Are you new to the world of MSP? Are you looking to create a list of loyal and satisfied clients?
Starting an MSP business can be really difficult. With a lot of competition in the industry, snagging that first client can be a lot of work. And even for well-established businesses, sometimes growth can take time and planning.
So, if you’re struggling to gain new MSP clients, we’re going to give you a hand. Below are our top seven tips for getting clients as an MSP business, along with a few things to avoid when trying to find new customers. Read on now to find out more.
1. Acquire Referrals 🗣️
Word of mouth is an often forgotten marketing tactic that can be of great use in the world of MSP. Clients want to hear about the great services their colleagues and peers have had with service providers, so referrals can actually do wonders for your client recruitment and retention efforts 👄.
Referrals can come from all sorts of places, including blog content from happy clients, Facebook groups for small business owners, or even just over a meal with friends. You can also encourage referrals by incentivizing them. Offer clients discounts or deals for referring your services to others.
Referrals are a great way to find your ideal clients and build trust with them. A referral program helps potential clients see how your products or services have worked well for others in their industry and can help them take a chance on your company, even if you’re just starting out.
2. Network 🌐
Source: Zippia
Networking is one of those marketing techniques that people often groan at. However, successful startups often have networking to thank.
Source: Zippia
We know that networking is time-consuming, and we know that some people just don’t enjoy the idea of pitching their services in person at a local event. But, an in-person meeting can really have a profound impact on your business.
Attend industry events, go to trade shows, and seek out conferences where clients you would like to target are also in attendance. Once there, build relationships with them and generate referrals if you can!
3. Use Marketing or Advertising 🧑💻
Traditional marketing is a fantastic way of reaching your target audience and ensuring that the right people know you’re here offering the services they need. There are many ways to market yourself, including utilizing social media platforms, writing guest blogs, and creating a website with intuitive web design that uses Search Engine Optimization (SEO) to help you climb the search rankings 🧗.
If you’re not a fan of marketing yourself, you can always outsource this work to a digital marketing agency that can take on all of your marketing efforts, plan content, and enhance your site’s SEO.
4. Partner With Others 🤝
Large MSPs may have leads that they can’t entertain because they will only generate a small revenue. If you partner with a large MSP, they can refer those leads to you.
You can then return their help by providing them with a commission, typically 1 month’s recurring revenue.
Another way to get clients is through buying a small managed IT services company. By doing this, you’ll acquire the company’s client list. You can convince them to avail of your services by helping them with issues that the previous company cannot fix.
If you’re a company with limited means, you may also consider partnering with complementary services. This could be a business that’s services go hand-in-hand with your own. You can reach greater audiences by partnering and will be able to offer a bundle or deal to clients to get both of your services for a slightly reduced price.
Partnering in this way costs you less and gives you access to the client list of another company. A great way to find companies to partner with is networking, which we discussed above.
5. Specialize Your Services 🔃
One great way to improve your client recruitment is to become a highly specialized service. This can be done by specializing in a niche, industry, or location. While you may want to keep your client options broad, specializing can actually offer you lots of benefits.
To begin with, if you’re a specialist service, more specialist MSP clients will seek you out, and they may be willing to pay a higher price for your specific services. Additionally, it will give you a competitive edge over other, broader services in the area.
So, how can you specialize?
By Expertise
Your expertise as a company can define the services that you provide. Perhaps IT support or data storage are areas in which you offer your best services. Reducing your services to provide highly specialized critical services can attract clients who may not need a full IT infrastructure but want to outsource some services.
By Location
Another great way to specialize your services is to offer them based on location. This has a number of benefits. For one thing, businesses will know someone local to them is providing their support services, and for another, it will make in-person training and onboarding much easier.
By Industry
If the majority of your clients are in one industry, you may find that developing these services to aid companies in this area specifically can help you to specialize your service offerings. Perhaps you have worked with a few hospitals and found that they need specific bundles or infrastructure in place. Use this knowledge to specialize as a company.
6. Reform Your Customer Service Department 📞
If you’re an established business currently looking to improve your client recruitment, you may find that improving your customer support services, retraining staff, and expanding what you offer can help to improve client satisfaction, referrals, and recruitment.
IT and computer support tend to be an area where most non-IT employees are stuck. Because of this, your role tends to be talking clients through problems and offering solutions. If your customer support isn’t up to scratch, then you’re not going to get good reviews from clients, nor are you going to get any referrals.
7. Offer a Free Trial 🆓
Source: Evolving Digital
Offering a free trial of some of your services is a really good way of showing potential customers what your services and products do. It can help them to see how they would benefit from using your services and how they might improve their own workflow.
Offering a free trial tends to improve your chances of turning a potential customer into a paid customer, so consider offering it.
Consider how long you will offer a trial for and ensure it is enough time for a client to understand and get the most out of your service. The goal of a free trial is to sell your product, so if they cannot see how the product works within the timeframe you give, a customer may pass on your services.
A Few Don'ts For Acquiring New MSP Clients 🚫
While there are lots of things you should do to acquire new clients, there are also a few things people think are a good idea that aren’t. Below are a few things we recommend avoiding when trying to build a client list.
Don’t Give Discounts
While it can be tempting to offer huge discounts and run sales to entice customers to your services, it can have a negative effect. If you’re constantly offering services that are lower than their value, then you risk not being able to cover your operating costs.
You also risk being known as a company that offers cheap solutions, which can damage your reputation.
Instead of discounts, consider our free trial recommendations so that customers get to try your services for free to see what all the fuss is about. You might also consider partnership bundles that give a small discount and provide clients with two services that they need.
Don't Ignore Customer Feedback
Customer feedback is one of the best resources that you have. It can show you where your services may be lacking and how customers would like things to run. If you can tailor your solutions specifically to the needs of clients, then you’re likely to have more satisfied clients. And more satisfied clients tend to lead to more referrals.
Don't Forget About Personalization
It can be easy when looking to recruit clients to focus solely on the sales pitch. You can have all the benefits, features, and plus points about your company listed, but oftentimes, clients are looking for personalized solutions that fit their needs and requirements. Keep this in mind when you’re looking to recruit new clients.
Conclusion
Building a client list, whether from scratch or to grow a company, can be tough going. Attracting new clients may mean having to tweak your pitch, network, and even invest in marketing. Try a few of our recommendations and see how they help you acquire new clients quickly!
If customer acquisition is taking a while, try to persevere. Rome wasn’t built in a day, and nor is your client list going to be!
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