Search Engine Optimization (SEO) can be a daunting task for anyone who doesn’t have a background in marketing. SEO is how you get your site or business found. While following the basics will almost always be the right choice, there are tricks which can help an MSP get an edge over the competition. Let’s look at the 13 easiest things you can do for your MSP (though a lot of this advice applies to most businesses) to improve organic SEO.

Keywords

When someone performs a search, they use keywords or important terms to try and find a specific result. This is the foundational concept behind how a search engine works. Keywords used to live in special tags or be derived from the title, but computing has grown and search algorithms have gotten exponentially more complex. Almost everyone is familiar with keywords, but how they work has changed substantially. Keywords don’t just live in a title or a tag, they live in the content.

1. Targeted Keywords

What does your page or solution provide and how would a prospective client find it? This is the most important question to answer before even starting to create content. Once you have an answer, you can begin planning keywords which are relevant. For instance, if you’re writing about backups, you want to target the core keywords for backups, but also the specific keywords which help qualify your article.

We use terms like backup, BDR, and disaster recovery to cast a wide net for generic information on backups. This isn’t enough though, we want to get some of the long-tail searches even if they’re tangential. We work in terms like cloud, on-premise, virtualization, tape, etc. to make this content more appealing to more search users (and ideally anyone reading as well). Target keywords, but make sure they’re relevant to your content. This is the foundation to everything you do with SEO for any content.

2. Use Synonyms

You may have noticed that a lot of those keywords I mentioned seem a bit redundant. Backups and BDRs are arguably the difference between rectangles and squares. A search engine algorithm might use synonyms to help a user direct their search, but an exact match is still worth more. Pepper in synonyms and similar terms where they fit to cast a wider net.

This is especially important for MSP’s since your client may not always know what to search. They don’t necessarily know what DRaaS is before they talk to you, but they do know what they want (or at least have an idea) when they search (and it may be as vague as “to have backups”). The more generic or simple terms you can work in (especially early on) the more likely you are to get and retain a prospective client. Spicing up terms benefits more technical content as well.

Links

Inbound and outbound links can influence search rankings. Who you link to, and who links to you will impact your search engine ranking. Links are still important, but link farming (arbitrarily putting links on sites, or link farm sites to manipulate search rankings) is a quick way to get dropped. How can you squeeze an extra ounce of link juice (the value of a piece of content based on inbound links) out of your content without crossing a line?

3. Internal Links

The quickest and easiest way to increase link juice (which improves your SEO) is to link to your own content. You can’t just spam the same links or random links; they have to fit the content. Internally referencing your own blog or assets (in a way which contextually fits) is an extremely easy way to get an edge without any real downside.

Got an article explaining what something is? Link to it on other pages where you use the concept. Don’t be afraid to edit older content to add links to newer articles. This gives clients (or peers) a way to dig deeper and stay on your site while (ideally) deriving value.

Content

Modern search engine algorithms don’t just look at keywords and titles, they look at the entirety of the content and everything on the page. The main “trick” to good organic SEO is to just make better content. What question does your content answer and for whom? While good content is the main key to good SEO, that doesn’t mean there aren’t things you can do to improve the odds or make content shine even more.

4. Clearing Assets

Any asset which you use needs to be legally obtained or applied (the license matters). You can’t just download an image off the internet and use it. This seems like it would be common sense, but there are countless people who don’t follow this rule. If you used to do it before you knew better, fix it now.

It’s arguably content theft, but to top it off, it will hurt your SEO. It can also get you dropped entirely or even a DMCA takedown notice. Clear all assets you plan to use and make sure you have them licensed or use something with a free or public domain license. Attribution is also important depending on the license.

5. Subheadings and Organization

Headings, subheadings, and their organization can also impact SEO. The “ideal” at present is between 100 to 300 words per subheading for most content. These little changes in organization can enrich the keywords a search engine picks up on and in turn increases your SEO.

Most search engine algorithms give preference to content which is emphasized in some way. The most common way to do this is via test markup like em or strong tags, or h header/title tags. Make sure you highlight things which are important. You don’t even need to rewrite the whole thing. A little extra organization of content and subheadings leads to a boost in SEO.

6. Content Consistency

A bad verse in an otherwise great song can ruin the whole thing. Likewise, inconsistent quality can be as bad as consistently bad quality. Having poorly written content and keeping it for a misguided attempt at optimizing keywords or similar hurts your SEO. This can be a paragraph or a page.

This isn’t a judgment on your writing, but what content do you have which is (or has since become) wrong? An article about Windows Server 2003 won’t hurt anything, but an article about best practices for wireless security from the days of WEP will. It isn’t just dated, it can be harmful.

If everyone who Googles “best MSP near me” clicks your page and jumps to the next result because the content sucks, Google’s algorithm takes notice. If some of your content is bad, it can tarnish the rest too though. Where a reader lands can be as important as whether they even click. If content doesn’t work anymore, pull it. Make sure that the content you have stays consistent with the message you’re trying to broadcast to your clients without confusion.

Content Length

A long article has a different impact on SEO than a short article. A short article weekly has a different effect on SEO than a long article sporadically. You can create countless comparisons but the rule of thumb is that more is usually better. More content more often, or more words on a single article.

7. The Magic Word Count

Most search engines hit a soft SEO plateau around 1,000 to 1,500 words. The bigger ones tend to favor a bit more, usually 1,200 or more is ideal. Google, Bing, and basically any other modern search engine is going to reward you for longer content, you just hit diminishing returns from it.

The one thing to take of note of though is that substantially less than 1,000 word articles (say around 800 or less) tend to be worth less for SEO. Some content doesn’t need to be that long and trying to force it just harms it (like a contact page). SEO rules, especially this one, tend to be a bit like English spelling rules. The rule applies until it doesn’t.

Conclusion

SEO is SEO in any industry, the difference is how valuable a specific factor is over another. These tools and techniques work as basic tools for all kinds of specific SEO. A local business will benefit less from a global presence. One of the big differences for SEO for an MSP is the focus on both local and general reach.

You want your company to be the first result locally for prospective clients, but you also want vendors and other businesses to be able to find your site. These give you opportunities for growth and development of your business.

Meet Kenneth Perrot, Account Manager

What do you do here at The 20?

I am an Account Manager, so I work with our current customers to ensure their satisfaction and success within the group.

Describe The 20 in three words…

Exciting, Fun, Challenging

As a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up? 

I used to watch a lot of Forensic Files as a kid and wanted to be a Forensic Scientist, until I realized I wasn’t all that great at science.

What’s the most challenging thing about your job? 

The most challenging part would be when there is an issue that comes up where I might not have the most expertise. Thankfully I am surrounded by great team members that I can gain knowledge from to help find solutions to those issues!

What do you consider your greatest achievement? 

I would consider my greatest achievement graduating college and moving halfway across the country to a state where I didn’t really know anyone! The personal and professional growth that has come from this experience has been huge.

What do you think is the most important quality necessary for success? 

Work ethic and drive. “Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.”

What do you like most about The 20? 

I love the overall atmosphere and the day to day interactions I get to have with my coworkers! The 20 employs great people who make me look forward to going to work. We also have great customers who make work enjoyable as well!

What do you like to do in your spare time? / What are your hobbies? 

In my spare time I am very active! I’m in the gym 5-6 days a week, enjoy playing golf, basketball, disc golf, and tennis.

Where are you going on your next vacation?

My next vacation will be a trip back to Tampa for Thanksgiving to see friends and family!

What’s your top life hack?

Always try to be polite and well-mannered when you can! You attract a lot more bees with honey than vinegar.

Interested in working with Kenneth at The 20? We’re hiring! Check out our Careers page for more info.

Thank you for making Virtual VISION 2020 a success! 

The 2020 Virtual VISION Conference featured an impressive speaker lineup, best-in-class thought leadership, actionable content sessions, channel trends, interactive peer panels, and virtual peer networking – all focused on growing your IT services business. Keynote speaker Gary Vaynerchuk, prolific entrepreneur and 5-time New York Times bestselling author, shared business growth strategy and marketing tactics. The speaker roster also included Walter Bond and Mark Manson. Hailed as the most important MSP event of the year, VISION brought together top MSPs and IT service providers for two impactful days of speakers, sessions, and networking focused on business best practices, thought leadership, and growth. 

Virtual VISION 2020 Featured Sessions:  

• The New MSP Landscape | Tim Conkle 
• The Only Thing Stopping You is You | Walter Bond 
• How to Build a Sales Pipeline That Closes Deals Consistently | Mark Elliott 
• Keynote Speaker: Gary Vaynerchuk aka “GaryVee” 
• Top 3 Strategies for Engaging Remote Customers | Eric Townsend, Dell 
• The Law of F*ck Yes or No | Mark Manson 
• Security in the MSP Space: Threats, Opportunities & Strategies to Position Yourself for Success | Matt Solomon, ID Agent 
• Tightening Up Your Security Stack To Avoid MSP FUBAR | John Hammond, Huntress 
• Panel Discussions: MSP Marketing 101, Making the Jump to AI, Shadow Channels 

“The 20’s model is poised to dramatically disrupt the MSP market, and a critical piece of this strategy is expanding and enabling the right type of partner base in order to accelerate nationwide growth. With Virtual VISION coming to a close, we are excited for the continuous growth and to see you all in 2021.” – Tim Conkle, Chief Executive Officer of The 20 MSP.  

Thank you to all of our sponsors! We had an amazing time in the virtual world with all of you and can’t wait to see you all  in 2021.  Stayed tuned for VISION 2021 dates at the20.com.  

5 Things MSPs Need to Know About Backups

Backup and Disaster Recovery (BDR) is an entirely different skill set which builds on standard IT knowledge. You have to have a certain level of basic IT understanding to implement a BDR solution for a client, but you also have to know about how the BDR process works to make it efficient. A little bit of understanding can go a long way for putting all of the parts together.

This article covers some of the basics that any MSP needs to know about Backup and Disaster Recovery in order to understand the process. There’s more to it than just grabbing a solution and slapping it onsite. There are a plethora of options, and very few of them compete in the exact same space. There are also technical considerations which are required to make the solution work as intended.

How Should You Migrate Backups?

Migrating data is one of the most painful parts of the backup and restoration process. Data migration happens when you’re either moving solutions, restoring from backup, or backing up a backup. The source is as important as the process.

Backing up a backup tends to be the least time constrained of the three. A cold backup or similar is typically for security rather than necessity. This is where you backup the backup to the cloud or similar for redundancy. If you don’t use a cloud solution, this can be done via a simple external drive (not ideal), or a separate NAS appliance on the network. It’s best to try and convert the backup to the ideal form for separate storage at this stage. If the secondary solution doesn’t work with SQL servers, run a manual database backup and back that up. The easier it is to work with the backup of a backup, the better. You’ll need it when you least expect it.

Restoring from backup is going to be constrained by time. You want to focus on speed at this point since every second the client is down hurts their business, and potentially your relationship with them. If they use a cloud solution and have a slow connection, can you take a drive and physically restore it off-site with a faster connection? This is the step to pull out the stops for.

Moving solutions is the more nuanced migration path. You need to get the backups out of one format, and into another which is usually time intensive. Time constraints hinge on the reason for the migration. If the previous solution failed, then it might be a bit more urgent than something with a nice handover. What do you do when one of these situations happen?

What Makes Legacy Data Hard to Work With?

We know there are still people using floppies out in the wild. Older technologies don’t die until the last media or device does. Even tape is still alive and kicking (more often than it should).

You’re going to run into clients who don’t know about media degradation, or just won’t spend the money to change how things are done. The drives have been there for 10 years, they should be fine, right? Moving a client like that requires more momentum than usual.

Tape, while dated, is also extremely efficient when done right, but it’s also extremely expensive. You need to fight the momentum to “get their money’s worth” and a format which has lasted decades as an IT mainstay. The problem is when they refuse to upgrade a decades old machine and parts are scarce.

There are still places which use burned CDs and DVDs to store software versions, and places with old floppies in their drawers. What does their business still potentially rely on in a rare scenario? The data on old floppies may win a lawsuit, but only if they’re readable. I’ve been in a spot where the data on an old floppy made the difference between a deal being a good idea or a bad one, but I had to have the tools and the know-how to get the data off.

A USB floppy reader isn’t much, but a tape machine is. Some formats require special knowledge to troubleshoot. You have a cost for hardware, but one for knowledge too. The skills don’t really transfer either.

On top of all of this, backing up data is good, but you have to be able to use the data later. What do you do if nothing can read the data? Are these elements factored into your BDR plan?

What’s the Difference: Cloud, On-Premise, or Hybrid?

Each solution has its own mix of advantages and weaknesses. Comparing a cloud and an on-premise solution can feel like comparing apples and oranges, so the hybrid approach just buys both. This is fine if you have the money, but breaks down if you don’t. It also breaks down if there aren’t compatible solutions.

Cloud solutions are best in locations with low requisite data to function, and/or high bandwidth. The lower the bandwidth and the higher the amount of necessary data, the less realistic the cloud gets. Though, it’s still ideal as an alternative or off-site backup even on slower connections. These solutions tend to be most costly on a month by month scenario, but what is the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO)?

On-premise solutions are solid choices traditionally, but they suffer from several concerns. You have a higher initial cost for a lower maintenance cost. You also take ownership of the risk when a drive pops or a surge happens. When the site’s down (power, internet, etc.), your backup solution is too. Some cloud solutions can be rigged to get a VM or at least file-share running elsewhere to limp along.

Hybrid solutions combine the benefits of an on-premise solution with a cloud solution. The cost is primarily financial. You have to maintain an on-premise device, the service for it, and a cloud solution. The major benefit is that you provide a substantially better backup solution with more flexibility and redundancy.

Which Is Better: Cloud, On-Premise, or Hybrid?

Each of these solutions is different, but none of them are objectively better. The cloud solution trades local networking access for a more resilient medium. This solution also relies on an app or similar to sync, so the average ransomware attack is typically useless against the backups. A backup is a backup.

On-premise solutions are typically faster, more robust failovers, but also suffer from being physical devices onsite. If a drive pops, it’s on you to fix. If it’s vulnerable to certain attacks, ransomware may take both your client and their backup in one swoop.

Hybrid approaches get the best of both worlds, but at the cost of maintaining multiple solutions. Some vendors like Unitrends offer hardware programs to offload some of this cost, but no matter who you use, a hybrid approach is going to be more than any single approach. Not every vendor offers both either.

The best solution is the one which works the best for you and, more importantly, your client. While this seems commonsense, it requires you to know what works best for your client rather than just what works for you. Some solutions are more flexible than others, but some are definitely one-trick ponies.

What does their internet connection look like? Do they have usable hardware or is an on-premise solution an additional expense? How much data do they typically use, how much do they need, and how much is it worth to ensure access? There’s a continuous cost-benefit analysis which needs to be done to decide the best solution. To top it all off, how much is it worth to them, and you, to learn to deal with this solution?

What Are the Big Pitfalls Between On-Premise and Cloud Solutions?

Hybrid solutions round off the problems of either by buying their way out, but what is the real difference between the individual pieces? What gotchas are there for on-premise versus the cloud? Each solution is different, but there are inherent differences between the cloud and on-premise solutions.

What bandwidth is available? The more bandwidth the site has, the more practical a cloud solution is. One thing many backup specialists forget about is the cost in terms of time and money to restore a backup. Slow uploads with slow changes can mask the cost of a slow download.

How much data is required to function? The more data is necessary the more an on-premise solution makes sense. You can physically pull a hard drive but you can’t really pull a drive out of the cloud. Some businesses build off of terabytes for their day-to-day operations, others only need a little bit. Where is your client?

Money is another concern. A business can’t function without IT, but they’ll cut corners unless it hurts enough. IT is viewed as an expense to most businesses. Can you move them if the cloud is the wrong answer for backups but it’s cheaper?

While each of these factors has an effect, what do you do when a client is a mismatch of bad for both solutions? A combination of a site with slow bandwidth, bad infrastructure, security issues, low budget, and a high amount of data is not going to fit either an on-premise or cloud solution. While this sounds like a nightmare, they still want to eat their cake and have it too. How you plan for this can be the difference between signing a client and losing them.

How Do You Sell Backups?

Very few people realize the value of a backup until they need one. Techs tend to experience this earlier than many career paths, but there are lucky people who’ve never truly felt this lesson. You don’t realize the value of an eraser until you make a mistake.

A client which has lucked out on every disaster will be harder to sell to. The desire for a backup comes from the understanding of what happens without data or an encounter with the solution itself. You don’t need a client to experience disaster to know they need backups (but it helps).

Ransomware runs rampant waiting for the next vulnerability and bit of luck to stick. Hard drives, tapes, etc. die with age. Even the wrong user can break everything if they hit the wrong thing. You need to do is make your client aware of this risk and how it impacts them.

Very few businesses say no to a backup after their first disaster. The problem is that very few stay in business after their first major disaster. We aren’t dealing with fear mongering; we’re looking to prevent catastrophic risk.

It’s one thing to not have insurance for a car you own, it’s a different thing to drive without it. When your client tries to operate without backups, they’re driving their employees and clients around without insurance. You’ll be fine until you aren’t. The more data you need, the worse off you are in a crash.

Backups aren’t just a good idea; they’re insurance against the technical unknown in many respects. Sell your clients on the benefits of backups by understanding what makes their business work. IT isn’t a service, it’s a utility. How do you keep your client from destroying themselves without breaking the bank?

Meet Lance Keltner of UNI Computers!

Tell us a little about your MSP…

UNI Computers was established in 1993 as a computer repair store in Lawrence KS.  I took over ownership in 2006 after working there for 7 years.  At that point, business managed services was a very small part of the business, but I knew it would be the future and where I needed to focus growth.  I continued to put time and effort into growing the business services side of the company and today it accounts for more than half of our total revenue.

How long have you been a member of The 20?

We joined The 20 in 2018 and are a bit past 2 years of being a member.

Why did your MSP originally look to partner with The 20?

The selling point for me was two fold and equal in importance:  #1 was the pre-curated stack of tools and security with the foundation already set and process in place to use, sell, and manage it.  #2 was the community.  I know enough to know what I don’t know, and having a large community of people just like me with all different experiences and skillsets is ultra-valuable.  Whenever I need an answer or solution to something, chances are someone has it and already knows it works.

Tell us about the biggest change in your business since joining The 20.

The biggest change for us is having a solid process that I didn’t have to invent from the ground up over the course of years that’s already proven to work.  I sell with supreme confidence backed not only by me, but also vetted by scores of other businesses around the country doing it the same way as I do, every day.

What do you like most about being a member of The 20?

What I like most is definitely the community.  I’ve formed life-long friendships here, which is not something I always do easily.  Everyone is here to help out.  No one is afraid of someone else stealing their stuff.  That’s rare in the world where everyone generally keeps their cards close to the vest.  I also like that if I need to get top leadership of The 20 on the phone for a call, it’s easy to do, and they are ready and willing to help with anything.  Our suggestions are taken seriously and more often than not brought into practice and used.  We are part of the process that makes The 20 better today than it was yesterday.

What do you think is the most important quality necessary for success?

The biggest quality for success is the willingness to change and adapt when it’s shown that you can do something better than you were doing it previously.

What are your biggest business challenges?

My biggest challenges personally are marketing and sales, which The 20 has helped with immensely but also the community and the people I have met have helped equally as much. The collaboration I’ve been able to do with other members has been priceless.

What are your areas of focus for 2020?

My biggest areas of focus are getting in front of prospects and keeping the pipeline full.  COVID brought about a lot of instant change, but we were fortunate enough that our base of clientele was very stable and so we haven’t suffered like some MSPs have.  Reaching new customers and bringing them the security and support they need has definitely been more challenging, and is the key area I’m working on as it dictates our overall growth.

What advice would you share with an MSP looking to scale their business?

Join The 20!  Seriously. Tim says the three most important things you can do are 1. Lead Gen, 2. Sales, 3. Scale.  That’s what The 20 is built on and what its focus is.  If joining isn’t possible, then those three things are still what you have to do, anyway you can.  They will decide how successful your MSP can be. Period.  I’ve doubled my MRR since joining The 20. This is the way.

What book are you currently reading?

I am currently in a few different books, which are all great:  The 4hr Work Week – Tim Ferris, Traffic Secrets – Russell Brunson,  Building a StoryBrand – Donald Miller.

Favorite blogs / podcasts

I haven’t been much of a podcast guy as I usually like reading more, so for blogs/sites it would be:

 1. The 20’s Teams community!

 2. Chris Wiser’s marketing program communities

 3. Cyware’s security daily email

 4. Recorded Future’s daily email

Interested in becoming a member like UNI Computers? Click here for more information!

A Foot in the Door: Shadow Channel Marketing

Crystal McFerran, CMO | The 20 

Shadow channels tend to instill fear in most Managed Service Providers (MSP), but the general process that makes them work is neutral (though the actual implementation may not be). It can be a legitimate foot into the door for a new client as much as it can be an underhanded way to poach clientele. If you distill the concept down, you get the natural next step for customer retention. Rather than just bringing the customer back, you want the relationship to progress.

The difference between an email list being spam or welcomed is in how it is executed. Trying to win a customer by screaming how bad everyone else is, and how you would do them right is going to be at best tacky, but more often it’s seen as sleazy. Winning a customer by showing them the best you have to offer, then baiting and switching is going to be equally unethical (and shortsighted). But, how is winning a customer over through better marketing and service different than a standard sale?

Sometimes, you just can’t win a customer for the contract, but you can get a transaction (or limited contract). A transaction doesn’t have to be a one time exchange though, it can be your foot in the door. If you know what the customer wants and can get it to them, why shouldn’t you try?

Getting a Foot in the Door

While transactional marketing has its place, it makes less and less sense for modern technology offerings. Shadow channel marketing requires a different approach. Why sell a single piece of software when you can sell a subscription? A transactional approach to most IT solutions ends up as a way to write yourself out of the story. A perfect piece of software means that clients have no reason to upgrade.

If you only charge once, you only get paid once. If you do everything right, that customer won’t be back anytime soon (once their problems are solved). The better you are, the worse this effect is, especially with break-fix models. While you can’t always sell a subscription, a transaction doesn’t have to be the limit of the exchange.

While some customers just want a specific solution and don’t plan to do anything further, others are on the fence. If you market right, you can turn a transaction into more. You just have to know what to target and how. The idea is simple, the implementation is not.

You have to provide something which shows what you are capable of, then have a plan to turn your foot in the door into a way in. Sometimes this means more ongoing transactions, other times this means your client buys into your service offering. Either way, it requires a good understanding of your client and how to make them aware of what you can offer.

Turning Transactions into Targets

One of the first steps in turning a transaction into a relationship is understanding why it happened at all. Was the customer just looking for a solution and you fit, or are they looking because they don’t know what they want? While there are far more reasons than this, this line of reason can be used to extrapolate out the ideas behind how to approach and qualify their transaction.

Most transactions are going to be rooted in either short-term needs or market exploration. People will pay for the convenience of here and now but don’t want anything more. You have to understand what your client wants and why they chose your service.

People buy something for a reason, so why is your customer buying from you? Did you fit the bill or did they just not know where else to go with their deadline? If you offer more, how can you show them that the one-off they got is representative of the rest of what you offer? The right marketing filter at this step changes a transaction into a relationship or lets it slip away without wasting time and effort.

You can’t just try to turn a transaction into a relationship if you’re selling an immediate need or a loss leader. You lose on either approach due to the fact it doesn’t fit in with the rest of the model. A transaction which can turn into more needs to be indicative of the experience you’re selling. A good client relationship starts with a good foundation and transparency. Keep this in mind when creating a shadow channel marketing strategy.

Growing a Relationship

A client relationship can be toxic or nurturing depending on the details and motives. There’s a subtlety between keeping your client safe and controlling them. There’s also a subtlety in how actions are interpreted depending on how you communicate and what your intentions are.

If you want to be a more controlling MSP, that’s fine as long as your clients understand and agree. There’s nothing wrong with making the relevant decisions if both parties are in agreement, but this needs to be mutually understood and accepted or you become a tyrant. Once you get your foot in the door and show the client you can walk the walk and talk the talk, you should use that trust for mutual growth rather than selfish growth.

A relationship only blossoms when both parties get something out of it. You can’t just tell what you give them though, you need to show it. What is your solution providing and what do the next steps in the relationship provide? Your actions speak louder than your words. If you come on too strong you smother them, if you are too aloof, they lose interest. Manipulation can work in the short term, but it is unethical and tends to poison the well to boot.

While we’ve stepped away from marketing proper, we haven’t stepped away from the mindset. When it comes to shadow channel marketing, you need to frame every outreach in a way which pushes the underlying goal without pushing too hard. Many non-technical clients pick an MSP based on feeling rather than experience and understanding. How do you offer more without trying to show up the competition? Done right, a successful campaign ends with a win for both your service and the client. As long as both parties know what is going on, it doesn’t matter if you sit in the shadows.

???? Don’t miss “Shadow Channels: Threat or Opportunity?” panel discussion on Sept. 30 at #VirtualVISION!

Moderator: Rich Freeman, ChannelPro Network

Panelists: Mark Elliott, 3i International | Zane Conkle, Cytracom | Robert Boles, BLOKWORX, Inc..

Meet Courtney Ford, Graphic Designer

 This month we have turned the spotlight on Courtney Ford! Courtney quickly became a tremendous asset to the entire team at The 20. Read below to find out more about Courtney!

What do you do here at The 20?

I’m the Graphic Designer so I help the Art Director create social media content, digital/print collateral, and cool stuff for around the office.

Describe The 20 in three words…

Strong, Family, Exciting. 

As a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up? 

Marine Biologist… until I realized I am actually scared of everything in the ocean ????

What’s the most challenging thing about your job? 

Right now it’s VISION season so deadlines are crazy trying to get everything finished. (PS: don’t forget to register at the20.com if you haven’t already ????)

What do you consider your greatest achievement? 

Knowing all the words to Eminem’s “The Real Slim Shady”

What do you think is the most important quality necessary for success? 

Dedication

What do you like most about The 20? 

I often describe The 20 as my dream job, so that’s a list we don’t have time for.

What do you like to do in your spare time? / What are your hobbies? 

This isn’t a hobby… YET. I just bought a leash so I can start walking my cat outside. I’ve also picked up playing Animal Crossing in my excessive amount of time at home this year.

Where are you going on your next vacation?

Colorado is the plan ⛄️

What’s your top life hack?

Always keep a bottle of hot sauce with you.

Interested in working with Courtney at The 20? We’re hiring! Check out our Careers page for more info.

The Making of a Threat: Shadow Channels

Tim Conkle, CEO | The 20

The term shadow channel conjures feelings of fear and paranoia just from its name, but the concept itself is as simple as it is insidious. It’s a winner take all creep to conquer the company service by service. A managed company purchases a service which the managed service provider (MSP) doesn’t offer, isn’t competitive on, or else they’re already shopping around for other solutions. Things develop and the other service provider begins to either expand their offerings, or place doubt on the previous MSP’s expertise and ability. It ends with a transition, a draw, or an eviction.

The general strategy which makes a shadow channel work (turning a foot in the door into more) can be useful for you, but it’s harmful when used against you. Pushing your way into a company’s services can provide a way to get a new client, but a competitor can use the same edge against you. A strategy is like a weapon, you want the best one on your side and not in your face.

There are actions you can take to prevent shadow channels from being as large of a threat, but they’re all time dependent. A channel grows slowly and turns into a waterfall if you don’t check it. To know what to do, you need to understand the nature of a shadow channel, how it operates and succeeds, and the nature of your relationship to know what to do. There are no objectively right answers, but there are wrong ones.

The Birth of a Threat

A shadow channel seemingly grows from a simple transaction or a service. Some of these will be direct, others will be borne from rogue IT at a company. The threat comes when the competitor gets your client’s ear and undermines you. This sounds like regular competition, but the difference is in the execution.

There are so many ways to accomplish the same basic task in tech, and each solution has different metrics and benchmarks. How does a non-technical company make sense of and compare 10ms network latency to 3ms data latency? There really aren’t “right answers” to technical problems but sales may tell your client otherwise.

While another company offering a service can be harmless, it becomes a liability if it has to be integrated into the environment. You lose control of that asset but you have to keep it secure and functional without limiting it. It takes a more sinister turn when the new vendor begins to complain about the way things are done or starts to creep in.

The salesperson for this other service assured your client it’s safe to have administrative access to the network, and your client “isn’t stupid”. Like social engineering, this competitor is preying on a lack of understanding and human weakness to elevate themselves. Now you have to share the keys to the kingdom with your competitor and support them as they (potentially) undermine you.

It’s not something to fear monger over, but it is something to be aware of. If a company is providing a technical solution to your client, are they a threat or are they scratching an itch you don’t? If that itch is something you could scratch, why are they moving to someone else?

Fragmentation and Jealousy

A managed service contract is a bit like a relationship; it’s more complicated than just an exchange. You need to be aware of perception and the mechanics of your relationship with your client. A person’s feelings in the matter don’t need to be justified for them to hold an opinion, and you have a lot of people between your business, your clients, and other vendors. A breakdown in communication becomes a breakdown in process. The other companies don’t necessarily care if it makes the client less secure and makes your job that much harder, most just want their money.

Shadow channels work because they either impress the company with one service or transaction and grow the relationship, or else they poison the client’s opinion of their current MSP. If your client just cares about the best bang for their buck, they may leave even if the other provider has only put their best foot forward to show off. Some providers will try to use gimmicks such as security audits with shaky premises to paint the narrative that the current MSP doesn’t know what they’re doing. A bad security audit is one thing, but a bad security audit from fraudulent or manipulated data is another.

You can try to say something, but if it makes it this far, you just end up sounding jealous or defensive. This channel often relies on a more emotional angle to try and either generate attraction to the new product, or to sabotage what you already have. To make matters worse, your competitor isn’t going to advertise they’re working to kick you out. You need to be ahead of the curve without tipping everyone off or run the risk of losing the battle.

Finding the Cure

Shadow channels rely on taking advantage of the business practices of a client or their MSP. They spotlight your weaknesses either by showing that they’re “better” (if they actually are, it’s just competition at this point) or by sabotage. The evidence might not be right, but that doesn’t mean the target knows enough to know better. You can fight this by staying organized, communicating with your client, and trying to find them solutions before solutions find them.

Not every company offering a service is playing a game, but more and more are. The more you can get from a client, the more profitable they are, especially if you have a standardized setup. When a client buys into your workflow, (ideally) both of you benefit. Your competitors operate the same way, just with different parameters. How can you make it harder to switch without being nasty about it?

What is your client doing and why? You need to be aware if you’re providing anything which touches on security as it can impact your client’s efforts as much as your own. If you offer a competitive service, this makes the whole situation that much more urgent. Why didn’t they pick you? Be honest with yourself and try to address if it is worth addressing.

You have to know your client and how they react to plan around how you respond. If they’re more emotional, how can you play on that angle without being manipulative? If they’re more analytical, how do you show yourself to be the better value even if the numbers don’t look as good? There are multiple metrics for value, you just have to know which are worth measuring.

Conclusion

Perception is reality, so if you can control the perception, you get more control of the outcome. If your service costs more, what does it do better that is of value to your clients? If your clients don’t like something about a service, how can you either show them why it’s useful or change it to make them feel in control of the process?

Understand what makes shadow channels work and shut them down before they can cause damage. If a competitor targets you on your security, how do you disprove them without getting defensive? What are the security implications of rogue IT and why is it a threat to the client? You can’t win every battle even if you are competitive, but you can increase the odds if you can shut the threat down soon enough.

Some clients don’t even want to know they have IT, others want to hold the reins the whole way. How can you satisfy your client’s needs without letting another company get their ear and without making it unprofitable for yourself? While shadow channels aren’t necessarily the boogieman they’re made out to be, they can and will poach clients if you don’t understand them or act on them. Prevent them from getting a hold or else you’ll get pushed out.

???? Don’t miss “Shadow Channels: Threat or Opportunity?” panel discussion on Sept. 30 at #VirtualVISION!

Moderator: Rich Freeman, ChannelPro Network

Panelists: Mark Elliott, 3i International | Zane Conkle, Cytracom | Robert Boles, BLOKWORX, Inc..

The 20, a leading consortium of managed service providers (MSPs), is excited announce keynote speaker Gary Vaynerchuk.

Entrepreneur and social media influencer, Gary Vaynerchuk, better known as “Gary Vee,” is set to deliver a keynote address on October 1st at Virtual VISION. GaryVee got his start over 13 years ago after starting a web series called Wine Library TV. After slowly building a following and an audience, Gary Vee started VaynerMedia, a full-service advertising agency that has grown to work with some of the most recognizable brands in the world.

Today, Gary continues to be an influential figure in the marketing and entrepreneurial spaces. He is a highly sought-after public speaker, a five-time New York Times bestselling author, as well as a prolific early angel investor in companies like Facebook, Twitter and Uber.

GaryVee will give a keynote address to everyone at VISION, followed by a Q&A session.

“We are so looking forward to GaryVee’s keynote at VISION,” says Crystal McFerran, CMO of The 20. “The 20 is thrilled to share this incredible slate of content with the MSP community. If you’re looking to take your MSP to the next level, you don’t want to miss VISION 2020!”

Joining Vaynerchuk will be a powerful speaker lineup including Mark Manson, author of New York Times bestseller “The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck” and Walter Bond, former NBA player and success coach.

What can you expect from VISION this year? A full roster of sought-after speakers, innovative disruptors and business-focused visionaries sharing their knowledge with likeminded MSPs who are seeking to level up.

Virtual VISION will take place Wednesday, September 30th and Thursday, October 1st. The two-day event also features a full slate of leading channel partners and industry experts. Hailed as the most important MSP event of the year, VISION 2020 will bring together top MSPs and IT service providers for two impactful days of speakers, sessions, and networking focused on business best practices, thought leadership, and growth.

Keynote presentation and Q&A by Gary Vaynerchuk

Business and life lessons from Mark Manson and Walter Bond

Hot topics such as AI, the new MSP landscape, shadow channels and sales/pipeline creation

Growth strategies from MSP industry experts

The full conference agenda can be found here.

Interested in attending VISION 2020? Register at https://www.the20.com.