AMI-Partners (AMI) announced the release of its latest whitepaper titled†Accelerate Growth and Profitability with Office 365 Migrations and Ongoing Cloud Services: How MSP-ISV Partnerships Are Empowering Small and Mid-Sized Business in The Cloud.†The whitepaper covers the findings of a recent global study on Managed Service Providers (MSPs) and how some are achieving faster growth and profitability.
According to AMI, MSPs are finding that†firms with less than 1,000 employees (SMBs) are an increasingly attractive market as they are migrating to the cloud in growing numbers. AMI estimates that SMBs will spend nearly†$40 billion†on cloud-based e-mail and productivity solutions such as Office 365 by 2022, growing at a CAGR of 25 percent worldwide. These firms typically lack in-house tools and expertise and turn to MSPs when moving to an Office 365 environment. MSPs, in turn, are partnering with solution providers for greater efficiency and effectiveness in the migration process. According to†Joseph Bertran, associate director at AMI, “When it comes to SMB Office 365 migrations, partners have a variety of tools to choose from including BitTitan, Microsoft, and SkyKick. While each tool offers unique benefits, their approaches differ†and some deliver greater profitability and acceleration for MSPs.”
By using a suitable tool, MSPs reported being able to save an average of 18 hours on a typical SMB migration project. This enables them to achieve significantly greater profitability by allowing them to complete twice as many migrations with the same amount of time and resources. AMI’s whitepaper reveals how MSPs can leverage an effective tool to maximize time saving and profitability. That process begins with understanding the attributes of an effective migration solution and choosing one that fits the MSP’s approach and strategy. Savvy MSPs look for a tool that is technically robust, offers a great partner and user experience, and intelligently uses automation to increase efficiency. The tool that offered the highest satisfaction and largest increase in profitability was the one that provided a comprehensive approach to automation spanning sales planning through delivery.
Forward-looking MSPs view Office 365 migrations as a critical beachhead for an ongoing and trusted relationship with their customers. For example, many MSPs offering migration tools are also looking at cloud backup solutions to protect their customers while enabling a recurring revenue stream. According to the white paper, 95 percent of MSPs using tools that deliver on key features and provide cloud-backup said that they experienced a material increase in profitability when compared to other tools. MSPs that participated in the study indicated that cloud backup tools are as critical to them as those which assist them with migrating their customers to the cloud.
