MSPs Struggling to Establish Brand Identity

Managed service providers are not doing enough to establish their brand or to distinguish themselves from the competition, according to one marketing executive.

MSP marketing leader David DeCamillis announced in early November that he was opening MSP Boost Consulting, a new firm designed to help MSPs enhance their brands, improve sales, and generate better leads for their companies. DeCamillis has worked in the MSP space for the last 16 years but decided to go independent and offer his input and expertise to any company willing to hear him out. The consultant previously worked as CRO at Techmedics. He's also held roles at Platte River Networks and Applied Tech.

MSP Boost Consulting's David Decamillis

Tackling MSP Brand Identity

One of the areas that MSPs appear to struggle regularly is how to brand their company and make it stand out compared to the thousands of other MSPs in the marketplace.

"If you don't have a good grasp or knowledge of your brand and what you want it to be, you don't generate leads that fit your ideal customer profile," DeCamillis told Channel Futures. "So many MSPs are struggling with that across a variety of sizes."

According to the former Techmedics executive, a brand's identity is integral since it is often key to how the company uses digital marketing.

Related:Next Generation of MSPs Faces 'Brutally Competitive' Market

"Many MSPs do not put together a proper marketing plan each year with a marketing calendar planning all their lead generation activities, whether email drip campaigns, social media, posts, your blog newsletter, webinars, in-person lead generation events, etcetera," added DeCamillis. "They're not planning and focusing on all the lead generation activities they need to do to generate qualified leads consistently."

The other area in which MSPs struggle to distinguish themselves from other companies and from other MSPs is how they present their offers.

"What we sell is different than any industry. We're not selling a widget; we're selling a relationship; we're selling a partnership; we're selling ourselves as part of a company and becoming their full IT department," DeCamillis said. "And that's a challenge for many MSPs to document and sell consistently. So, where I'm finding gaps isn't in their sales process; maybe they will do the first step and organize an assessment. of the prospects. But then they're not delivering on showing their value through the processing and providing the proper proposal, or maybe they're not capturing that genuine connection with the prospect and identifying their pain points or priorities or issues. It's like every other MSP out there when they present a proposal."

Related:Kaseya Working Toward Federal Compliance in 2025

MSPs Staying on Top of Tech Innovation

The MSP market isn't wholly struggling, however. One area that MSPs regularly excel in is keeping up with the technological needs of the day. The trend "started with cybersecurity, which continues to be a growing market and a concern. And I think many MSPs started to include more security in their platform and what they were delivering to their customers," DeCamillis said.

"I think most have done an excellent job of adding tools like MDR and multi-factor to that security stack. They're starting to get involved more in governance and policy creation," he said. "They're helping with audits and getting involved in the cybersecurity requirements for insurance. So those trends continue and I think they will continue because each industry seems to be getting more regulated and it's now up to the MSP to ensure their customers are staying safe in meeting those requirements."

Several major MSP vendors strive to improve their compliance standards and offer appropriate options to federal agencies. Kaseya's Max Pruger spoke to Channel Futures about its efforts toward federal compliance.