I recently wrote a blog post titled “Why Regulations are a Good Thing for Technology Service Providers“. The concept was simple: regulations and compliance benefit Technology Services Providers. Customers providing products and services within their industry usually have compliance requirements like protecting credit card information. Most business owners are not trained or prefer not to deal with these obligations and rely on third-party vendors. I wanted to revisit this topic now that the business environment has changed overnight.
When businesses sneer at compliance and regulations, this is an MSP opportunity. The COVID-19 pandemic altered our business environment and threat actors are taking advantage of security flaws. Financial records, health information, and personally identifiable information are vulnerable while businesses attempt to solve problems with personnel and loss of revenue. As our President, Gary Pica says in every webinar, “the environment has changed and will not return to normal.” Within this new—and constantly changing—environment, we can continue to look for opportunities that benefit our customers.
How does compliance benefit you and the customer?
- Compliance requires extra effort and those costs can be rolled into your All In Seat Price (AISP). Rolling the maintenance cost of a compliance program into an AISP prevents the addition of other monthly fees and retains a single price per seat.
- Compliance objectives have additional requirements for security and privacy. For a standard business, those safeguards are most likely not in place and require separate implementation. These projects add to and provide Non-recurring Revenue (NRR) opportunities.
- The addition of a compliance strategy is added to the customer’s strategic roadmap. A vCIO can add recommendations and initiatives centered around compliance and cybersecurity programs. Doing so leverages the need for products, services, policies, and procedures that meet and retain compliance status.
- It is always a topic of conversation. Modern business practices likely fall under regulation, compliance, or statutory law and these topics are good to keep in mind when having discussions with a decision-maker. Some decision-makers are not up to speed on the latest requirements and informing them regularly has its benefits.
The message isn’t to “prey on the weak” or take advantage of a customer while they are down; it is to perform the heavy lifting while they concentrate on the day to day. After all, one purpose of an MSP is to remove the burden of Information Technology from the customer.
The pandemic changed how we work and how we support those who require help with their technology. Now is the time to adapt and accept the new normal for Technology Success.
