How are resellers showing an ROI on managed services deals in order to sell them?  (If you are in channels, I’d be interested in hearing what you are seeing from your partners as well).  Here are some observations along with a White Paper I have written on using assessments to accelerate sales cycles by providing justification to the buyer through risk.

WHITE PAPER: (click and download the Assessment document)

1. Differentiation and closing the deal seems to have little bearing on the platform; Nable, Zenith, LPI, Kaseya,…some are  better than others technically, but none are great.  The differentiation seems to be in the offering and services provided locally more than the platform.  The better implementations are largely customized and target only small and mid-market opportunities.  After that it’s custom or OEM’d.
2. Companies that try to show an ROI simply invite an audit of past service calls.  This leads to long sales cycles.
3. The initial offering may look promising, however once the reseller’s current customer base has been exhausted, sales plateau.  New customers are needed…but hard to find.
4. Small businesses won’t sign up for monitoring unless the seller can show some kind of justification.  Often they can not.
5. Reporting is poor among most platforms – the client doesn’t receive much value here.  Trying to creating quarterly value is often a struggle leading to resellers putting their SE’s on site to demonstrate value.  This is done without an accurate counting of the opportunity cost, and is often the thing that makes the monthly contract unprofitable (something generally hidden in the financials.)

Personally I have found that assessments work as deal accelerators (when they focus on risk analysis) – we’ve done them in every sized account; some complementary, others for a fee.  The deal is closed when justified by demonstrating a high likelihood of loss.  What are you seeing?  I’d love to hear your comments on this and the white paper!  If it’s helpful, feel free to pass it on.

© David Stelzl, 2010