User Insights: MSP 501ers Weigh in on Kaseya CARES Program
We asked for insights on the Kaseya CARES program from a few of our MSP 501ers that are Kaseya users.
April 24, 2020
![Kaseya cares portal Kaseya cares portal](https://eu-images.contentstack.com/v3/assets/blt10e444bce2d36aa8/bltb3b808d6bb1a6c63/652458f83219a20fbe81b2d9/Kaseya-cares-portal.jpg?width=700&auto=webp&quality=80&disable=upscale)
Rob Schenk, CEO of MSP, Intivix
In terms of bettering your business best practices, what were you focused on pre-pandemic?
Some of our top focuses include new marketing initiatives, internal process improvement and automation initiatives. We are also focused on providing clients with multi-modal support options to streamline and enhance overall white glove client experience.
What are your primary concerns now, and are they reflective of the industry?
Our primary concerns are communicating proactively with clients and cementing our position as critical business partners. These communications are very important to understanding our clients’ financial position and working with them accordingly. Also sorting through the transition to working from home for client end users is a big one, as well as coming up with creative ways to ensure that the transition occurs effectively. We want it to be as secure, productive, and as efficient as possible.
Do you think MSPs will come out the other side of this in a better position? Why?
I think stronger MSPs will come out of this in a very positive way, assuming that we are kept whole through the PPP stimulus options. We are trying very hard to keep our team complete and avoid layoffs.
What is the most beneficial of the parts of the Kaseya CARES program? (Help navigating the legalese around the U.S. CARES bill; assistance with business best practices through Kaseya’s Powered Services program; direct financial assistance) and why?
We recently had our first meeting with Kaseya CARES. I anticipate that direct financial assistance will be the most useful as we are carefully looking at the bottom line and expenses to make it through this difficult time.
Gavin Livingstone, President, Bryley Systems Inc.
In terms of bettering your business best practices, what were you focused on pre-pandemic?
We were refining our product mix, simplifying and consolidating offerings while reviewing our pricing models.
What are your primary concerns now, and are they reflective of the industry?
The current and future well-being of our clients; few are directly shut-down at the moment, but all will feel the impact.
Do you think MSPs will come out the other side of this in a better position? Why?
In this environment, I believe that the financially strong MSPs with good business practices and loyal clients will do OK; I suspect those not as strong will find it difficult to continue.
What is the most beneficial of the parts of the Kaseya CARES program?
As a Kaseya customer since 2005, we have always been impressed with their technical capabilities, but we are now benefiting from their business-oriented programs like Kaseya CARES and Powered Services; the business best-practices are the most-compelling part.
Adam Bell, President, Sublime Computer Services
In terms of bettering your business best practices, what were you focused on pre-pandemic?
We started off the year with security audits for everyone! Based on our findings, we planned to implement any changes needed to make our clients as safe as possible. We were also meeting with each client to listen to their needs and get their feedback concerning our service and what services they would like to see us provide.
What are your primary concerns now, and are they reflective of the industry?
Our concerns right now are getting our clients working from home. Working from home and remote has a higher risk, and we have found efficient ways for our clients to work while reducing that risk. The plan is to make long term adjustments to our remote access policies that actually make it a better experience for the users.
We have the security that we like and they have the speed and access that they like. The entire industry is facing this problem right now, and I think that we’re approaching it with a healthy balance of what is good for us, and what is good for our clients. Some I.T. service providers force security that works but is so painful to the user that they won’t use it.
Do you think MSPs will come out the other side of this in a better position? Why?
Good companies who are providing good service will come up with solutions to help their clients. Companies who cannot or will not make changes will unfortunately fall by the wayside. The entire industry will provide better service and keep our clients in business.
What is the most beneficial of the parts of the Kaseya CARES program?
The most beneficial parts would be the Government Relief Navigation and Business Guidance. When the industry comes together and learns together, then everyone benefits.
Luis Giraldo, CEO, Ook Enterprises Ltd.
In terms of bettering your business best practices, what were you focused on pre-pandemic?
We had been primarily focused on new managed services opportunities and sales as 2020 kicked off. Although we’ve secured 3 new clients since the beginning of the year, with a few more prospects still looking to engage with us, the majority of our efforts rapidly shifted towards work-from-home deployment and enablement. All our clients are now operating remotely for the most part, and doing so in a stable and fairly efficient manner. COVID-19 confirmed that our focus on standards and best practices (standard tech stack, thorough documentation, established processes and SOPs) has made a big impact for our clients—and for us.
What are your primary concerns now, and are they reflective of the industry?
I’m mostly concerned for the wellbeing of our families, staff, customers, and their families and staff. Our heart is heavy with everything that’s going on, and so many people will be affected emotionally and financially. We’re currently operating strictly in disaster-recovery mode, meaning that all our focus is on ensuring immediate response for our customers, solving their challenges and addressing their urgent needs. We’re OK to go a little while without net-new growth, it’s more important that we are on the ground for the customers we have today.
Do you think MSPs will come out the other side of this in a better position? Why?
The optimist in me says “of course!”, but I think it really depends. Some industries will be hit much harder than others, but I think MSPs are likely to come out stronger and more resilient on the other side. As Paul Dippell usually says, and I’m paraphrasing: success will likely be determined by MSPs’ own ability to adapt to change, to becoming a “next-gen MSP”.
What is the most beneficial of the parts of the Kaseya CARES program?
The Kaseya Cares emergency response program is multi-faceted, and I think this will enable helping the largest amount of MSPs possible, at different stages of their businesses.
● The government relief navigation is not particularly relevant to us being in Canada, but for many new MSP owners already knee-deep in their response efforts, a shortcut to access government relief programs will be much-welcome respite.
● The business guidance is always important and always helpful. I happen to know the guys running Powered Services (kudos to Dan Tomaszewski, Matt Solomon, and Kevin Lancaster – and their teams), and can tell you that they really get it – they know what’s going on on the ground for MSPs, and the content and collateral they’re putting together is extremely relevant. Also, I’ll take advice from Gary Pica any day of the week, and I’m happy to see that he’s so involved in ensuring MSPs are well equipped to weather this storm.
● On the direct financial assistance end of things, we’re watching our cashflow very carefully but we’ve been lucky not to require it thus far, despite a few customers having to make unfortunate staffing changes. So, we’re doing our part to ensure we don’t dip into programs that may benefit other MSPs more profoundly at this stage. I applaud Kaseya for their initiative as well as all our amazing channel vendors as they have all truly stepped up to the plate to ensure each and every MSP has the best chance to succeed in the face of this epidemic.
Anthony Mongeluzo, President, PCS
In terms of bettering your business best practices, what were you focused on pre-pandemic?
Our goal has always been to focus on the business process. How can we deliver the service better? We continually tweak small things that make a big difference. We are big on value and what value we provide. We do very complicated things but I believe the best value is to work on the basics to improve.
What are your primary concerns now, and are they reflective of the industry?
Our primary concerns are the well being of our clients. Many businesses right now have no options. They are closed. It is a bizarre and unique economic market with a great deal of uncertainty. The IT industry (and primarily managed services) are significantly valued because we are needed to function. Your time and material and smaller providers will suffer significantly through this pandemic. The larger, more established MSPs will find a way to survive. Cash flow will be slower, and some clients will no longer have the ability to pay. IT Managed Services is an excellent and essential service but as your clients shrink, your revenues will shrink.
Do you think MSPs will come out the other side of this in a better position? Why?
The MSPs that survive will be in a great position. There will be less competition. IT salaries which were increasing by the day will lower. The market is going to change to a buyers market for employers. Four to six weeks ago, most companies needed bodies. Value and talent will be a big differentiator in this new economy. Many small shops will close, and their “CEOs” will be working for someone else. Overall, your healthy and robust MSPs will take a hit, but they will survive.
What is the most beneficial of the parts of the Kaseya CARES program?
Kaseya is doing a great job overall. Many IT leaders are not great at business, and Kaseya is providing those tools. We work with many partner companies, and Kaseya is doing the best job of trying to assist and partner with the MSP community. Connectwise is doing the bare minimum, and I have not hear from many other companies. I give Kaseya a lot of credit for jumping in front of this situation and handling it well.
Matthew Tucker, CEO, Pegasus Technologies
In terms of bettering your business best practices, what were you focused on pre-pandemic?
Both before the pandemic hit, and now as more of our clients feel the virus’ impact, our focus has been perfecting the customer experience.
What are your primary concerns now, and are they reflective of the industry?
Today, our primary concerns are staff safety, avoiding layoffs, helping our clients survive, and emerging stronger as this pandemic passes.
Do you think MSPs will come out the other side of this in a better position? Why?
I think efficient MSPs who entered the pandemic era fully aware of their revenue streams and service profit margins will come out stronger. MSPs that haven’t been actively tracking and managing their KPIs will struggle with cash flow, clients, and staff retention. This opens the door for stronger MSPs to capture new business, be it organically or through acquisitions.
What is the most beneficial of the parts of the Kaseya CARES program?
Pegasus was already well on our way to applying the benefits of the CARES Act before the Kaseya CARES program debuted, and we have spent many years implementing our best practices internally and across our client base, but it’s nice to know vendors like Kaseya have our back in this unprecedented times. Vendors all need to be more like Partners in times like these, or else they won’t be vendors for long. That includes MSPs. The best part about the CARES programs is the financial assistance, because it helps us to accomplish the three immediate goals we set for the company- staff safety, no layoffs, and client success.
Matthew Tucker, CEO, Pegasus Technologies
In terms of bettering your business best practices, what were you focused on pre-pandemic?
Both before the pandemic hit, and now as more of our clients feel the virus’ impact, our focus has been perfecting the customer experience.
What are your primary concerns now, and are they reflective of the industry?
Today, our primary concerns are staff safety, avoiding layoffs, helping our clients survive, and emerging stronger as this pandemic passes.
Do you think MSPs will come out the other side of this in a better position? Why?
I think efficient MSPs who entered the pandemic era fully aware of their revenue streams and service profit margins will come out stronger. MSPs that haven’t been actively tracking and managing their KPIs will struggle with cash flow, clients, and staff retention. This opens the door for stronger MSPs to capture new business, be it organically or through acquisitions.
What is the most beneficial of the parts of the Kaseya CARES program?
Pegasus was already well on our way to applying the benefits of the CARES Act before the Kaseya CARES program debuted, and we have spent many years implementing our best practices internally and across our client base, but it’s nice to know vendors like Kaseya have our back in this unprecedented times. Vendors all need to be more like Partners in times like these, or else they won’t be vendors for long. That includes MSPs. The best part about the CARES programs is the financial assistance, because it helps us to accomplish the three immediate goals we set for the company- staff safety, no layoffs, and client success.
A few weeks ago, we took an in-depth look at the Kaseya CARES program, and how it was developed to help SMB partners through the COVID-19 crisis.
Congress passed the CARES Act on March 30. The $2.2 trillion bill is meant to bring relief to mainly small to midsize businesses, loaning funds to help them keep the lights on and avoid layoffs. But like any legislation, there are miles of bureaucratic red tape to navigate and mountains of legalese to try to understand.
It’s clear that SMBs in every sector will need help navigating the bill, refining and pivoting their business plans and best practices, and accessing funds to keep them going. In the channel, many vendors, distributors and master agents are rolling out programs to help their partners through this crisis.
Kaseya CARES aims to do just that. We solicited commentary from some of our MSP 501ers that indicated they are Kaseya users on last year’s survey, asking them to provide their take on the following:
In terms of bettering your business best practices, what were you focused on pre-pandemic?
What are your primary concerns now, and are they reflective of the industry?
Do you think MSPs will come out the other side of this in a better position? Why?
What is the most beneficial of the parts of the Kaseya CARES program? (Help navigating the legalese around the U.S. CARES bill; assistance with business best practices through Kaseya’s Powered Services program; direct financial assistance) and why?
Click through the slideshow above. to view their answers.
About the Author(s)
You May Also Like