So in this post, we continue our six-part series on the 5 STEPS TO IT SERVICE PROVIDER VICTORY WITH CLOUD. So far we have provided four posts covering 17 tips of what will be a total of 28 when this series comes to completion.
You can find those posts here:
This series is meant to provide value to renegade IT professionals and their organizations, especially those of Managed Service Providers (MSPs). This is in hope that they can in turn provide value to your customers and others and that is what step 4 is all about, the customer lifecycle.
Most cloud vendors provide very little life support. They usually shuttle customers onto wikis, FAQs, and offshore helpdesks. But realize that your customer is already used to being supported by your team. This established relationship means you have already established a relationship with them, and this is a significant advantage and sales tool. You can provide personalized customer support and meet their specific needs, which is far more than cloud vendors can provide.
The value you provide with cloud services can be integrated with existing management and monitoring services and allow you to support your cloud customers in the same way as managed services are. Cloud data, users, and licenses can be centrally managed and monitored. To do this, you will need to select a cloud management solution that integrates with tools that used to support your managed services customers.
To efficiently manage cloud services, you need to have uniform policies. Universal policies to do with email message retention, passwords, and so on requires establishing with all customers.
It's essential to provide the same level of support for cloud services that you have for other managed services. Remote management and monitoring (RMM) tools exist and designed to help you achieve these goals. By monitoring your customers in real-time, you can be proactive about providing support. If there is a service outage, you can alert them before they even know what's happening.
You can add value to your services by monitoring your customers' cloud costs and usage. During meetings with customers, you should provide them with in-depth usage reports. These reports will give them an idea of the ROI that your cloud services offer to them.
Capacity and storage issues give you the perfect opportunity for upsells. Alerting customers to these issues will also strengthen your relationship and provide you with increased revenues.
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