborative in Paml Springs, CA
- MSP University delivers Managed Services Training at Autotask User Group Meeting in Pasadena, CA
- MSP University conducts onsite Technical Service Delivery Training for Partner in Peoria, IL
- MSP University meets with Autotask for 2010 strategy session in East Greenbush, NY
- MSP University meets with CompTIA for 2010 strategy session in Chicago, IL
- MSP University meets with ConnectWise for 2010 strategy session in Tampa, FL
- MSP University meets with Ingram Micro for 2010 strategy session in Santa Ana, CA
- MSP University meets with MANAGEtoWIN for 2010 strategy session in Garden Grove, CA
- MSP University meets with Own Web Now for 2010 strategy session in Garden Grove, CA
- MSP University participates in Karl Palachuk's 50th and final SMB Conference Call
- MSP University participates in final Own Web Now Spam Show of 2009
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If you know anyone that might benefit from reading our newsletter, please forward it to them, and have a prosperous New Year!
Sincerely,
Erick Simpson
MSP University
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