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Effective Outsourcing for MSP Growth – TubbTalk #64

Richard speaks to Mark Matthews, owner and CEO of Bromsgrove based MSP, ATG IT to discuss the benefits of collaboration and outsourcing, and what their partner relationship with Continuum looks like.

 

 

An Interview with Mark Matthews

I’ve known Mark Matthews for a long time now and became great friends a number of years ago when our mutual friend, Phylip Morgan introduced us. Phylip, of course is the Managing Director of Continuum, EMEA, and I think it’s fair to say Phylip has been a great influence on both of us.

Mark and I have a shared belief in being Go Givers, which forms the basis of everything Mark does. In fact he runs his life on the book, The Go Giver by Bob Burg. With the lessons learnt in this book, Mark is all for collaboration and doesn’t expect anything back, but knows working in a Go Giver way, it’ll come back some other way. He acknowledges we all can’t know everything, so at some time we’re going to have to collaborate with somebody.

Collaboration has been a big part of Mark’s business and it’s played a big part in the success of ATG. This includes collaborating and outsourcing with partners such as Continuum on their master MSP model, utilising their back up side as well as their NOC (Network Operations Center) and SOC (Security Operations Center). Outsourcing to Continuum has meant ATG has been able to free up engineers, re train them and allow them to focus on more projects. It’s also meant they can take on much larger contracts that they would have otherwise been unable to approach.

Mark explains that there are 4 factors in choosing to outsource this type of work to the likes of Continuum instead of choosing to build things it in house at ATG:

Specialisation in certain areas, you don’t want to be the master of nothing.
The skill set to do these things, training is not cheap.
The cost to build your own NOC would be ineffective
The time to do it. It’s such a fast moving world, by the time you’ve developed it, you’d have to start again.

It’s about collaborating with people that are better at doing the job than you are and actually admitting that’s the case and dealing to your own strengths.

I often get asked about the challenges of on boarding outsourced partners. Mark also shares some words of wisdom about the lessons he has learnt and what needs to be in place before jumping in with two feet.

Mentioned in This Episode

The Go Giver, by Bob Burg
Continuum
ConnectWise
CompTia

Get in touch with Mark





Twitter: @thecrispguy
LinkedIn: Mark Matthews
Email: mark.matthews@atg-it.co.uk





Connect with Me

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How Being a Go-Giver Can Increase Your Sales – TubbTalk #43
How IT companies can sell themselves better – TubbTalk #20
How to Choose an MSP NOC Provider

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Moodbeam – Monitor Your Emotional Wellbeing

How would you describe your emotional wellbeing?

How do you feel, right now? How did you feel yesterday? What about last week?

How we feel is so important to our emotional wellbeing, but it can be difficult to monitor your emotional wellbeing without help.

Every Friday I share one of my favourite finds of the week — a website, tool or an app that has impressed me.

My Friday Favourite this week is Moodbeam – Monitor Your Emotional Wellbeing.

How much does it cost?

A Moodbeam One wristband costs £49.95

Monitor Your Emotional Wellbeing

I already monitor my physical wellbeing thanks to apps like Welltory – Manage Your Stress and Energy.

The Moodbeam One is a smart wristband that can help you to monitor your emotional wellbeing.

It’s a wearable device that will allow you to monitor how you feel at the push of a button.

You can press the button whenever you feel a strong change in mood. Press yellow when you’re feeling happy, blue when you’re feeling unhappy.

It’s also possible to set the Moodbeam wristband to gently vibrate to remind you to record your mood at specific points in a day.

You can then connect your Moodbeam wristband to the Moodbeam app, which instantly syncs your mood data.

The app allows you to view your mood data and spot trends in your emotional wellbeing.

You can also share this data with others. For instance, the Moodbeam was inspired by a mothers desire to know how her daughter was feeling when she wasn’t with her.

The Moodbeam wristband contains a small USB device that runs for around a week before recharging. You can swap the USB device to different sized wristbands to suit you.

Your Moodbeam wristband will also track how you sleep, and how many steps you take each day. This additional data can be used to learn how sleep and exercise affect your mood.

I’ve been wearing a Moodbeam One wristband for a few weeks now. It has been useful in helping me with my emotional awareness and spotting trends in my emotional wellbeing.

I see it as a useful tool to help many of us with our mental health.

How can I get it?

Click here to buy the Moodbeam One wristband.

You can visit the Moodbeam website to find out more, visit the Moodbeam Facebook page, or follow @MoodbeamLife on Twitter.

Thanks to Mark Matthews of ATG IT for recommending the Moodbeam to me!

You Might Also Be Interested In

Woebot – An AI-based Therapy Chatbot to Help with Depression and Anxiety
The Man Sprouts Man-ifesto – Let’s Talk About Male Mental Health
Book – The IT Business Owner’s Survival Guide

The post Moodbeam – Monitor Your Emotional Wellbeing appeared first on Richard Tubb.

Google Adwords and the Opportunities for MSPs – TubbTalk #63

Richard speaks to Adam Porteous, Google AdWords expert at Pronto Marketing. Adam is here today to talk to us about Google AdWords and specifically how MSP’s can use Google AdWords to grow their business and to thrive.

How Can Google AdWords Work For MSPs?

It’s the quickest route to market for MSPs. It’s got the highest, short term opportunity. With SEO, if you’ve not got some sort of solid content, solid rankings, potentially good SEO structure, you may not be getting much organic traffic. With AdWords, you can technically get to page one tomorrow, depending how fast you can get a campaign together. So, there is a lot of revenue opportunities there for businesses that potentially have never generated much business through their website and have always relied on events, offline marketing, word of mouth, referrals, these types of activities.

Google AdWords has potential for businesses that aren’t getting the most out of their website, and who think that SEO is too much of a long term strategy to follow.

How Long Before An MSP Sees Results From AdWords?

It all depends on a couple of things. It will depend on the way the campaign is structured, a little bit of luck and then also, what you personally measure as success. The advantage of AdWords is that you’re going to be able to get traffic immediately. So keywords such as, IT support services, managed IT services, IT consulting, cybersecurity company, even location keywords like IT company near me, you can start getting traffic for them on page one. So it’s a great opportunity. If you’ve been stuck promoting primarily through offline activities such as referrals or word of mouth, then AdWords is your quickest way to get success.

In general, it will take between 1-3 months of learning the ropes, then around 3-6 months to become successful with Google AdWords. If you’ve had experience running AdWords campaigns before then you might avoid some unqualified traffic and see success faster. Around 3 months is where you will start seeing good leads coming through. And then more importantly, you could get the best lead of the campaign in the first two weeks, and that could turn into recurring revenue so there is a bit of luck involved as well.

What Do Google AdWords Cost For MSPs?

It really depends on the cost per click. The best way to talk about price is to make an indication. It’s based on conversion rate. So typically, the conversion for MSPs in the B2B, IT space is between 3 and 5%. Prontos campaigns, usually sit around between 4 and 5% mark.

So imagine you had a conversion rate of 4% and a keyword at £20, that means you have to get 25 clicks to turn a lead into a conversion. The lead could technically cost £400 or £500 which is quite significant. So that’s where you’ve got to have a really tied up sales process and also make sure your AdWords campaign is continuously optimized to make sure you’re getting the right types of leads, and then converting them before they have a chance to shop around or go to another competitor.

Is It Worth Doing Google Adwords If You Live In a Highly Competitive Area?

You’ve got to have budget. You’ve got to be able to stomach the fact you’re going to spend some money. Hiring someone who has expertise, rather than just going in yourself blindly is a good option to avoid spending too much money.

If you do it consistently you can end up on page one of Google, and then it can turn into a reliable stream of income. You’ve got to focus on the medium to long term picture with anything that is recurring revenue focussed.

Will Google AdWords Work If You Live In a Tiny Regional Town?

It’s all about checking the search volumes. Sometimes you think that there’s a target location that might be worth targeting because no other MSP seems to be doing it from an organic perspective. But it’s probably because there isn’t any search volume there. So most of the time, it’s worth just consulting Google Keyword Planner and checking what the volume is in a target area, looking at the competition online yourself and seeing if there are businesses competing for ad space there and seeing what sort of results that come up.

But, if an area is serviceable and if the cost per lead is less in that area, and you convert well because you’re a local business, then it’s all about trying things out and finding what works best for your business.

What Are The Most Common Mistakes You See MSPs Make With Google AdWords?

It’s not specific only to MSPs, it’s a common AdWords mistakes that people can make. With keywords, you have different types. You have an ‘exact match’ which is where you’ve got a key word with the parentheses brackets around it, and that says your ad will only appear if someone searches this exact term. Then, you’ve got the ‘phrase match’, which is a keyword where you have one or two words together, but they can be used in a phrase with other words around them. So, for example, ‘women’s hat’ is an exact match but ‘buy women’s hats’ is a phrase match.

Then, you’ve got what’s called a ‘broad match modifier’, which is where you have an exact match term and then you’ve got a plus sign in the Google structure which allows you to add another keyword on top of that which might be relevant. So in this case, ‘hats for women’ as an example, and then you’ve got ‘broad match’, which is anything goes, anything with this that matches this keyword in a sentence, whether it’s six words, seven words, two words.

You can easily run into lots of problems with broad match in particular and sometimes phrase match will get unqualified traffic.

How Do You Know Which Keywords Are Best For MSPs?

Firstly, look at what keywords they are currently getting traffic for that are unqualified and find the root source of these keywords. Sometimes people will come through with no rhyme or reason, but other times it’s just about weeding out and doing some best practices.

One way to structure everything correctly is through what they call ad groups. Ad groups are group sets of keywords that you place into a group and for which you then have adverts that display and take people to a specific landing page relevant to that ad group. And you group these with collective terms. So within the IT industry, managed IT services would have a number of different terms: VoiP, cloud services, CRM solutions, IT support and then everything within the advert from the search result to the actual landing page is going to reinforce those keywords that have been present throughout the customer journey.

So for example, an IT support ad group won’t just be IT support on its own because there’s other search terms that people look for. So you would maybe include things like IT support company near me, IT support consulting, IT support outsourcing, IT support solutions and local IT support. There are lots of different variations that people will use. And with the fact that there is such little search volume within the IT space online, it’s really critical to have enough keywords in there so you can actually get some visibility and some traffic each month.

What Are The Popular Keywords For MSPs?

In the UK you’ve got, ICT and IT. MSP might not be as relevant in the UK, but still worth searching. Managed Services, Managed IT service, IT support and IT consulting are still common. And CIO Enterprise IT solutions are emerging keywords that are more on trend with the current services people are offering.

And then you’ve got things like cloud services, which can also have products or brands that sit within those search terms as well. So perhaps, cloud services, business phone systems, VoiP managed IT services, IT consulting. Plus cybersecurity They are the big primary keywords.

Should Google Adwords Go To a Homepage Or a Dedicated Landing Page?

Home pages can have success. But you are usually advised against it. The reason being that the homepage has a lot of different content for different users and it’s about directing someone down a conversion path.

But, with AdWords, you’ve already got the idea of the conversion path because you know what the person’s looked for, and they are specifically asking for it. So the dedicated landing page needs to ensure you have a copy that pertains to what the keyword was, which will help impact your quality score, which is the way Google determines how much you’re going to pay for clicks and potentially conversions. And the rest of the page isn’t about plugging the page with keywords, but about a good customer journey. So, clear calls to action, explaining about the business, unique selling points, how long they have been in business and maybe embedding some reviews. All these things will have an impact on the user. You have very limited space to capture the user’s attention because users click around different AdWords. And with AdWords when you’ve just paid 20/30/40 dollars or pounds to get someone to that page, you need to get everything on the page that will make them convert. You need them to believe that you are the right provider for the services they need.

What Is The Key to Creating a Headline Or Ad Copy That Converts?

You really need to trial what works for you. The whole thing with AdWords is that you don’t let anything ever run stale. Always be testing out what works best and then run and then keep optimizing.

With headings, you want to include the primary keyword that the user is searching for and then maybe something about your brand or company. Why you are the best in the business, or something that stands out. And from then on, it’s about what’s included within that.

So, if someone is looking or managed IT services they probably want to know what you can offer within that package. Is it remote support? Is it 24/7 desktop support? Is it VCO or VCIO or IT consulting? Do you offer VoiP systems? What’s within that package? Whereas something that’s about cloud services could focus on Office 365, Amazon Web Services, or CRM solutions.

Depending on the user types you will go down a different path. That’s the main way to determine what should go on to a page.

What Is Retargeting?

Retargeting is a form of advertising that Google allows you to do based on cookie tracking. You’ve probably shopped on Amazon and then left something in your basket. Then when you go onto facebook and you see an Amazon advert stalking you around the page asking you to do something and eventually you’ll end up clicking the ad and going back to complete the transaction.

People utilize it not only in the B2C space, but in the B2B space too. It’s a different, tougher nut to crack for the B2B market versus B2C. But it can be very successful for trying to bring back organic visitors. It’s a good way to maximise the return on AdWords traffic that might have cost you a lot to initially get onto your website, and it will bring them back to convert the second time around.

Should You Do Advertising First Or a Retargeting Ad?

It really depends on your traffic. If you have a product or service that you can resell to existing customers, then sometimes retargeting will work as you can resell a product to the same person that’s already bought it from you.

In the MSP space, if it’s a service based enquiry, and someone’s looking for a consultation the sales cycle could be 1-2-3 months, so it’s quite difficult to get to leverage retargeting well.

Any pages that get high organic traffic, which is when traffic comes through via keywords, should have a retargeting pixel on the pages. That way you are engaged with specific services and using specific banners to push them back to that product or service that they initially enquired about.

What Is a Negative Keyword?

Negative keywords allow you to exclude a large a large amount of traffic depending on what type of keyword matches you’re using. Basically you’re creating a list of keywords which you want Google to not show your ad for if someone types in.

So, for example, say you’ve really explored and squeezed the juice out of IT services as a keyword. And then you’re trying to see what are the keywords or searches you could appear for so you’re using a broad match modifier or you’re using a phrase maps to see which type of keywords could also crop up with IT support. But then potentially something like ‘cheap’ might pop up and for you, you consider yourself as an enterprise IT company, and that cheap is devaluing the service that you offer.

Likewise, someone could be looking for an IT support job, so using something like job and jobs as negative keywords will ensure that your page doesn’t appear when someone’s typing in IT support jobs. Because you can be one click away from IT support services, which is someone looking for your IT support services, and likewise, someone clicking your ad trying to send you their CV, and that could have cost you, $40 or £40.

How Does The Bidding Process Work With Google AdWords?

Google AdWords bidding uses the same platform and principles as Facebook in terms of it’s an auction. So, Google is going to give top space to whoever wants to pay the most money. Which in AdWords can make it very difficult because if you’re in a very densely populated area where there might be some very big franchises or large companies that you can easily get squeezed out the market just based on competition being able to spend more money than you.

For bidding strategies, you can use something like Wordstream, which is a tool to help you optimize what you place on bids. But it’s really about just setting limits and taking time to see, how much exposure you get. If you’re not getting any impressions, it means that your bids are too low, because you’re not even on page one or page two of the ads, and therefore you’re not getting any exposure. And remember that in the MSP space, searches are really low. They can be between 10 and 50. so if you’re not on page one, there’s a high percentage trap of just getting no traffic. It’s really important to not over bid on certain keywords, make sure you’re getting enough impressions that you’re either on the bottom of page one at the lowest.

And then as move forward with your strategy in the long run, find out which services bring in the most revenue to you. And then you can adjust your bids and the strategy accordingly and bid more aggressively on terms that you know did deliver quality leads or quality sales, versus ones that perhaps got you more leads and more volume, but they don’t convert as well. So you have that as something that you’d consider secondary and you place lower bids and put less emphasis on it.

What Is The Best Way To Track Spend Versus Conversion?

Google will give you the actual pixels that Google gives you to track things from your analytics data, all the way through to conversion. There are things you may want to set up with analytics, such as UTM parameters, where it tracks all the way from a click from an advert, to a landing page, to a conversion and then you’ll know exactly what the customers journey was.

You can then start to get a pattern around campaigns that work well, how your audience behaves with your site. And obviously in the end, what leads drive the best revenue.

That all requires a little bit of technical know how with how you set up analytics and some of those items. Then there’s other things you can use like Facebook pixels, LinkedIn pixels, which won’t have track conversions, but maybe pick up data that you can add into your retargeting audience.

You can use products like Hot Jar, which is a visual heat map where you can use screen records and record users interactions with your landing page. So you can kind of see maybe if you place the form on the right or below the fold, which one leads to more conversions, did people struggle to navigate to find stuff, did they bounce quickly? And that’s the basic conversion tools you’ve got

What Is The Highest Converting Campaign You’ve Seen An MSP Use On Google Ads?

It’s all dependent on competition. There’s so many factors that will influence what is successful and what works well for someone versus another person.

If you can get a conversion rate of 5% in the MSP space, that’s pretty solid. And then from there, you just want to make sure you find the best keywords and ad groups that work for you. And from there, you should then become profitable once you start getting in recurring revenue from customers.

But you’ve got to make sure your sales process is watertight, because there’s not many leads, there’s not much volume. And these people are shopping around on ads. So what’s to say they don’t click three other ads and reach out to three other people and if they pick up the phone first, they could be the first opportunity.

What Is a Location Keyword?

Location keywords can be quite useful. So for example, if you’re in the Manchester region or Liverpool region, instead of just typing in IT support, there may be an extra keyword to denote location, such as IT support Trafford or Salford. These are other opportunities you could have, maybe even, North Manchester or Bury where there may be only 10 searches or 10 per month, but it could be extra traffic that could lead to one potential lead.

But one thing to do look out for with location keywords is that sometimes vendors will be out trying to pitch to businesses who they can sell their products to, who will then sell to MSP clients. So sometimes location keywords can bring in vendor inquiries or solicitation type traffic.

Mentioned in This Episode

Pronto Marketing

Connect with Me

Subscribe to TubbTalk RSS feed
Subscribe, rate and review TubbTalk in iTunes
Subscribe, rate and review TubbTalk on Stitcher Radio
Subscribe and rate TubbTalk on Spotify
Follow TubbTalk on iHeartRadio
Follow @tubblog on Twitter

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Seatfrog – Upgrade Your Train Journey

The price of UK rail travel is, in my opinion, ludicrous. The price rockets even further if you want to travel in comfort in First Class. So how can Seatfrog help you keep costs down if you want to upgrade your train journey?

Every Friday I share one of my favourite finds of the week — a website, tool or an app that has impressed me.

My Friday Favourite this week is Seatfrog – Upgrade Your Train Journey.

How much does it cost?

The Seatfrog app is free to set up and use.

Seatfrog – Bid to upgrade your train journey

I’m writing this Friday Favourite sat on the 1135 Cross Country train from Newcastle-Upon-Tyne to Birmingham, where I’m headed to visit friends and family.

Unlike air travel, where you can use Hopper and know when to fly and book flights at their cheapest, the UK rail booking system is a shambles.

Despite trying to book my ticket online around six weeks in advance, buying First Class carriage tickets would have cost me an eye-watering £245 each way!

Instead, I booked a standard class ticket at a much more reasonable £43.35 each way.

I then used the Seatfrog app to bid on First Class upgrades for my train ticket in the days running up to my journey.

Thanks to Seatfrog, 48-hours before my trip, I ended up paying £15 to upgrade my ticket to Birmingham to a First Class ticket. I am currently sat in (a virtually empty) First Class carriage.

EDIT: I bought a First Class Upgrade for £6 via Seatfrog for my return trip from Birmingham to Newcastle-Upon-Tyne!

How to use Seatfrog to get a cheap First Class Upgrade

The Seatfrog app is easy to set up and use.

You can either register your travel details manually or enter your existing reservation number. Seatfrog will then tell you if there are excess First Class upgrades that you can bid on.

Not every UK train operator participates in Seatfrog, but my regular train carriers, such as LNER and Cross Country, are included.

You place your auction bid and then wait to see if you’ve won the upgrade.

If you win, then Seatfrog will send you an electronic upgrade ticket. You can use this ticket when boarding the First Class carriage.

The UK train ticket system is ridiculous and outdated, but Seatfrog helps you to keep your costs down when you want to upgrade your journey!

How can I get it?

You can download the Seatfrog app for iOS or Android.

Visit the Seatfrog homepage to find out more.

You can also visit the Seatfrog Facebook page, or follow @Seatfrog on Twitter.

Thanks to Darren Piper of Accordant Solutions for letting me know about Seatfrog!

You Might Also Be Interested In

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The post Seatfrog – Upgrade Your Train Journey appeared first on Richard Tubb.

How to Offer Incredible MSP Cyber Security Services – Live Video

How can your business offer incredible MSP Cyber Security Services to its Small & Medium-Sized (SMB) clients?

That topic will be the focus of our next Avast interactive Live Video for MSPs on December 4th 2019.

The changing nature of MSP Cyber Security Services

As a Managed Service Provider (MSP) or IT Solution Provider, how you keep your client’s networks secure is rapidly changing.

Having antivirus alone is no longer sufficient to keep clients safe.

Clients now expect their MSPs to offer a Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) policy, and employees are now remotely working on a variety of platforms. Securing these devices can be a challenge!

However, these challenges also provide MSPs with the opportunity for new income.

Being able to provide ongoing, customised MSP Cyber Security Services is a massive opportunity. Your MSP business can offer its Cyber Security expertise, helping you to become a trusted advisor, and increase your recurring revenue.

Live Video –

Taking place on December 4th at 4 pm GMT, brought to you by our friends at Avast Business, we’ll be broadcasting a live video from the studios of the London Stock Exchange.

I’ll be hosting a panel of experts to discuss:-

Key elements of cybersecurity required to keep SMBs secure in 2019
How to position and communicate the need for multiple layers of security
As well as how to package security services into your overall services stack

If you caught our live video on How to offer awesome MSP Endpoint Protection then you’ll know these are lively and very interactive sessions!

Your MSP Cyber Security Experts

Your panellists for the live video on How to Provide MSP Cyber Security Services to SMBs are:-

Robert Gibbons, Head of Managed Services, Evaris Solutions Plc
Leigh Wood, Managing Director, Node IT
Chris Tate, MSP Evangelist at TotallyMSP

Robert, Leigh and Chris will be answering your questions live on air.

Make sure to register and send them your juiciest MSP Cyber Security questions!

Register for the Live Video

Register now to learn how MSPs can deliver better and faster protection to SMBs, while also expanding revenue and growing business. Not sure you can attend the live session? Register and watch the recording later.

This live video will take place on 4th December 2019 at 4 pm GMT.

Can’t join us live? Never fear! Register anyway and you’ll be able to view the video-on-demand at your leisure.

Visit the Avast Business BrightTalk website and register for free. If you’re already registered, then here’s a direct link to the MSP Cyber Security live video.

When you register, we will give you on-demand access to this Managed Services video, and we will give you access to a library of other videos. They are all aimed at helping you grow your MSP business.

Conclusion

What is your biggest MSP Cyber Security challenge right now?

Leave a comment below or get in touch to let me know — I’ll ask your questions live on air!

You Might Also Be Interested In

Cloud DNS Protection – Avast Secure Web Gateway
How To Boost MSP Operational Efficiency – Live Video
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The post How to Offer Incredible MSP Cyber Security Services – Live Video appeared first on Richard Tubb.

Advancing Women in IT – TubbTalk #62

Richard speaks to international speaker, IT business owner and diversity champion

Tracy Pound on how the MSP industry is helping advance women in IT.

Tracy Pound is the Managing Director at Maximity. She also works on the board of directors at CompTia and, above all that, she is one of the strongest, smartest, most savvy women in the IT industry.

Interview with Tracy Pound

CompTia is the Computing Technology Industry Association. It’s a global trade association that’s designed to support people within the tech industry with multiple different facets that helps it do this.

Their core focus is around building and selling certifications, so if you’ve come across A+, network+ or security+, that is CompTia. They’ve built that out as their core and they sell certifications around the world to the tune of around $85million a year and growing. That money then gets reinvested back into the membership side of the organisation.

CompTia have membership communities around the world. They have a UK community. A new Benelux community that launched earlier this year. Plus communities all over including Australia, New Zealand, Canada and of course the biggest one is in the USA, because it’s an American trade tech association. The membership is expanding geographically, very quickly. And they are looking at where they can put new communities to support people who already work in the tech industry. Whether you are a vendor, distributor, MSP, tech consultant, whether you work in aligned industries eg. lawyers who specialse in digital law and GDPR. The community is there to support all those people and bring them together. Not just to network, but also to further their business and the industry as a whole.

The membership community deals with many things including wider workforce issues. They look at questions such as: “how do we get younger people engaged within the tech industry?”, “how do we make sure that we keep the skills and the expertise that we’ve got in it”, and “how do we grow it as a professional industry, as a profession, rather than just an industry?”.

CompTia also do a lot of work and advocating on Capitol Hill to try and make sure that governments pay attention in the right way to tech and how it develops. Especially when it comes to cybersecurity. There is quite an interesting dynamic between stopping people from hacking on a global scale and sharing what they shouldn’t be sharing, versus governments that want you to keep your data close to you.

But cyber security in general is a huge topic and they look at how to educate end users, plus how to educate MSP’s, vendors and distributors on how to keep data safe.

So CompTia is there as a voice for the tech industries for all of those kinds of activities. And it’s a home for people who want to be part of the community. They have multiple different communities including advancing women in IT, advancing diversity in IT.

There is also the research element. CompTia do lots of research as well, and that research is then delivered back via the website on CompTia.org. Plus, they will go out to events to talk about security, trends or managed service provision.

CompTia also has a foundation for creating IT futures in America. It’s designed to try and help people who are going through college education or school education to get into a career in tech to start with. They are looking at different ways to deliver exams to make it easier and an all round better learning experience. Something that people can engage with. It’s trying to support an exam methodology that supports the way we actually work in real life, to simulate it, to make it easier so that when you come out from an education, you are truly ready for the world of work. So there’s a lot of exciting stuff that’s going on that level, and it’s great.

As you can probably tell, CompTia is a very big organisation and does a lot to make sure the tech industry is future proof and sustainable.

What Can People Expect From a CompTia UK Channel Community Meeting?

They can expect a lot of inspiration. There will be networking with peers. Learning via the research that CompTia does. For example, at the last meeting we had a business genius cafe. So people could book a slot to talk to an expert in finance, in HR, in diversity, in sales and in operational efficiency, and get some advice for free. So a lot of the stuff that CompTia does is delivered out as part of the membership. It’s a very low cost entry and has a lot of value add once you get inside it because everything is included. It’s helping people to further their businesses. It’s giving people the opportunity to listen to industry and business experts.

The EMEA is a big conference that CompTia have in the UK, usually in October/November time. It’s done in collaboration with the certification team and it’s an event to educate. Plus it has a big vendor fair. So it gives people an opportunity to promote what their solutions are and it gives people who are members the opportunity to go and talk to those vendors, find out what they’re developing, look at where emerging tech’s going, what the next solutions are that are coming out. But most importantly, it’s designed for people to share ideas, share information, that at the end of the day, helps them to have a sustainable, better business. At the last EMEA meeting in October, Karen Brady was a keynote speaker. She was absolutely fantastic, very high profile, and helped to give people a bit of inspiration and something they can take away with them to improve their business. The community events support people and help them learn something.

It’s a no brainer. CompTia does so much good for the industry and it’s a community of people who are givers, they share knowledge, they help the industry grow, they help one another grow. It’s just a fantastic organisation. Want to know more about CompTia? Listen to another podcast episode to hear some thoughts from attendees of an CompTia EMEA conference: Who are CompTIA and how can they help your IT business? TubbTalk #16

Why Are There Not More Women in the Tech Industry?

I already mentioned that Tracy is one of the smartest and savviest women in the IT industry. But the IT industry is so poor at attracting these types of women. Why is that? Again, it’s a long answer. It’s a complex problem, which doesn’t have an easy solution. A lot of it is down to unconscious bias. People like people that are like them.

Back in 1984, when Tracy started in the IT sector, when the IBM PC first came into the market, when Microsoft wasn’t the be all and end all to everything. There was no precedent for how people worked or what people needed to look like to be successful in tech. So people forged their own path, and became successful. And over time the industry has moved towards a more traditional set-up, which companies generally do as they mature – they start to look like other mature companies. And a lot of mature companies look like white men in suits. And so as the industry progressed it followed this route. But for women, that actually means that they have less of a voice now in a growing industry than they did 20 years ago, when the market wasn’t so mature.

With tech, there is still a way to go in terms of maturity. And whether it will get there, we don’t know as tech changes so quickly so it may never fully mature as it always morphs and changes into something else.

So a large part of the reason that women aren’t attracted to the industry is due to an unconscious bias. There aren’t many role models for women to follow. Because we do what we’ve done before, because somebody’s already done it and therefore it’s easier and quicker to set up. And now the industry is stuck in a rut, which they are slowly moving out of, but the rut is very difficult to change as it is hard to change people’s view of what they do and why they do it.

Some companies don’t even realise they are doing it. But a lot of tech websites use imagery that sits around men. A lot of imagery around mechanical things. And girls are often not exposed to this growing up, so they will look and it and think it doesn’t look like them. So they go a different path. To change this, and to attract women to tech, we have to follow a different path. But that’s a really hard thing for people to do. There aren’t enough girls in the pipeline to apply for jobs. It’s hard to get women to interviews.

So first and foremost we have to change this bias.

And from a customer service perspective it makes sense. Most companies that MSPs serve are typically around 50/50 split of men and women. Yet, if you look at the MSP help desk and service desks across the country, certainly in the UK, at least 99% of the time it is men.

You’ve got a bunch of men supporting a bunch of men and women. It should be more representative of the customer that you are supporting.

But for all the reasons above, MSPs are struggling to recruit women into technical roles.

What Can We do to Attract More Women to the Tech Industry?

So what can we do now to start taking steps to change this unconscious bias and attract more women to tech?

It starts at a very young age. For people with parents, if you have daughters, encouraging them to do technical things. They don’t have to be good at maths and that’s one of the big myths that sit around this. What you need is a logical mindset. So long as you can follow logic, which a lot of women can do very well and just as easily as men, then you can work in tech. Encouraging young girls to tech and giving them the opportunity and encouragement to follow their technical roots and to be aware that it’s a good industry to be a part of.

Tech is a growing industry. Many industries are shrinking. We’re in the middle of a fourth industrial revolution and tech is at the forefront. It’s growing and it’s sustainable. So it’s a good career for people. So parents need to know that if their daughters go in tech they will still have a job in 10 years. And they will have the opportunity to have a fantastic career through it as well. So parents need to encourage their children and give them the courage to take those technical courses from a young age.

CompTia did some research a few years ago that looked at girls and boys who were around about five and six years of age. And at that age, they were already starting to see a difference in the way that their minds were developing. Boys were being given mechanical lego type toys. While girls were given more dolls and creative things. Kids minds form based on how they play. So if girls are also given mechanical toys then they will also develop a capability for it. There is nothing wrong with gaming and computers, it’s a great introduction if you want to go down the coding route and it’s also analytical as well.

We also need to educate teachers about unconscious bias, about how to encourage girls to take up some of those STEM subjects, because it isn’t just computers. It’s not just technology, it’s engineering, it’s maths, sciences. All of those STEM subjects. And we need teachers to actively encourage girls to take those courses.

And we then need to make sure that that follows through into the world of work so that when people are looking for staff, when they are putting a job advert together, when they look at how they promote their organisation that they are appealing to the widest range of people and not just to a narrow band that’s going to encourage largely men to apply for those roles. It sounds a bit harsh, but it is breaking those barriers down. Its stopping people doing automatic thinking, because we need some dynamic thinking, and for people to make an active change on it, but it’s not a straightforward thing to do. And it’s going to take a generation or so to the point where we’ve got an equal number of men and women in the tech industry. But we’ll get there.

We’ve already got a tonne of fantastic women in IT, but it’s about the next generation coming through, isn’t it? It’s about encouraging the next generation of girls to see technology as a subject that they want to work in.

What Path Has Tracy’s Career in IT Taken?

Tracy’s career has been a long one, 35 years and counting. She started as a programmer writing software for estate agents. She discovered that programming was not where she belonged. She was best getting out and talking to people, and love the installation part of the process, going to configure systems and doing the training. So that’s been the mainstay of her career. But unfortunately, or fortunately, the company she worked for back in 1984 went bust like a lot of companies do. Back then everyone thought they could make a quick buck out of setting up an IT company, without any real understanding how long it actually takes to develop or write software before you even get a hint of a sale, before you ever get a return on that investment. So she had quite an unusual start to her career.

Then she went to work with Olivetti distributor as a trainer with Multisoft accounts, SuperCalc, Multiplan, WordStar, WordStar Professional. She use to train on all the very early DOS based systems but the sales guys on the team would almost sell to well and she’d come into a handwritten note saying: ‘I’ve just sold this to someone can you learn how to use it, your installing and training it next week’. So she had to quickly learn how to use multiple systems. That’s been a fantastic trait that she’s carried throughout her career. Olivetti put her through Unix training because at the time the company had some very early PC networks. Laterally when Novell networking came in and Windows networking came in, it was a completely different world and she didn’t like it. So she got more involved with the end-user side of things rather than the technical side and went on to set up and run a help desk. This was the days before RMM tools and PSA tools and stuff like that, where if somebody had a problem, they’d pick up the phone and it would be diagnosed over the phone without seeing their screen.

Then she went and spent eight years in the automotive industry so saw IT from the other side. She worked as an internal IT manager in a company with their own team of programmers so they wrote their own ERP system.

So Tracy has been lucky enough to see both sides of technology.

Then, once she had her first child in 2000 she decided to set up her own business. Her business now does a lot of training and consultancy around how to use technology better in organisations. She also does a lot of training with CompTia so is part of their education family around the world.

Tell Us More About Maximity

There is an incredibly complex set of software available now, that will genuinely help businesses move forward, but most people don’t know how to use it properly. So Maximity’s mission is to take the SH out of IT. To demystify it. It shouldn’t be complicated. It should be straightforward. Businesses need to understand how to use technology, but they shouldn’t be technologist.

Maximity work closely with a lot of their clients on a long term basis. Tracy spends her days in-house supporting her clients ensuring their systems, their processes, their data is being put in in the right way, so that they can use it in the right way, so that they can forecast and they can grow in a successful way. Tracy’s job is to try and rein in the explosion of growth that happens in large businesses to make sure that people don’t go off and do their own things all over the place and to make sure that there is a central understanding and control of the data and the way in which it flows around the organisation.

One of their clients has 13 electronic tools. They are all linked to Sage 50 accounts. Most people think Sage 50 is an accounting package, but it’s way more than that. So it’s stock order, order processing, project control and it can be manufacturing control, plus payroll. So there’s a lot of data that organisations can use to decide what is selling well and what isn’t, what the margins are, what stock levels are, what’s slow moving, fast moving and who orders what. There is a load of analytics that sit behind it if you know how to get that out of the system. Maximity does a lot of the work that sits around making sure systems are put together. This helps keep the data clean, especially if staff change and aren’t trained correctly. With GDPR coming in, this was especially important as companies needed to know where data was, how it was used and where it was backed up.

Companies are not technical, they are not in it to be IT companies. Maximity are the IT expert. They bridge the gap between the technical and the non-technical. Maximity have some fantastic customers, that are very very long time customers. They see the value Maximity have in forwarding their business.

The Future of MSPs

I think the future of the managed service is going to be more about business process, helping small businesses to do things faster, better and cheaper, using automation, connected technologies, that sort of thing.

At some point over the life of MSPs they have come away from the training bit, which doesn’t make sense, as training is what creates sticky customers. If customers can’t use their software, whether that is Excel or Word or Sage, whatever application it is. If a helpdesk can’t help them out on that front, then the end user gets really frustrated. When they get frustrated too much, that’s the point at which they move on to somebody else. So it doesn’t make sense for MSPs to not close the loop on the training element.

So, this is a huge opportunity for MSPs. Maximity get a lot of calls from companies because MSPs can’t do the training for them.

Who Are Tracy’s Role Models?

We already know that Tracy is a massively influential figure in the IT industry. But who does she see as a role model?

Fiona Challis is somebody that Tracy really looks up to. She’s a super salesperson. She’s a superb sales trainer. And an amazing speaking. Just an all round brilliant businesswoman. (Listen to the recent podcast episode starring Fiona sharing her expertise on How to do Awesome MSP Sales)

Nancy Hammervik at CompTia who runs all the communities around the world is also a massive inspiration. I’ve never known anybody to work so hard in all my life.

Mark Matthews, his ethos, his way of working, what he’s been through. When you hear people’s stories of things that they’ve had to put up with, how their businesses have gone and how they’ve turned it around. It’s phenomenal.

Lady Karren Brady has had such a great career, especially being a woman up against it in a very much male dominated world.

Richard Branson, when you look at what he’s achieved, it really helps motivate you if you are having a bad day.

Amy Kardel as well, who’s the ex Chair of the Board of Directors for CompTia. As a woman, she is just a superpower. She just does so much stuff, it’s untrue. Self learning and self development, as well as a lot of giving back and a lot of energy.

And of course, one of Tracy’s inspiration is her husband. He’s very supportive. They have a bit of role reversal. Peter has his own business, he’s an insurance broker, but they share offices, and it’s Peter that stays at home as Tracy travels.

What is Next for Tracy in 2020?

So what’s next for Tracy Pound? What will 2020 hold?

Tracy is trying to put all the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle into place. Next year is going to be a huge year of growth. This year, was all about putting systems in place. Next year is growth including employing more salespeople and trainers. Office 365 is a massive opportunity. Of course, Sage will still play and important role as there is still huge demand for it. But so will Xero cloud accounting. And Office 365 has massive potential.

Want to get in touch with Tracy? Get in touch using the contact details below.

Mentioned in This Episode

CompTia.org

Maximity

Connect with Tracy

LinkedIn: Tracy Pound

Twitter: @TracyJPound or Maximity_UK

Facebook

Website: Maximity.co.uk

Email: Tracy@Maximity.co.uk

Connect with Me

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You Might Also Be Interested In

Who are CompTIA and how can they help your IT business? TubbTalk #16
A List of User Groups for UK Managed Service Providers
Being a Woman Working in a Male-Dominated Industry – TubbTalk #27

 

The post Advancing Women in IT – TubbTalk #62 appeared first on Richard Tubb.

diskAshur2 – The Fort Knox of Hard Drives!

I think the diskAshur2 is the Fort Knox of hard drives!

If you store personal data on a portable hard drive, then you should encrypt the contents of that drive. If you don’t use encryption, then the data on the disk could easily fall into the wrong hands.

Every Friday I share one of my favourite finds of the week — a website, tool or an app that has impressed me.

My Friday Favourite this week is diskAshur2 – a PIN authenticated portable hard drive.

How much does the diskAshur2 cost?

The diskAshur2 range starts from £129.

A 1TB diskAshur2 USB 3.1 secure portable encrypted hard drive costs £210.

diskAshur2 – Secure Portable Encrypted Hard Drive

I’ve taken a look at the iStorage encrypted drive range before, when I reviewed the iStorage DataShur – PIN Encrypted USB Flash Drive.

The diskAshur2 is the big brother to the DataShur range. It’s a PIN authenticated portable drive that uses military-grade hardware encryption.

This means it’s the Fort Knox of Hard Drives!

It is ultra-secure but easy to use. Unlike solutions such as Microsoft’s Bitlocker, the diskAshur2 requires no software and is compatible with any operating system.

It uses a USB 3.1 connection. To use the drive, you simply enter a PIN on the physical numeric keyboard that is built-in to the hard drive case. The drive is then unlocked and you can plug it into any device to read the data.

If you yank the diskAshur2 out of a connected computer, the data is locked again until you re-enter your PIN.

You can set your PIN to a unique 7-15 digit number. If you’re an IT department or Managed Service Provider (MSPs, then you can set independent user and admin PIN codes on the device. This means that if the user forgets their PIN, the administrator can help the user create a new PIN.

I see the physical aspect of the diskAshur2’s numeric PIN keyboard as a great offering for IT businesses. Software-based encryption tools need setting up across multiple computers. The diskAshur2 uses a security method in a PIN that everybody is familiar with and requires little training.

How can I get it?

The diskAshur2 range is available from Amazon. iStorage IS-DA2-256-1000-B 1TB diskAshur2 USB 3.1 secure portable encrypted hard drive - Phantom Black 

You can find more details about the diskAshur2 range at the iStorage homepage.

You can also follow @iStorage_Ltd on Twitter, check out the iStorage LinkedIn page, or visit the iStorage Facebook page.

You Might Also Be Interested In

pCloud – All your files with you, anywhere you go
How to Protect the Data on your Laptop or Mobile Device
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The post diskAshur2 – The Fort Knox of Hard Drives! appeared first on Richard Tubb.

The Datto Executives Live from DattoCon 19 – TubbTalk61

Richard is still on a high from this year’s Paris DattoCon! And he just can’t help but share his excitement with you guys. So in this week’s podcast he’s bringing you not 1, but 4 of Datto’s executives who’ll open up about 2FA, the future of RMM, Datto’s European expansion, and their new line of networking products.

An Interview with:
Ryan Weeks — Chief Information Security Officer

First up, Richard talks to Ryan Weeks, Datto’s Chief Information Security Officer. Ryan is the man in charge of Datto’s own information security, internal corporate systems and infrastructure. He also plays an active role with Datto’s product teams, working on how to extend the security functionality of Datto products to better aid MSPs in the work that they do to help the end customer.

Working with such a broad scope is no mean feat but Richard relishes his role:

“I do a lot of MSP education and outreach and I’m currently on a crusade to unite all of the channel vendor technology security teams together in the fight against the endemic threat that MSPs seem to be facing these days.

Datto is a company that truly believes in the important work of security, so it makes getting out of bed and coming to work to fight the good fight really, really easy to do every day.”

The biggest security threat for MSPs

There’s no doubt that it’s a fight worth fighting; it’s a difficult time for MSPs who are currently being targeted by criminals: hackers who aren’t playing around when it comes to the damage they cause.

What advice would Ryan have for Datto partners on how MSPs can stay safe in the current climate?

Ryan’s favourite security sound bite is one that he’s stolen from the airline industry: put your own oxygen mask on first!

“We saw a pretty seismic shift in the threat landscape around this time last year, September of 2018, where MSPs started to become the focus of attack because they’re supply chain to interesting end customers that criminals want to attack. MSPs traditionally do a great job of protecting their end customers. But sometimes they may neglect — through no fault of their own — their own internal programme because they’re doing such a good job protecting their end customers.

We’re at a point where MSPs really need to stop and look at the things they’re doing to protect themselves and their own technology ecosystem, because right now they’re effectively co-sharing risk with their customers. Their customers’ risk is their risk, and their risk is their customers’ risk. And I think they really need to start viewing it that way.”

Ryan explains that there’s a lot of really tactical advice out there but at the broadest level it’s about going back to basics. It’s about looking at your people and your processes and getting your basic IT hygiene in order before worrying about anything more advanced.

Cyber criminals “aren’t doing anything exceptionally interesting. They’re doing basic living off the land techniques, stealing credentials, existing vulnerabilities, poor hygiene, like RDP open to the internet. So if you focus on simple things, you can actually really reduce your exposure.”

Strength in numbers

When it comes to mitigating the threat from cyber criminals, Ryan firmly believes that there’s strength in numbers. He knows that with the current size of the MSP industry, there’s more than enough work to go around, so in the last year he’s issued a rallying cry to bring vendors together to tackle the security threat.

“We’re facing an endemic threat right now and the only way we’re going to get through it is if MSPs and all the channel technology vendors band together and really start, fundamentally, changing the way we think about securing ourselves and our customers.

We’re also working with other channel technology providers to build an ecosystem of threat intelligence sharing and collaboration, talking about protection mechanisms that are working, how we’re detecting MSP attacks and preventing them.”

Two factor authentication

One of Ryan’s boldest moves has been the introduction of mandatory two factor authentication, but it wasn’t an easy decision to make.

“We kept seeing attackers use RMM technologies to exploit MSPs and their customers. And it wasn’t necessarily always the fault of the technology solutions provider. And at Datto, or at least what I’ve done at Datto, is I’ve brought this mentality of a shared responsibility for security; MSPs and Datto, sharing the responsibility to protect their technology.”

After looking at the stats and realising that there hadn’t been a successful security attack against an MSP that had 2FA, they were “more than 90% sure” about the decision. But they knew that user feedback would be vital.

“We got, I think, over 100 responses, most of them overwhelmingly positive. And so we just decided that the time was right, the MSPs were behind us and it was just something that we needed to do. We were going to take a leadership position in the market and say we’re going to be the first RMM to require two factor authentication for all of its users. And we’re still on that path.

We’re doing it in a way that not only solves the security piece, but we also listen to the feedback about usability and we’re merging those two things together, as we’re delivering this functionality. That’s something else that is really important to me at Datto: merging pragmatic solutions with security and usability in mind.

I don’t want to create a brick that no one can use. I want it to be a secure and usable experience.”  

Emily Glass — Chief Product Officer

Next in the firing line, we have Emily Glass, Datto’s Chief Product Officer who came to the firm as part of an acquisition back in 2014. Luckily she initially spent a significant amount of time as a customer experience officer, dealing with the challenges of the product and the partners, so she had a solid understanding of their business needs before moving to her current role.

Which is just as well, because Emily now heads the teams responsible for product management and design — a role that excites her every bit as much today as it did when she first started. And the thing she’s most excited about right now?

Datto’s networking products

As one of Datto’s newer product lines, Emily finds it an interesting challenge.

“John Tippett and the product and engineering team are passionate about the mission of bringing networking gear and solutions to partners in a way that’s built for MSPs. We get a lot of feedback and that’s how we build the product, improve and innovate.”

And because it’s at the beginning of the process, it’s even more exciting because I feel like you might sometimes have more options and you really have to choose carefully.”

So how would Emily explain the MSP focus of the Datto networking range to an MSP that uses Cisco, Draytek or any of the other well-known brands that have been around for years?

“We looked at the market for networking products and saw there were really two choices. There’s the enterprise in which the price is too high, and you don’t really need all those features as a small medium business. So it’s a little bit overkill and then it becomes unnecessarily complex to manage. And in the commodity end you might have all the features you want and you might have a better price but again, it might not be pricing in the way you want to consume it.”

So that’s where the networking as a service concept comes in, where the upfront hardware fee is very low but there’s an ongoing recurring monthly fee for all the support upgrades. And all of the service that comes with it has a lifetime warranty which we think is really MSP focused.”

Of course, on top of that you have the cloud management; we really put a lot of energy into that to make it seamless to migrate between Datto products. And, if you’re familiar with some of our other products there’s a little bit less of a learning curve.”

Emily on being a woman in a male-dominated industry

Having grown up in a technical environment, Emily was never in any doubt that she would pursue a career in engineering. But when starting her university degree in computer engineering, she couldn’t help but notice that she was in a minority.

She didn’t let it hold her back though, “I think it’s a little bit about personality. I’m very logical, very pragmatic, very efficient, and I want to arrive at the best solution. And so I appreciate various viewpoints and I can tolerate a lot of discussion or noise very well, because I kind of cut through it and get to the point. I think that’s necessary for a product role, where you have to get something built at the end of the day, and you have to sometimes push through a lot of objections.”

Despite her own success, she’s glad to see the tide is turning for women in tech and is happy to have played a role in that.

“I do feel like that’s a responsibility; being that presence, being a powerful woman and modelling that for the folks at Datto, for our partners — I do view that as part of my job.”

She — and the company as a whole — are excited to see an increase in women taking part in tech peer forums, as well as those attending the DattoCon keynote: “It’s something that Datto is very passionate about pushing forward as well.”

Mark Simon — Managing Director, EMEA

Next, Richard catches up with a relative newcomer to the MSP space: Datto’s Mark Simon, who has been with the company for about six months and is enjoying only his second DattoCon experience.

“It’s been really thrilling actually to be part of what has been an event that has far passed expectations so far, just in terms of numbers, the engagement, the networking…I’ve really enjoyed it and my sense from talking to dozens of partners is that they’re hopefully feeling the same way.”

In fact, he’s fast becoming a fan of the MSP industry in general.

“I’ve really enjoyed getting to know and learn about the MSP community; their curiosity, their willingness to help each other, I’ve never seen it in any other industry. The MSP community is unique in that respect and I really enjoy that.”

Building a world class team

Mark’s focus so far has been on building a world class team, hiring new people and making sure the right people are in the right jobs, that they’re trained and supported and really clear on what their missions are.

But, while the UK is the largest part of Datto’s EMEA business, Mark’s focus extends beyond Britain.

“We have very robust businesses in the Nordics and we actually just opened a new office in Benelux. So all of those are really important to us.

And then we have a considerable partner base through our distribution network in Southern Europe, France, Italy, etc. I’m really enjoying seeing the different phases of the MSP community in different countries.”

Datto’s biggest challenges in Europe

Mark knows that with so many partners, in so many European countries, he’ll face a wide variety of challenges.

“It’s about where is that particular market in terms of its adoption of the managed services model. Some countries, like France, are very much at the beginning of that journey. So things that we in the UK or US, might take for granted, like the idea of business continuity and disaster recovery is just less well known.

In some other areas, where Datto is not a well-known brand, the challenge is going to be brand building, building trust and credibility and about sharing what we stand for. But whenever we talk to partners about setting up in Copenhagen, for example, or investing more in France, the reaction is overwhelmingly positive that a large North American company is taking EMEA seriously.”

Christian Nagele — Director, Commercials (Senior Director EMEA strategy)

After talking to Christian Nagele almost a year ago at DattoCon Barcelona, (take a listen here: From CentraStage to Datto: One Cloud-based RMM’s Journey – TubbTalk #46) Richard was keen to catch up and quiz Christian on Centrastage, Datto’s RMM product, about how it has grown over the past 12 months.

Centrastage, while not quite ubiquitous (yet) is being used by more and more MSPs, and the feedback has been overwhelming positive.

So is Christian happy to rest on his laurels?

Not a chance. 

“We set out to make Datto RMM the leading MSP focused RMM on the market by the end of 2020. So we have this project called Datto RMM 2020. That’s a fairly bold statement — to achieve market leadership — but I think the investment that’s going into the product is testament to the fact we’re serious about it and so from a product lead perspective, there have been huge improvements, enhancements and acceleration in the last 12 months, which is reflected in the numbers.

Every month, hundreds of MSPs are joining the Datto RMM platform. It’s a technology that is challenging to design, build, deliver and support for all the RMM vendors, so we have a lot of respect for our competition but I think where we started the company all those years ago has put us in a really good spot to both deliver world class RMM but also to start looking beyond the traditional RMM genre into what does RMM look like in 3-5-7 years.”

The future of RMM

One of the key trends to emerge, explains Christian, is that it’s as much about the end user now as it is about the device.

“The management of network devices and windows, laptops and servers is a very well-defined requirement. It could always be done better, quicker, with more automation, but I think now the end user who is sat behind the Windows laptop, the MacBook Pro, or the mobile device is becoming far more important. The MSP has to educate, to support, to secure that end user.

That’s clearly an upside within our RMM tool; it gives you a footprint on that end user’s machine. It gives you a window into their world and almost a two way communication channel. So we’re already starting to think: how does an RMM tool move beyond the device into helping MSPs engage with their end user for feedback, support and all the usual things.

And with the explosion of internet connected devices, our ability to plug millions of internet enabled devices into the Datto RMM platform is also going to be a key part of our differentiation going forward.”

If Datto’s RMM platform started off as Christian’s baby, he says it’s now a teenager, “about to take a driving test and head out into the big wide world!” 

Mentioned in This Episode

Datto
DattoCon19
Centrastage
Cisco
Draytek

Connect with Me 

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You Might Also Be Interested In

The Datto CEO on his first year
A First Look at the Datto and Autotask Story — The 2018 Tour
From CentraStage to Datto: One Cloud-based RMM’s Journey – TubbTalk #46

 

 

 

The post The Datto Executives Live from DattoCon 19 – TubbTalk61 appeared first on Richard Tubb.

Captivate – Growth-Orientated Podcast Hosting

Do you host a podcast or are considering building one?

For example, does finding a growth-orientated podcast host seem more complicated than it should be?

Every Friday I share one of my favourite finds of the week — a website, tool or an app that has impressed me.

My Friday Favourite this week is Captivate – Growth-Orientated Podcast Hosting.

How much does it cost?

Captivate costs from $19 per month for podcast hosting.

Captivate offers a 7-day free trial.

How to start your Podcast Hosting

Getting started with running your podcast can sometimes seem an overwhelming task. For example:-

You can quickly become distracted thinking about the equipment you want to buy.
It is easy to ponder about the format you want your podcast to take.
Becoming overwhelming by the technical aspects of hosting your podcast is common.

So, where should you begin?

For several years, I’ve hosted my podcast — TubbTalk – The Podcast for IT Consultants — at podcast hosts Libsyn.

Above all, I did this because Libsyn is a very highly regarded host. For example, they are reliable and used by many of the top podcasters.

However, I recently moved so that we now host my podcast with Captivate’s offering. I did this primarily because I think Captivate’s solution is changing podcast hosting. They are growth-orientated in their approach.

The Captivate interface is simple and effective. As an example, Captivate’s interface features some powerful help functions and useful prompts.

Captivate is a user-friendly host. For instance, you will find that they make it easy for you to get your new show up and running with the minimum of effort.

Migration your existing show into Captivate’s podcast hosting is an automated process. For instance, it took me less than 15-minutes to migrate all 50 episodes of my podcast into Captivate.

How can Growth-Orientated Podcast Hosting help you?

I think that it is clear where Captivate’s podcast hosting is growth-orientated. For example, any podcast creator wants to know who is listening.

In other words, Captivate makes it very easy to check out your podcast listener stats.

As an example, they provide:-

A download overview
download averages.
how people listen (device details)
where they download from (geographical listener details)

… plus many other statistics.

The Captivate system offers you a free website to promote your show. You will find that this website is highly customisable.

In addition, check out the customisable podcast player we use for my podcast show below.

The player has a friendly “call to action” feature which lets you drive traffic to a specific source. For example, you can direct people towards your email newsletter.

The Captivate dashboard also makes it simple to distribute your show to all the major hosts. For example, you can submit your show to directories including Apple, Spotify, Stitcher Radio and others directly from within your Captivate dashboard.

 

I love the ability to add members of your team.

For instance, this means is that you don’t need to share a single set of credentials amongst various people. This feature has been handy for Team Tubb.

Unlimited Podcast Shows

In addition, you can host unlimited podcast shows within your Captivate dashboard. This feature means that if you want to host more than one show, then you will not pay an extra fee.

Likewise, you will only pay for the number of downloads your show(s) get. For example, you get a free 10,000 downloads per-month in the basic tier.

In conclusion, I can’t speak highly enough about our experience with Captivate’s service.

Above all, I would say that founder Mark Asquith and his team at Rebel Media UK are real podcast experts.

In addition, they have done a fantastic job creating the Captivate platform. For example, it is a platform that supports experienced podcasters or anyone new to podcasting.

How can I get it?

Click here and start a 7-day free trial of Captivate.

You can also follow @CaptivateAudio on Twitter, or visit the Captivate Facebook page.

Thanks to Mark Asquith of Rebel Base Media for introducing me to Captivate!

Other Articles For You

Why you should listen to Podcasts for personal development
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Listen Notes – A Podcast Search Engine that actually works

The post Captivate – Growth-Orientated Podcast Hosting appeared first on Richard Tubb.

The Datto CEO On His First Year – TubbTalk #60

What’s next for Datto? Where better to find out than DattoCon19! This week Richard is joined in Paris by Datto CEO, Tim Weller, who shares his thoughts on MSP acquisitions, PSA tools and a whole lot more.

An Interview With Tim Weller

Stepping into Some Big Shoes

Datto’s hallmark has always been close personal partner relationships — it wasn’t unusual to call tech support and end up on the line with Datto founder Austin McChord, who started the business from scratch and grew it to over 1700 employees and over 16,000 partners.

For Tim Weller, those were some pretty big shoes to fill. So how has he found his first year as Datto CEO?

“It’s been it’s been a blur, the channel’s moving fast and so is Datto.”

But one thing that helped him hit the ground running is some solid advice from Kevin Johnson, Starbuck’s new CEO who succeeded founder Howard Schultz.

He told Tim the key was having, “the wisdom to understand what’s best about the company and what your predecessor did, and the courage to change the things that need to change as you grow.”

Fortunately Austin had some equally useful advice to share with Tim before handing over the reins. He said, “Don’t try to be me. This is a great business, follow the channel and it’ll take care of itself.”

And Tim is in no hurry to make drastic changes to the company culture. “We’ve always been keen to do anything for a partner and we still want to deliver on those promises. Now the question is, how do we deliver on those at scale? Then it comes down to business processes, software systems, training…but the culture is still the same.”

Tim on the Rise of MSP Acquisitions

There has been a significant upswing in MSP acquisitions over recent years — and it comes as no surprise to Tim who views it as yet another signal that the channel is growing up.

“I’ve been in a lot of tech industries and it’s common at this phase of an industry; if we have 16,000 partners, the upper quartile are executing better at some level and getting some scale and are just more mature businesses. And so they start looking at the rest and saying, can we gain scale? It’s the same with restaurants, hotels; it’s the evolution of any industry really.”

Tim sees Mitesh Patel of Fifosys, a guest from a previous episode (Click here to find out How to Do MSP Acquisitions Well) as a good example of this: “There are real synergies in all tech businesses when you do M&A if you’ve got your tech stack in order. Mitesh is running a very tight operational business and then buying younger MSPs who are less mature — he has the opportunity to get not only scale on the revenue side, but quite a bit of operating leverage from profits too. Datto sees it because we’ll have two partners that merge and if they’re both Datto partners, that’s great. If one or the other is a Datto partner, then we view it as a fresh chance to go into the one that’s not and talk about the suite.”

However, as trends go, Tim thinks it’s still early days for MSP acquisitions: “One of our partners, Tim Walker, from the UK, led a panel I was on this year and we had a breakout on M&A and I think we probably had 40-50 people in the room. Of those maybe only 5 or 6 were actually acquiring. I think more MSPs are looking than buying right now but it’s definitely a trend we’re starting to see.”

The Right Time for MSPs to Start Using PSA Tools

During his keynote speech, Tim shared the stat that 80% of DattoCon attendees use a PSA (professional services automation) tool. So what advice does Tim have for those MSPs who are still on the fence about PSA tools?

“Many people wait until their turnover hits maybe 50 million before they start using a PSA tool. But as much as I love Excel, spreadsheets can only take you so far. “

In this business, if you’re going to make the move to managed services, if you’re going to start charging recurring revenue and using your tech people for service desk and maintenance, you need to be able to track their time and which projects they’re working on.

And it’s just too hard to do that effectively. So I think if you don’t want to grow rapidly, you can sort of work your own scripts and your own tools and cobble things together. But if you have aspirations for growth, it’s the single best investment you can make from a platform perspective.”

For Tim, the important bit is implementation and getting the PSA tool setup right from the get-go and he believes this is much easier for younger companies. They generally encourage people to go with the default settings and then adapt them to their business as it grows. “The big MSPs have their playbook already done. And they have to adapt the tool to their playbook, which is why we make it highly configurable. But it’s much easier to put it in when you’re young. I think it’s really like the foundation of a house, it’s the same thing. You can build it later but why would you?”

Cloud Continuity and Why It’s Not Just For Disasters

One of the most interesting subjects Tim touched on in his keynote address was cloud continuity and resilient imaging.

Tim is keen to point out that cloud continuity isn’t only for disasters, for earthquakes, fires and floods — it’s for the everyday ‘disasters’ that won’t make the headlines.

“I’ve been in tech long enough to know, disaster was me tripping over the power cord, me dropping a magnet near the desk. I mean, it’s the server crashing, it’s not the fire. It’s about maintenance, the normal on and off of servers.”

“If you’re on a Windows server, you get a technology called Windows snapshots. In lay terms you can essentially tell Microsoft to pause the server and give you an image of everything running, all of the applications, and then you can take that image offline and ‘virtualise’ it.

On a laptop or PC, there really isn’t such a thing. You’re in a different OS. And of course, laptops and PCs are on and off, and you might unplug it at the end of the night, you might be travelling on mobile, you might be offline.”

Resilient imaging is the result of a two-year effort to build the tech that will rebuild images in the cloud only.  Datto’s engineers have figured out the algorithms required to deliver a full image of your laptop or PC.

“Say you leave your laptop in an Uber here in Paris on the way to the airport, we can say, okay, here’s the last known likely good image of Richard’s laptop. You get back home, go over to a colleague’s web browser and you can run everything that was on your laptop. Or you can go to the high street, buy another laptop and pull whatever you’re running on our cloud back on to an image on that laptop. The ease of ‘virtualising’ and then pulling the image back onto the MSP’s laptop means you don’t need to spend an hour restoring, rebuilding all of the toolbars and configurations. And then of course you get screenshot verification which Datto invented.

As I’m fond of saying, it’s easy to back up, it’s hard to restore!”

It’s fascinating tech but Tim worried initially that it wasn’t necessarily commercially viable. However, after launching commercially only a few months ago, almost 10% of their US partners are already using it and Tim is pretty excited to bring it to Europe soon too, once they’ve allowed for GDPR compliance and data sovereignty.

Microsoft Teams and the Need For SaaS Protection

There were literal cheers in the room when Tim touched briefly on Microsoft Teams in his keynote, and with the huge rate of growth there, it’s hardly surprising.

Again, Tim isn’t focusing on disasters. As he says, “Microsoft isn’t going to lose your data centre, but even if you use it for only 10 minutes, you want to be able to back up all of that data. Doubly so for teams because as people come and go from end user companies, you want to be able to find that thread from marketing, for example. You want to be able to index and search documents posted by people who’ve since left, or the cover yourself against the rogue employees that might wipe out all the accounting spreadsheets and you don’t notice as they just disappear into the cloud.

It’s not like the PC you could surveil and back up — it’s a very ambiguous concept. We find partners using it all the time and losing data.”

Tim sees Datto’s new SaaS protection as huge opportunity for MSPs to profit from the prevalence of O365 in Europe. He envisions a “whole path of value added services, that in total will add up to multiples of the margin they’re getting on the actual O365 seed.”

What’s Next For Datto?

There’s no doubt that Tim has had a busy first year as Datto CEO and he’s not about to slow down, as he goes back to his Finnish roots with the company’s new Nordic expansion. He’s impressed by the maturity of the tech levels in Nordic countries, as well as the rate of expansion they’re experiencing over there, so opening offices in Copenhagen, seemed like a logical next step. As he explains, it’ll offer easy access to Stockholm and Helsinki and he’s excited to be putting sales support and account management in Copenhagen where they already have engineers. 

When it comes to Europe, Tim hints at even more interesting times ahead: “we cover everything from somewhere. And of course, we’re sitting here in lovely Paris, so you might well guess what the next market could be…”

Mentioned in This Episode

Datto
DattoCon
Fifosys
Office 365
Microsoft Teams

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You Might Also Be Interested In

How to Do MSP Acquisitions Well
How to Implement a PSA Tool in Your MSP

The post The Datto CEO On His First Year – TubbTalk #60 appeared first on Richard Tubb.