As the world continues to struggle, it is not surprising that many economists predict a recession in the near future. Issues such as the pandemic, supply chain disruption and the increasing levels of inflation have led us to that point. What does this mean for business?
Considering the global economic forecast, companies must again prepare for an uncertain future. They will look to reduce their costs and ensure their business is sustainable during these unprecedented times. Recessions usually affect small and medium-sized businesses more than large enterprises. It is why SMBs often refine their spending by freezing their recruitment, increasing layoffs, unsubscribing from services and products, and downsizing their office spaces.
In some areas, cost-cutting can be a sound strategy during tough times. However, a few areas need more scrutiny before reducing costs. IT services are one of those critical areas to analyze before any existing IT subscriptions. A short-term cut in the wrong area could have profound long-term unintended consequences on the overall business.
IT services are a crucial part of any business. Here’s how MSPs can explain this to their clients when customers are stringent about their spending.
Why should businesses continue IT services?
Most businesses are now operating with their employees, applications, and resources in remote locations. Managing all these remote devices and their applications are required for the day-to-day operations of a business. The need for IT services can be split into two main categories, operations and security.
IT services needed to manage company operations
To survive in a tough economic climate, companies need to be lean and efficient. They need the right tools, and they need them to be available. Critical tools in this category include:
- Appropriate IT management tools and services to keep the environment running
- Collaboration tools to help staff work more efficiently
- Appropriate applications are needed to run core functions such as Finance and HR
- Specialist applications for business-specific applications
IT Services needed to manage cyber-Security
Cyber-security is the one area where you cannot afford to make cuts. Organizations everywhere are seeing an increase in the number of ransomware threats, phishing attacks, and other malicious cyber activities you hear about on the internet. A business must monitor and protect their remote devices and their data. Not only do they need securing, there are also legal and compliance issues they must adhere to.
A ransomware attack could be financially catastrophic for an organization. Recent evidence shows that smaller businesses are more likely to be attacked – and in many cases less likely to survive such an attack. In addition to disruption, there is the risk of reputational and, financial costs. Additionally, if there are data compliance laws and the company loses data, the penalties are sometimes even higher.
Six suggestions for IT services sales to sustain client and business
When trying to retain customers, an MSP’s sales and accounts team play a key role in retention. It’s up to them to convince their clients not to cut costs on their IT services as it could only hurt them in the long run.
Here are some suggestions that the IT services sales and account teams can use to help persuade them to maintain their services
- Understand the specific needs of each existing client, and ensure that the services suit their needs. A “One size fits all” approach will not work.
- Use data based on the existing service to show the difference you made and how removal of the service could harm them. Stick to facts as much as possible and avoid generalisations they could find easy to ignore!
- Highlight that savings incurred from cutting IT services could increase costs over time. Use industry facts on the cost of downtime etc to help the argument
- IT operations and security go hand-in-hand, which is why the absence of IT security may lead to massive consequences, including poor data management, unsecured devices, and weak privacy policies.
- The need for normal operations and a financially stable business can depend on healthy IT management routines supporting it. Businesses need stable IT infrastructure to survive and so cannot afford lengthy downtime. Use your SLA to illustrate the potential damage to their business if it wasn’t there.
- If your customer does not know what you do, they cannot value it. Ensure regular reporting with the client, so they understand past incidents and what you did to resolve them. The better understanding they have, the less likely they are to cancel!
Since the global economy is vulnerable to inflation and possible recession, businesses must prepare. However, they need to know that cutting costs on IT services can make things worse. Hence it is best to retain their IT monitoring, backup, helpdesk, and other crucial IT solutions, even during unprecedented times ahead.
MMSOFT Design, Ltd. is the maker of Pulseway, a mobile-first IT management software that helps busy IT administrators look after their IT infrastructure on the go. Easy-to-use, cloud-hosted solution with a user-friendly mobile app that abstracted the desktop away, Pulseway is used by over 13,000 businesses worldwide including BestBuy, DELL, Louis Vuitton, Canon and Siemens.
