Are You Sticky?

The term “stickiness” goes by a lot of other names–for example, “customer retention,” “loyalty” and “long-term patronage” are all bandied about. But “stickiness” has a ring to it that might resonate with MSPs. Being “sticky” connotes having a bond with your customers, a connection that requires an overt effort on their part to break. Sometimes that bond can be broken in a single powerful tug, but very often it is just gradually chipped away at until it is … gone.

Antivirus solutions can play a big part in determining whether an MSP’s bond with its customers remains strong, breaks suddenly or gradually degrades. A frustrating fact about endpoint security: You only know it’s working when nothing happens. The better the solution, the less aware of it your customers become. So, unless your clients are particularly attuned to the staggering number of threats in today’s security landscape, they are blissfully oblivious to just how many disasters you may have helped them avert.

Of course, depending on the endpoint security solution you employ, some of those disasters may not have been averted … ahem.

CryptoLocker has been particularly effective at avoiding detection by many of the leading AV solutions on the market, leading to some very unhappy customers and some highly chagrined MSPs. These CryptoLocker breaches have put a real strain on the stickiness of many MSP-client relationships, and have led numerous MSPs to investigate and ultimately switch to Webroot. (Not to brag, but our CryptoLocker protection is simply unrivaled.)

Stickiness in Jeopardy

That’s the kind of dramatic security breach that can significantly weaken, or even completely destroy, the bond you have with your customers. But there’s a way in which AV solutions can jeopardize your stickiness–far more subtle but over time just as damaging.

Imagine you’re sitting in a movie theater and the person behind you kicks your seat. “No big deal,” you think. Then it happens again … and again. You’re starting to get annoyed, but you don’t want to make a scene. Alas, it keeps happening over and over and over. Ninety-nine times the person kicks your seat, and on the 100^th kick you blow your stack and exclaim, “WILL YOU PLEASE STOP DOING THAT!”

At that exact moment, someone walks by in the aisle and sees you “overreact” because someone kicked your seat–just once, for all they know. But, of course, that’s only what they saw; it’s not what really happened. Your reaction was in response to the  cumulative effect of many, many aggravations.

Now apply that same principle to your clients and their experiences with the AV solution you employ. Even when it doesn’t allow major infections to occur, there are a number of less obvious, but still aggravating, ways in which an endpoint security product can alienate customers. Does it:

For all of the benefits that Webroot Business Endpoint Security solutions deliver (and not to brag again, but there are many), perhaps the single greatest advantage is Webroot’s utter invisibility to an MSP’s customers. For them, it’s working so discreetly in the background that they simply forget about it—and the quiet satisfaction it fosters in those customers makes you “stickier” to them.

Let’s face it: AV protection is a necessary evil that MSPs must provide. It offers modest opportunities for profit, but great potential for problems–big and small–that can engender customer disappointment. So when you’re considering ways to cement better relationships with your customers, don’t overlook Webroot.

Otherwise it might be kick, kick, kick …

To learn more about the Webroot Channel Edge Partner program, click here, or check out how quick you can install a trial and discover first-hand how Webroot security protects, lowers your costs and boosts your bottom line.

Guest blogs such as this one are published monthly and are part of MSPmentor’s annual platinum sponsorship.