Top 5 Mistakes MSPs Make in 2023

As businesses increasingly rely on technology to run their operations, Managed Service Providers (MSPs) play a crucial role in providing IT services and support to ensure that their client’s systems and networks are running smoothly. I am in the unique position of meeting and talking with many different MSPs around the country and have created a list of the Top 5 Mistakes MSPs generally make.

1. Lack of lasting expertise: Clients contact MSPs because they expect a certain level of expertise that they could not get from hiring their own IT Staff. However, the reality is that many MSPs have a high turnover rate, which in turn drops the level of knowledge that the MSPs can assist their clients with. This can result in poor service delivery or could even place their client’s data at risk due to improper setup and installation.
   1. Keep your staff happy and listen to their complaints.
      1. Provide regular performance reviews that show you are paying attention but not so much that they feel it’s micro-management.
      2. Everyone tends to think things through differently and therefore can provide invaluable feedback and recommendations if listened to and understood. People want to stay in places they feel they can make a meaningful difference.
   2. Pay your employees fairly and give the more valuable employees more, to keep them from looking elsewhere for a job.
2. Not being proactive: One of the main selling points of an MSP is proactive monitoring. However, many MSPs choose to buy the tool but not invest in using the tool to its full potential. All MSPs should be monitoring for hardware and software issues so they can be fixed before causing a large amount of downtime.
   1. Major Monitoring Must Haves:
      1. Hard drive Failure
      2. Power supply failure
      3. RAID Health Status
      4. Server Offline
      5. Backup Failures
      6. AV Status (Installed, Not Functional, Virus Detected, etc)
      7. Machines Failing Patching

• A good MSP adds new things to monitor and automate all the time and does not stick to the minimum monitoring expectations.

3. Lack of Attention to Client Backups: When clients sign with an MSP, they expect that you are taking care of the most important things in their business and that you will give them suggestions on things to change based on what you see during the initial audit of the environment. This topic could likely fall under ‘Not being proactive’, however, I believe this is a large enough issue to be classified in its own category. Backups are the only thing standing between your client’s business from surviving or not during a disaster. Always monitor your client’s backups because no matter what you explained to them during onboarding, they will claim that you were supposed to be watching it if you have a re-occurring contract with them.
   1. A good MSP takes backups seriously and validates through a variety of tools that backups are happening.
   2. Tests should also be performed regularly on backups to make sure data can be pulled and a bare metal restore is possible from them.
4. Lack of attention to Security: Security is one of the most important things for businesses today and MSPs are responsible for ensuring their client’s IT Infrastructure is secure. Some MSPs fail to provide the necessary software, processes, and procedures to properly protect their client’s data.
   1. Adequate firewall rules should be in place for all clients that block known bad content.
   2. Antivirus software should be installed on all devices and, if possible, monitored fully (Missing, Not Functioning, and Detected Threats)
   3. End Users should be trained as to what a phishing email looks like and how to spot them.
5. Poor Communication: It is essential that MSPs provide crystal clear communication to their clients that set the expectations realistically and leave no discussion open-ended with an opportunity for the client to misunderstand what you are saying. Many MSPs may stretch the truth to get the sale, ultimately leading to missed deadlines, misunderstood expectations, and if not hashed out immediately it could harm the client’s business down the line.
   1. Honesty is a magnetic trait and should be the top priority when communicating with prospective or current clients.
   2. Overpromising and underdelivering tend to happen all too often, so if you can under promise and overdeliver, it will place you well above your competitors!

The examples given below each common mistake are meant to provide some ideas on how to grow your MSP but do not dictate the only possible options. Please contact us to request more information. We look forward to hearing from you.