Get your MSP Business Off to a Strong Start in 2020

Looking back on 2019 allows you to look to the year ahead.

2019 was a busy year! At Technibble, we hope you were able to achieve everything you set out to accomplish as an MSP and more. But of course the job is never done. As an MSP and business owner there is rarely a dull (or quiet) moment. It’s the turn of the new year and it’s an incredible time to reflect and look back on the last twelve months, and with a clear and open mind, plan ahead for 2020.

Look Back and Plan Ahead

Just because it’s the new year, it doesn’t mean it’s the time for New Year’s resolutions, half-hearted commitments or pipe dreams. Now is the time to really look back on your MSP business, get into the gritty detail and ask yourself some honest and sometimes difficult questions.

1. What went really well throughout or at certain points of the year?
2. What went really badly?
3. Did I let anyone down? Clients, partnerships, family?
4. What venture or investment failed, needs more work, or dropping?
5. Which type of businesses did I have the least success with?
6. Which type of businesses did I have the most success? Can I target more of these?
7. Did I introduce any new services?
8. Did I improve my existing services? Did they set me apart from the competition?
9. Did I study and expand my skill set and understanding?

These are just a few thoughts and you’ll undoubtedly have more to add, write them down and give yourself time to reflect, not to ruminate negatively but to really help identify where your strengths and weaknesses are. As MSP’s and business owners we all need to be accepting of where we’re both strong and weak but also remember that these are what make us unique as individuals and MSPs. We can’t achieve everything, this isn’t realistic, whether that be through a lack of time or relevant skills.

Understanding where the gaps are will provide ample opportunity to focus hard on the money earners or allow you to correct course and skill up (perhaps hire) to address the gaps. Part of the ability to adapt, move forward, correct course and quickly identify a failing is what being a business owner is all about, and for a lot of us, what we love about it!

What went well? First, be sure to celebrate your success whether this be patting yourself on the back or taking your colleagues out to dinner. Being an MSP is not an easy ride and you should take time to remember the things you do really well and acknowledge the help you receive from colleagues, family members, clients and friends that enable business success.

Sometimes when moving into a new year it’s a clear matter of channeling energy into your successful endeavours which often means a greater return. Don’t do this blindly, be sure you have the resources and energy to do and avoid overextending your capability which can have the habit of impacting your quality of service.

What went wrong? Don’t worry, it happens to the best of us, don’t shy away from the problems. Facing them head on will be your key to success in 2020. Give some additional thought to those areas that failed on the first run, sometimes it’s a matter of adjustment rather than cutting it loose.

Areas that have continually proven to be poor concepts can be disregarded with little love lost but what about areas that have done ok but simply drain resources in the way of money or worse, your time? Maybe further consideration needed as to whether this is something you continue with.

Tools for Reflection

Reflection can be a difficult process for some. It can often be difficult to remember what I had for lunch three days ago, let alone try to pick apart 12 months of business. We’re busy, doing business, so where do we start?

Records!

It’s likely that you have plenty of records, call logs, client meta data backed up by months of financial data. If the answer is no then there’s a worthy goal for 2020, keep organised records and notes on all business activities. Record keeping will allow you to track all your incoming requests, requirements and customer needs and allow you to collate relevant, important and sometimes surprising information.

Ticketing systems will allow you to track a plethora of detail to hone in on your biggest customers (good and bad), the types of issues you’re fixing, parts needed, services utilised. Accounting records will also be a key source of information that will allow you to pick apart your biggest areas of spend so that you financially plan ahead. Which tools, advertising and third party services gave the biggest return?

Ask your clients! I get mixed responses to this idea. The wealth of information that can be obtained from simply asking your clients should not be discarded. I find the best approach is a carefully crafted questionnaire of up to 10 to 15 questions with the promise of a prize for those that spare the time, £50 Amazon voucher? 2 free hours of support? Collate the information to paint a clearer picture on how you’re doing from a client perspective and feed this into your decision making and planning for 2020.

Following your clients you should spare the time to put feelers out to all those impacted by business operations. These could be your staff, business partners, even family and friends. Any important relationship in fact would be worth querying, you may unearth some previously undisclosed piece of detail that simply wouldn’t have expected.

Refocus on your Clients

Clients, clients and more MSP clients. Is often the first thought when stepping into the MSP world and it’s not uncommon to learn the hard way, we can’t take on an infinite number of clients without addressing the inevitable impact. The number of clients and client focus are key areas to address moving into 2020 and effectively managing capacity to get the best return is a critical consideration.

The capacity equation. Too few clients is something that needs addressing quickly to build a sustainable MSP business and may point to problems in your marketing, your strategy or your approach. Some business owners don’t always have brilliant sales skills, this is quite common but can be easily addressed through third party support, training and if you’re perhaps in a better position, hiring.

Often hiring is a consideration when the operations are a little more sizable and sustainable, but it’s an option nonetheless. These issues, in part, are why we put together the Technibble Marketing Membership, please take a look at how we can help you build out your client base.

Having too many clients is a good problem to have but no less challenging. There is a natural and critical threshold once breached which starts to impact the MSP owner and their business, inability to respond to clients, rushed work, stress, anxiety, tiredness are some of the smaller side effects of such a situation and requires urgent attention before things get drastically out of hand.

It’s time to cull your client list! This can undoubtedly be difficult but some will find great satisfaction and start to wonder why they hadn’t done this sooner. In the busy day of doing business it’s very easy to let in difficult customers, we’re often aware of it at the time, internal alarm bells are ringing but the contract has the potential to be lucrative and the dream of another sustainable contract will win out.

It’s a natural approach to business. Ensure your contracts hold a simple “get out client hell free” clause in such scenarios to cover yourself legally. It’s always good to consider the 80/20 rule, if this concept is new to you then I strongly recommend a quick Googling. In short, 20% of your clients will be taking up 80% of your time, creating 80% of your stress!

Making Time for Study

Study and learning are important regardless of what we choose to do in our careers or businesses as an entrepreneur. Your MSP priorities and focus for the coming 12 months will weigh heavily on what you commit time to so set your house in order before making key decisions in this area. Need to brush up on your GDPR? Get a book dedicated to the subject or invest in some outside help. Need to work on your pitch or salesmanship? Toastmasters can offer a great learning and speaking opportunity. On the road a lot? Listen to audio books.

Technical skills is often a matter of acquiring the tech for a short period and then putting the time aside to test. Fitting it in is often the tricky part and often needs to make way for running the actual business, but it’s a critical requirement if you hope to progress and improve this year!

Making the time to study in this way isn’t new but effective planning will make the intent come to fruition, plan the time now throughout the coming year but be realistic and have others sense check your plans. They’ll often help bring you back down to earth, I find the significant other is pretty good at this! That one week trip to the MSP conference would be incredible, but realistic?

Studying outside your field is an interesting concept worth exploring which widens your breadth of understanding and assists critical thinking and conceptualising “outside the box”. Read and study areas in an unrelated field of choice that interests you in your spare time. Nothing is out of bounds here as long as you enjoy the topic. You might be surprised at the results.

Making Time for Health

I’m not going to give you a lecture, you’re intelligent enough to know that spending time on your own health is important. But then because it’s important I couldn’t leave it alone. I know a lot of people running MSPs that are so busy that they simply do not make time or consider the impact to themselves physically and mentally.

These are real challenges for most in our day and age, perhaps more so for a business owner! Focusing on the clients, juggling priorities, late nights catching up, mix in a little parental responsibility and you have a recipe for self-neglect.

Health professionals have varying ideas on the best methods and have different approaches to a healthy lifestyle so I urge the reader to make time to investigate your options. We’re all different with different needs so there’s no one set program that I can recommend to the technically inclined, I know what works for me so take time to learn what will work for you. The simple message here is, make the time, sleep well and don’t disregard your health, both physical and mental.

We truly hope at Technibble that your MSP gets off to a strong start in 2020, our site, services, and community of like-minded professionals are standing by to assist you in meeting your objectives. Happy New Year!