Saturated Market? So, Why Start Up an MSP?

Managed service IT is here in a big way. Some even say the market is already saturated.

The managed service provider community is incestuous as it is. As July gets underway, the MSPAlliance is competing with a growing relationship between MSP University and CompTIA. This is combining many MSPs, VARs and potential clients into one big pot. As the MSPAlliance's MSPWorld Conference and Expo in L.A. in October looms, it will be interesting to see what trends develop.

"I think managed services in general is a growing trend and will be profitable as it evolves and gets more competitive," said Mike Ritsema, president and proprietor of i3 Business Solutions. "Certainly competitors are cropping up everywhere because the opportunities are so vast."

Under the Umbrella
The high growth and potential saturation leads to one understanding what one needs to get out of a managed services opportunity. Managed services encompass a lot of things. In fact you could say the term itself is both vague and transcendental in the world of technology, as it encompasses everything from hosted applications, to network administration and support, to virtual helpdesks and back-up and disaster recovery services.

Indeed that's a lot of IT ground to cover. It's actually too much to cover if you're a small- or medium-sized business looking to grow through technology expansion, or a tech service provider looking to broaden your portfolio of products.

Here is list of questions to ask yourself when considering a managed services platform:

From an SMB vantage:

• Do you want a partial or all-inclusive IT management and support at a fixed monthly cost?
• Do you want guaranteed or at least extremely reliable response times for helpdesk services?
• Do you want money back guarantee on Service Level Agreements you set up with your chosen vendor?
• Do you want to hire a trained technical staff without having to put a highly-trained technical staff on your own payroll?
• What are your technology needs?

From an IT service provider vantage:

• Would you like to focus on growing your client base instead of putting money into developing new technologies?
• Would you like to at least appear larger and more scalable in practice than you actually are by retaining a third-party service provider or channel partner?
• What are your technology needs?

Posted by Jabulani Leffall on July 07, 2010