managed services

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice
Whitepaper

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

Table of Contents
Executive Summary .................................................................................. 3 Making the Move to Managed Services.................................................... 4 Introduction........................................................................................... 4 Getting Started ..................................................................................... 4 Seven Obstacles to Success................................................................ 5 Velocity System – The Complete MSP Business Transformation Solution .................................................................................................................. 8 The Secrets to a Successful Managed Services Practice ...................... 10 Technology ......................................................................................... 10 N-central: Optimized to Deliver Managed Services through Five Core Functions ............................................................................................ 11 Remote Support Manager .................................................................. 14 Remote Environment Manager .......................................................... 18 N-compass MSP Performance Reporting .......................................... 21 Business Transformation Services..................................................... 24 Benefits ................................................................................................... 27 Conclusion .............................................................................................. 29

-2-

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

Executive Summary
VARs, system integrators and service providers are under severe pressure from the intense competition, excessive customer turnover, low technician utilization rates and shrinking margins that characterize today’s IT services market. To overcome these challenges, many IT service providers are making the move to managed services. Higher business valuation from a recurring revenue stream, improved margins from higher technician utilization rates and stronger customer relationships are just some of the benefits of becoming a managed service provider (MSP). Many companies today claim they offer managed services when what they really do is remote monitoring and management. While this is a step in the right direction, it is only one part of the solution. There are three necessary elements to a successful managed services transformation: an interoperable remote monitoring and management platform, best practices for configuring and using the technology and a complete sales and marketing system. There are many remote monitoring and management tools on the market today. There are even a few generic MSP transformation solutions. But these offerings are one-size-fits-all solutions that don’t address the specific needs of your business or your customers. To remedy this situation, N-able Technologies®, the market leader in MSP business transformation solutions, developed the Velocity System™. Used by more than 1,300 partners servicing 36,000 customers, Velocity System is the most comprehensive MSP transformation solution on the market. It combines award-winning technology with unparalleled business transformation services to help you deliver the broadest range of managed services at the lowest service delivery cost. The technology consists of:
• • • •

The N-central® remote monitoring and management platform N-compass™ for MSP Performance Reporting Remote Support Manager™ to give you real-time remote PC and server management capabilities The Remote Environment Manager™ desktop management tool for creating, managing and enforcing standardized environments for all PCs at a customer site

This whitepaper explores the managed services model and how Velocity System is optimized to provide the fundamental elements of a successful MSP practice.

-3-

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

Making the Move to Managed Services
Introduction
“Managed services” has become a very popular term. But, like so many other industry buzzwords, its meaning has become diluted. So much so that some see managed services as simply a generic term for outsourced IT services. But it is much more. Managed services is an innovative business and service delivery model that is revolutionizing the way VARs, system integrators and IT service providers are doing business. More and more IT service companies are moving away from the traditional, break-fix service model and making the transition to managed services — predictable and proactive business-focused IT services. The shift is occurring for several reasons. For one, margins on product sales have been steadily eroding over the years. Take desktop and laptop computers, for example. These were once mainstay products for many IT service companies but their price has been dropping steadily. It’s now at the point where there’s almost no profit attached to the sale. This decline in selling price means IT service companies are working harder for less revenue. The second impetus is that the IT service industry is intensely competitive and, with the small- and medium-sized business (SMB) market burgeoning, competition is becoming even fiercer. As a result, many IT service providers are being forced to lower their prices just to stay in business. The third reason for the move to managed services is that most IT service companies are currently operating in break-fix mode, which means that 100% of their billable technical resource time is dedicated to reactively correcting the IT failures discovered by the customer. The result is little predictability when it comes to a technician’s time. At times, they are pushed beyond capacity and at other times they are sitting around waiting for work to come along. Operating in a break-fix service environment also means that IT service providers only interact with customers on an emergency basis, which can create a negative experience. Under these circumstances, most customers just want their network up-and-running quickly. They don’t care how it’s done or who does it, which makes it difficult to develop tight customer bonds and easy to be displaced by a lower-priced competitor.

Getting Started
There’s no doubt that becoming an MSP offers many benefits. But knowing how to start the process can be confusing. To help organizations understand where they are in the process and where they need to go, N-able developed the MSP Maturity Model. The model, which is based on industry best practices, Gartner analyst research and observed behaviors from N-able’s own partner base of more than 1,300 MSPs, helps service providers assess their business and develop a plan to improve their managed services offering. Break-fix – This is the initial stage of the process. Break-fix service providers have the least amount of process maturity. Their processes are ad-hoc and

-4-

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

not documented, service delivery is unpredictable, service level objectives don’t exist, and 100% of technician time is dedicated to reacting to failures discovered by the customer. Break-fix service providers typically attract breakfix customers, who are low margin and costly to manage. Responsive – This level is similar to Break-fix except the service provider has some documented processes, offers up/down monitoring, and while 100% of billable technical resource time is still dedicated to correcting failures, the failures are often caught by the monitoring tool and not the customers. Responsive customers are loyal as a group but if their service provider is not delivering on expectations, they will not hesitate to terminate the relationship. Proactive – This tier differs from the first two levels in that preventative maintenance is at the heart of the Proactive MSP’s approach to service delivery. Because of this, Proactive MSPs can minimize the threat of failure, capture performance and capacity utilization information and use service level objectives to set targets. In addition, 50 to 70 per cent of billable technical resource time is dedicated to correcting failures. Managed – This is the first level in the hierarchy that takes a “utility” approach to service delivery. This level is one of the most challenging to attain because until now these companies have sold time as a product. Not directly billing for technician time is foreign to them. Managed-level customers are business savvy but not very technical. They are more interested in performance, capacity and regulatory compliance than they are in routers and switches. Value – This is the logical evolution from the Managed level. While the Managed provider manages IT based on the value of the IT components, the Value provider manages IT based on the business process that it supports – regardless of the infrastructure that requires the service. As with the Managed level, the Value provider generally abstracts the amount of time required to provide a service in favor of a flat-fee based on the value of the business service.

Seven Obstacles to Success
As we’ve seen, the move to managed services can be daunting for both you and your customers. Change is a difficult concept for most people and most organizations, which is why the right combination of technology, best practices and sales and marketing support is necessary for a smooth transition to managed services. There are seven major obstacles to an MSP’s success: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. Lack of C-level commitment Lack of a standardized remote monitoring and management toolset Failure to adopt or properly implement best practices Poor value illustration to the customer Absence of demand-generation sales activities Lack of targeted marketing

-5-

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

7.

Lack of service automation and management software and processes

Lack of C-level commitment
Without the commitment of the owner, CEO and entire management team, an IT service provider’s shift to managed services will struggle. Too often, organizations approach managed services as if it was a mere extension of an existing business line and that it does not need management time and commitment. Becoming an MSP is much more than an extension to an existing line of business – it is, in effect, a new line of business with very different drivers and success factors that require the absolute commitment of the CEO and entire management team.

Lack of a standardized remote monitoring and management technology
Many IT service providers do not use any remote monitoring and management technology – they rely instead on customers or technicians in the field to report problems. In other cases, they are using freeware or low-cost tools that aren’t designed for managing multiple customers. Because they have a scattering of tools, each with different interfaces, and different operating paradigms, the cost of training technicians and managing customers increases. The absence of a single view of all customers raises the risk of something important being overlooked by harried technicians. A remote monitoring and management platform allows you to leverage the skills and boost the productivity of your staff. If technicians don’t always have to be at a customer’s site to resolve issues, then they can deal with more customers at one time. The end result is better technician utilization rates and higher profits.

Failure to adopt or properly implement best practices
Many IT service providers have little or no experience with how to use remote monitoring and management technology effectively to deliver profitable managed services. Best practices help you to avoid the long and costly exercise of learning how to configure the technology and use it to monitor and manage customers. Best practices help lower the cost of delivering managed services while maintaining or improving the level of service. For example, without best practices, it could take four hours to configure a Microsoft® Outlook Exchange server rather than following best practices and doing it in an hour. Another example is alerts. Setting the threshold too low will cause too many false positives, which wastes technician time. Set it too high and you’ll miss customer issues, which will impact the service level.

Poor value illustration to customers
In the managed services world, value illustration is comprised of awareness activities, reports and report analysis. Once the customer understands how to measure the value you provide as an MSP, it is important to illustrate upon you to illustrate the value through regular service level reporting. A service level report provides a breakdown of every service level objective defined within the SLA and illustrates the commitment you made and the actual achieved performance levels for the reporting period. The objective is to show your

-6-

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

customers that they are getting what they pay for and if any performance targets are missed there are some corrective actions.

Absence of demand-generation sales activities
MSPs must generate demand for their services because many prospective customers have no idea what services are available or how a particular service can be of benefit to them. Your sales staff must identify and coordinate the activities that are required as part of the sales process, and what quantities of each activity are required in order to drive the desired sales. Sales professionals must aim to educate the prospective customer on the benefits and specifics of managed services. This should start with an ROI assessment that illustrates the total cost of the managed service program compared to the current cost of IT.

Lack of targeted marketing
Unfortunately, marketing program development for managed services is a typical area of weakness for most IT service companies. This places you in a position of significant risk. Without understanding who the customer is, what the customer needs are and how to present a compelling value proposition, your odds of successfully selling managed services are dramatically reduced. Selling hardware or blocks of time or just waiting for the phone to ring is how most IT service organizations (SOs) currently run their business. But a managed service is all about selling business value, security, compliance and uptime. In order to be successful, you need to completely change the way you package, price and sell your services to customers.

Lack of service automation and management software and processes
MSPs’ internal practices have gone through an evolutionary development. There are two main components of IT service support – timeliness of service and the capability of the technical resource to deal with the specific problem. In order to ensure timeliness of service, you must employ enough technicians to handle the load. This results in reduced technician utilization rates and increased support costs. A properly implemented service management solution results in keeping staff according to volume and skill requirements and keeping a managed service desk to provide more opportunities for improvements and cost savings. Once you overcomes these obstacles, you will have a clear path to a successful managed services practice. For more details on the seven obstacles, please refer to the Seven Major Obstacles on the Road to Managed Services whitepaper (http://www.nable.com/seven-obstacles/).

-7-

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

Velocity System – The Complete MSP Business Transformation Solution
91.6% of service providers N-able studied need to combine standardized processes with technical and sales skills to help them effectively deliver proactive managed services.
Higher business valuation from a recurring revenue stream, improved margins from higher technician utilization rates, and stronger customer relationships are just some of the benefits of becoming an MSP. However, as we’ve seen, transforming your business from a traditional break-fix service delivery model to one that is proactive and annuity-based is a process that requires more than just technology. In response to this need, N-able Technologies developed the Velocity System – a solution that incorporates industry-leading technology combined with unparalleled business transformation services to help you become a successful MSP. The Velocity System is the most comprehensive MSP transformation solution on the market. This complete and revolutionary system consists of five components:
•

An interoperable Web-based remote monitoring and management technology platform – The N-central platform enables your technicians to manage and monitor multiple customers – each with different devices, applications and services – while maintaining a high customer service level. The ability to identify current and incipient problems and correct them remotely and quickly, results in a low service delivery cost that improves your bottom line and keeps you competitive. N-compass – This offline business-reporting solution allows you to demonstrate the performance of your customers' IT infrastructure from a business perspective. Highly integrated and synchronized with Ncentral, N-compass leverages the data collected by N-central to create reports that depict the impact your services have on critical IT systems and applications. Remote Support Manager – Integrated in N-central, this optional component enables you to offer true remote PC and server support. It empowers your technicians to troubleshoot issues, resolve problems and manage customers’ devices remotely, without disrupting users. Remote Environment Manager – An N-central optional component, Remote Environment Manager is a powerful desktop management tool for creating, managing and enforcing standardized environments for all PCs at a customer site. Its ability to configure multiple PCs enables you to save time and reduce service delivery costs. Using its patented validation engine and intuitive GUI, you can construct sophisticated configuration profiles to manage every aspect of the desktop environment – making it easier to use and more powerful than a scripting solution. Unprecedented business transformation services – The Velocity System provides you with an unmatched level of business transformation support. The combination of people, products and processes delivered through a state-of-the-art knowledge management

•

•

•

•

-8-

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

portal are singularly focused on making you successful. Velocity System’s complete and proven go-to-market strategy provides you with marketing collateral, sales and marketing training for effective knowledge transfer and dedicated experts to help you plan, develop, and implement your marketing programs and sell managed services.

Figure 1 Velocity System contains everything you need to deliver the broadest range of managed services at the lowest service delivery cost

-9-

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

The Secrets to a Successful Managed Services Practice
Technology
At the heart of the Velocity System is N-central – a scalable, powerful, effective and complete platform for delivering a broad range of managed services. It includes configurable Web-based dashboard management of multiple customers, each with multiple devices, operating systems, applications and services. Through multi-stakeholder views, N-central offers demonstrable business value to elevate managed services from time-based to value-based services. N-central's distributed architecture forms the basis for its effectiveness and flexibility. The data collection system is comprised of three components that work together to make the system flexible, secure and distributed. By leveraging an architecture based on industry standards, N-central is able to collect data from customers’ networks and securely transmit this information back to a central server. N-able’s patent-pending data collection system works in heterogeneous environments, including Windows®, Novell®, RedHat® Linux and Macintosh®, and can be deployed in either an agent or network-based mode. This allows complete monitoring of the customer infrastructure, including the monitoring of mobile devices such as laptops. N-central’s Automated Configuration Management enables you to configure and deploy basic monitoring to customers in minutes. It allows you to apply standard monitoring policies and it saves time in deploying to – and administration of – customers. In addition, you can reduce service delivery costs by delegating customer deployment to junior technicians. Its interoperable, Web-based management dashboard helps you to:
• • •

Rapidly identify and correct actual and incipient problems, resulting in less downtime. Select and integrate the tools necessary to deliver managed services effectively to customers without being locked into limited tool choices. Manage and monitor multiple customers – each with different devices, applications and services – while maintaining a high customer service level.

- 10 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

Figure 2 N-central 6.5 remote monitoring and management support

N-central: Optimized to Deliver Managed Services through Five Core Functions
Every managed services offering must have a solid technology foundation on which to carry out the five core functions that are critical to success: monitoring, management, notification, reporting and interoperability. Ncentral is optimized to ensure that you can execute these five core functions at the highest level and deliver profitable managed services to the widest range of customers.

Remote Systems Monitoring
N-central monitors managed devices by leveraging industry-standard technologies and protocols, providing both comprehensive data capture and the flexibility to monitor virtually any IP-enabled device in multiple environments. This type of implementation allows N-central to develop multiple services based on these technologies, providing comprehensive coverage across any TCP/IP-based devices that support that particular network management technology. N-central supports the following monitoring and management technologies:
N-central Server Local Services TCP/IP WMI SNMP X Agents X X X X X X Windows Hardware Software Probe Probe

- 11 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

Log Analysis Syslog Asset ODBC EDF (External Data Feed) X

X X X X X

Dashboards
With its Web-based dashboard system, N-central is capable of organizing and displaying large volumes of status information in a manner suitable for business and technical users. The system can aggregate status information from many different devices across different locations and present them in an easily understandable format that will add value and help you and your customers to improve staff productivity.

Management Capabilities
N-central provides a comprehensive management feature set designed to improve your ability to deliver better and more cost-effective service to customers. Since every MSP has programs to support different types of customers, N-central provides three tiers of management – Core, Remote Support and Remote Environment – to allow you to tailor your service delivery to deploy the most cost-effective approach depending on each customer’s unique needs.

Core Management
A standard set of remote management tools is included in N-central and provides the functionality that all MSPs require in order to manage basicservice customers effectively. These capabilities are ideal for your time-andmaterials customers as well as those on a responsive contract. N-central’s Core management provides five capabilities:
•

Integrated patch management – N-central supports interoperable patch management based on Microsoft Windows Software Update Services. Interoperable patch management is seamless, cost-effective and the single most effective precaution you can take to effectively secure a network. Managed device remote control – Managed device remote control or "unattended" remote is a feature designed to provide technicians with remote access to Windows servers and workstations under management by an agent or Windows probe. Attended remote control – This provides an attended remote control capability for devices that are not under management by N-central. This allows you to gain remote control over any Windows device simply by having a user connect to a Web page and complete a form. This is particularly useful for responsive customers, new devices and if

•

•

- 12 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

you provide help desk services outside of a fixed managed services contract.
•

Remote script execution and software distribution – With N-central, you can install software or execute scripts on remote Windows devices. These remote capabilities allow technicians to automate routine activities such as deploying service packs, new software, conducting routine maintenance such as defragmenting hard drives or making bulk configuration changes to devices. By scheduling these tasks across many devices remotely, technicians can save a significant amount of time and dramatically increase their productivity. Asset management – Extending and leveraging N-central’s asset discovery, the asset management feature set provides functionality that is key to helping you effectively manage your customers’ environments. This functionality includes the display of critical asset information as part of the device details, providing reporting on asset devices. Using N-central's asset management features, you can monitor critical device information such as application compliance, license compliance and system changes.

•

Remote Support Management
N-able’s optional Remote Support Manager delivers advanced remote management features to MSPs, to provide true remote desktop and server support. Integrated in N-central, this component facilitates real-time remote PC and server support to allow technicians to troubleshoot and remediate issues on remote computers without having to interrupt the end-user.

Remote Environment Management
N-able’s optional Remote Environment Manager allows you to create, manage and enforce standard configurations for PCs across all of your customers from a single management console. Remote Environment Manager significantly reduces the total cost of desktop and application management by enabling you to manage desktops proactively and securely from one central location.

Reporting
With its focus on specific IT-related information and tasks, the internal tactical operational reporting solution shipped as a part of N-central supports daily operations, troubleshooting and capacity planning. This includes management information, such as customer device, customer user, audit and system executive summary reports. The internal reporting solution also supports tactical operations through utilization, detailed status, capacity and event reporting.

Notifications
One of the keys to ensuring scalability in a services business is to manage customer issues by exception. N-central delivers this capability by leveraging our availability, predictive failure, capacity and event monitoring services to provide key failure and predictive failure information. The notification engine turns this into a true management-by-exception system. You can configure thresholds that determine when an issue occurs. The notification engine can

- 13 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

then notify your technical staff (via SMS, email or pager) whenever an issue is detected. This allows you to support customers proactively while being secure in the knowledge that when a critical issue occurs, you will know about it and respond appropriately.

Interoperability
N-central interoperates with leading IT service tools. These tools deliver a dramatic return on investment by enabling you to automate time-consuming manual activities and achieve scalability and efficiency. Interoperability with Ncentral further enhances the tools’ value, taking advantage of the centralized monitoring, notification and reporting capabilities of N-central. This allows technicians time to resolve issues before they impact the customer. Examples of tools interoperating with N-central include Autotask™, TigerPaw™ and ConnectWise™ PSA.

Remote Support Manager
Remote Support Manager delivers advanced remote management features to MSPs, to provide true remote desktop and server support. Integrated in Ncentral, this component facilitates real-time remote PC and server support and provides access to more than 45 distinct capabilities to control, manage and gather information from remote computers without having to interrupt the enduser. Deployment is seamless as part of N-central’s standard device configuration, complete with multiple security and user experience settings. Remote Support Manager goes far beyond remote control to allow powerful indepth access to a remote system’s registry, Windows service manager, running processes, event logs, command prompt and many others areas.

Figure 3 Remote Support Manager Home Screen

- 14 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

The key to Remote Support Manager is that it provides the ability to manage a client device without using remote control and without requiring the technician to interrupt the user who is using the system. While in a remote management session, the technician can do on-the-fly file transfers, do real-time performance monitoring or conduct maintenance and repair on the system without interrupting the user – allowing user productivity to remain high. The technician also has the option of using remote control to take over the user’s PC and chatting with the user via the built-in Help Desk Chat mode.

Figure 4 Remote Support Manager Processes Screen

The nature of N-central’s architecture, combined with Remote Support Manager, ensures that an MSP can reach out and touch any Windows workstation or server regardless of its location – so long as it is connected to the Internet – and remediate issues without impacting the user. Remote Support Manager saves time and money through faster deployment and issue resolution. Its flexible support options ensure technicians can support users in the most efficient way.

Key Functionality
Remote Support Manager is optimized for real-time comprehensive Windows PC and server management. Core capabilities include:
• • • •

Comprehensive real-time PC and server support Troubleshooting and remediation with no user interruption Resolve issues faster due to the degree of control the MSP has over – and the information that can be collected from – a remote PC Automatic deployment minimizes rollout costs

- 15 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

Features Summary
Remote Control
Remote Support Manager provides advanced remote control functionality that enables technicians to research and remediate issues in real time. The remote control functionality allows you to:
• • •

Troubleshoot in full-screen mode or in a resized screen Issue warnings and notifications to users as well as send a Ctrl-Alt-Del key sequence to reboot or start remote systems. Copy clipboards and print locally from the remote PC.

Help Desk Chat
When troubleshooting an issue, the technician might need to engage the help of the user working at the affected computer. Remote Support Manager’s Help Desk Chat feature allows the technician to communicate directly with the user. Using the chat function, the technician can ask the user to follow various steps to replicate a problem or resolve a problem.

Figure 5 Remote Support Manager Help Desk Chat

Point-to-Point File Transfer
Using the File Transfer function, technicians can quickly and securely copy files from their machine to a remote computer. This functionality includes synchronizing and replicating files and folders. All data transferred between the two computers is compressed and encrypted by a Java applet. Transferring is carried out in a split-screen view by clicking on the file in the technician’s system and dragging it over to the appropriate directory and folder in the remote system.

- 16 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

Real-Time Support Management
Remote Support Manager’s control features include:
• • • • • • • •

Event viewer Services Processes Registry editor Environment variables Scripting Windows password Many others

Real-Time Monitoring
Remote Support Manager’s data collection capabilities play a vital role in desktop management and issue resolution. It collects a wide range of real-time performance data on any remote PC that your are supporting. This information is helpful for troubleshooting and fixing problems. The performance data collected includes:
• • • • • • •

CPU load Disk space Open TCP/IP ports Network Registry keys in use Installed applications Many others

Embedded in N-central
Remote Support Manager is invoked from within N-central when troubleshooting or proactively managing a PC or Server.

Automated Deployment
You can automatically deploy Remote Support Manager to devices through the N-central Windows probe or agent.

No user interruption
All changes and interactions can occur in the background without the user being interrupted or even aware of what is being done.

Remote control and chat mode
Technicians can remotely control users’ PCs and chat with users to gather information for troubleshooting and remediation.

- 17 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

Remote Environment Manager
Remote Environment Manager is a comprehensive PC management tool for Windows-based networks. It allows you to create, manage and enforce standard configurations for PCs across all of your customers from a single management console. This eliminates the need for custom scripts and significantly reduces your service delivery costs. It also yields financial benefits for your customers by lowering the total cost of desktop and application ownership. Remote Environment Manager enables you to secure, manage, inventory and support desktops from a central location, and USB and port security options ensure that desktops are secure against a wide range of threats. With today’s growing emphasis on energy efficiency, the power management feature of Remote Environment Manager is an important capability that will help you to control your customers’ costs. It enables you to configure machines so that they will power off when left idle for a specified amount of time based on the time of day, reducing energy usage and saving money. The cost of supporting and maintaining Windows desktops is constantly increasing. Systems require continuous configuration changes: application updates to install, printers to connect, e-mail profiles to create. In addition, there is the risk of data theft and intrusion by hackers because users’ desktops are not consistently secured. Remote Environment Manager allows you to deliver comprehensive proactive management of an entire client network. It is ideally suited for end customers with regulatory issues – such as financial institutions, educational facilities and health care operations – and where customers are on a fixed-fee contract. At the core of the Remote Environment Manager system is a unique profilebased management engine. This allows you to create device configuration profiles. These are then applied to the devices at the client site based on patented validation logic. Once applied, the profiles allow for complete and very granular management of the system and users they are applied to. To allow for effective control of the environment, the profiles can be refreshed at login, logoff and even refreshed on a configurable time basis. This means that if a user changes a setting, or “breaks” something managed by the profile, the system will reset the option that was changed or broken. This ensures a consistent and selfhealing client environment. The unique self-healing capability sets Remote Environment Manager apart from other MSP tools and provides a true “Managed Environment”. Profiles can be created generically and can use Active Directory (AD) to populate user variables, allowing for the establishment of a common profile for use across many customers, which will dramatically improve MSP operations, lower costs and increase support levels.

Key Functionality
Remote Environment Manager provides the ability to manage virtually all components of a Windows system. Core capabilities include:

- 18 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

• • • •

Comprehensive, standardized and enforceable configuration of every aspect of the desktop Port security to protect systems against a variety of threats Power management to save energy and reduce customers’ utility costs Remote support clients can be securely managed and remotely controlled from the management console through any Java-enabled Web browser

Features Summary
Complete Desktop Configuration
Remote Environment Manager gives you the power to configure, manage, secure and protect desktops from a single interface, and minimizes the need to travel to customer sites to provide IT service. Standard and enforceable configurations reduce the risk of users modifying their PC settings, corrupting their applications or exposing their PCs to risk.

Figure 6 Remote Environment Manager Profile Screen

Remote Environment Manager provides you with a complete set of desktop configuration features for Windows clients from 95 to XP, including:
• •

Remote control: Allows you to take over control of a user’s PC remotely. Lock down USB and other ports: Based on granular read/write permissions, this feature locks down more than 20 types of ports and devices. Reporting functionality enables you to show who is trying to gain access to prohibited devices.

- 19 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

•

Point-to-point file transfers: Using drag-and-drop functionality, files can be transferred quickly and easily between the technician’s machine and the user’s PC. Windows firewall (XP SP2+): Establish settings as well as allowed applications for the Windows’ firewall. Power management: Establish power settings to conserve energy usage and costs. Shut down idle machines even when the user is not logged on. Mapped drives: Proactively attach mapped drives and automatically remap them if settings are deleted. Printer access: Add and remove which printers the user can access. Manage shortcuts: Determine the standard set of shortcuts the user can access. Manage Outlook profiles: Set up the user’s Outlook profile and ensure compliance with standardized signatures, fonts and stationery. Microsoft Office preferences: Establish a standard setup for Microsoft Office applications. Registry and permissions management: Define and enforce the permissions and registry settings on a user’s machine. Desktop file management: MSPs can create rules to clean up files automatically on logout or login. This helps to manage system resources as well as remove unwanted files. AD environment standardization: Create consistent group policy and security policy settings. These are configured dynamically to ensure greater security and supportability by increasing standardization. Automatic script execution: In the rare cases where scripts are needed, they can be automatically invoked and run – on the fly, at login or on logout.

• •

• • • • • • •

•

•

Validation Engine
Remote Environment Manager’s patented Validation Logic technology determines how each desktop will be configured, using more than 25 validation types including the class of computer (e.g. desktop or notebook), operating system, group membership, AD sites, OUs, and registry and file properties. Custom validation types can be added, such as asset tags and hardware configuration.

- 20 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

Figure 7 Remote Environment Manager Validation Logic Screen

Active Directory Integration
Since Remote Environment Manager is integrated with Active Directory, you can use AD variables in configurations to allow a standard configuration profile to configure user-specific information such as names, email addresses and unique mapped drives. These profiles can then be applied to multiple users at a customer site. This dramatically lowers the number of unique configuration activities needed, thus increasing scalability and reducing management costs.

USB and Port Security
The USB and port security functionality controls read and write access to USB, storage and communication devices on the desktop.

Total Remote Support Management
This component uses Remote Support Manager to give you real-time remote PC and server management capabilities. See the Remote Support Manager section for complete details.

N-compass MSP Performance Reporting
N-compass MSP Performance Reporting is an offline business-reporting solution that allows you to demonstrate the performance of your customers’ IT infrastructure from a business perspective. Seamlessly integrated and synchronized with N-central, N-compass leverages the data collected by Ncentral to create reports that depict the impact IT has on critical business services. N-compass allows you to:
•

Maintain and increase service levels

- 21 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

• • •

Position yourself as a trusted advisor to your customers Better plan customer IT investments Differentiate your managed services offering

N-compass includes an offline data warehouse and reporting infrastructure that provides extensive and customizable reporting capabilities without impacting the data processing activities of N-central. Business Value Reporting The value of N-compass lies in its ability to present the results of a managed service offering from a business perspective. Through N-compass, you can create compelling reports to demonstrate to your customers that their IT infrastructure is performing at an optimal level under your management.

Architecture
The design of N-compass is based on an offline data warehouse. This warehouse is a uniquely designed database optimized for reporting performance and ease of report development. Leveraging the power of Microsoft SQL Server™ and the Microsoft Reporting Services engine, N-compass provides a simple-to-use reporting user interface that is seamlessly accessed from within N-central. This allows any N-central user to access N-compass reporting without requiring additional credentials. Reports are branded with a customized look and feel, and can be run on demand or scheduled for automatic delivery. Delivery formats include:
• • • • • •

HTML – Hyper-Text Mark-up Language XML – Extensible Mark-up Language TIFF – Tagged Image File Format (high-quality graphic) CSV – Comma Separated Values PDF – Portable Document Format, and Microsoft Excel® format

Analytic Capabilities
N-compass includes four important features that can be leveraged to provide comprehensive analysis reporting. These features provide the critical missing links to historical information, and relevance and contract comparison that help demonstrate the business value of services while helping customers make important strategic decisions. Comparative Baselines for Insight into Current Results Comparative baselines provide the ability to calculate data for specific time periods or devices and use it to provide insight into the current results for a given device or service. This helps to provide insight into historical levels of service and helps to justify future costs such as further investment into a project. Baseline information includes historical level and program level. Cost of Downtime – A Critical Investment Measure

- 22 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

Cost of downtime is a critical measure used to determine when further investment is required in key systems. N-compass uses mission-critical business service data from N-central to show how downtime, when aggregated over time, can cost a business. Service Level Agreements (SLAs) – Summary of Customer Expectations SLAs are used to set out the expectations of a relationship with customers as well as outline what services will be rendered, what service levels will be provided, what recourse the customer will have if those levels are not met and what the cost of the services provided will be. N-compass reports can demonstrate if results are meeting or exceeding the SLAs. Program Levels – Comparison of MSP Programs Available Often several standardized programs are used to market to customers. Ncentral and N-compass support the subdivision of these customers into program-level groups and provide baselines, SLAs and other key information to be assigned to those customers. N-compass provides the ability to measure the service levels on a program-level basis, allows comparisons across program levels and assigns standardized SLAs at each program level.

Features
Feature Capability

Optimized Reporting Architecture

N-compass includes an offline data warehouse and reporting infrastructure that provide extensive and customizable reporting capabilities without impacting the data processing activities of N-central. Multiserver support allows aggregate data to be collected from multiple N-central servers to provide aggregated reporting on the business value of a managed services offering. N-compass provides extensive reporting capabilities that leverage pre-defined Managed Network VoIP, IT services and Managed Security reports, and create unique customer reports to demonstrate the business value of your offering. Quickly set up and configured, N-compass is autoupgradeable and has seamless access to N-central to help increase technician utilization rates and lower service delivery costs. N-compass supports on-demand or scheduled report delivery. Reports are easily branded and the ability to export reports in numerous customer-friendly formats, including CSV and PDF, are ideally suited for MSP requirements. Multi-stakeholder reports provide the ability to demonstrate business value to executive, operational and technical audiences as well as to external authorities such as auditors. N-compass tracks comparative baselines, a running

Comprehensive Reporting

Ease of Implementation

MSP-enabled Reporting

Detailed Analysis

- 23 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

average gathered against either customer information, SO-level information or system-wide information based on a given metric. These baselines can then be used to compare against the metric for trending performance analysis. N-compass can track performance against any metric for the purposes of business impact and predicative analysis to help make informed business decisions.

For more information about N-compass, read the whitepaper From Promises to Proof: How to Demonstrate Value to your Customers (http://www.nable.com/velocity/whitepaper/n-compass.php).

Business Transformation Services
N-able delivers an unprecedented level of business transformation support for the service providers targeting the SMB market. Validated by our partners, Velocity System’s complete and proven go-to-market strategy is focused on making you successful by providing the right combination of people, processes and knowledge transfer. No other company invests in its partners’ success like N-able does through the Velocity System, which includes marketing collateral, sales and marketing training and dedicated experts to help you plan, develop and implement your marketing programs to drive sales of managed services.

Knowledge Transfer and Tools
Velocity Partner Center
All of the business transformation services are delivered through the Velocity Partner Center. Unique in the MSP space, this best-of-class knowledge and community portal serves as the focal point for delivering training, best practices and support to help you get to market faster with your managed services offerings. Your view to the center can be fully personalized, so you see the information and training that is relevant to you. The center leverages the experience of not only N-able but of the entire partner community by providing a collaborative environment that promotes lively community interaction through discussion boards and the sharing of custom reports, custom services and service templates.

N-able University™ Technical Training
In order to make technical knowledge transfer as effective and efficient as possible, N-able has poured its collective know-how – gleaned from our existing installed base – into N-able University. Since this information is packaged in an automated, Web-available format, you can review it any time and acquire knowledge at your pace. There are more than 35 technical, usage and business CBT courses and labs.

N-able University Sales and Marketing Training
As with the transfer of technical knowledge, N-able University also helps to make the transfer of sales and marketing expertise as effective and efficient as

- 24 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

possible. N-able University offers recorded lectures that you can follow at your own pace, as well as instructor-led webinar labs involving Partner Development Specialists and a group of your MSP peers.

Go-to-Market Sales and Marketing Tools
By leveraging the combined successes of N-able’s existing partner base of more than 1,300 MSPs, in conjunction with the efforts of our own market research team, N-able has developed a complete go-to-market strategy that includes messaging for a number of end-user practice areas. It consists of more than 30 fully developed and customizable sales and marketing tools including collateral, Web site templates, presentations, advertisements, press releases, email teasers, SLAs and pricing calculators.

N-able Service Library
When building a managed services practice, you need to understand the specific services you are going to offer, how these services are going to be provided and what the ongoing cost of providing these services is. In order to help answer these questions, N-able developed the Service Library – a collection of documents and templates that describe a preferred approach to the management of specific IT services, as well as effective automation strategies to minimize the overall cost of the management of the services. Each volume of the Service Library covers:
• • • • • • • •

Service Overview: A description of the service being provided. Service Details: A breakdown of the components that affect the service. Operational Management Plan: The details of the tasks that must be performed to deliver the service effectively. Monitoring Strategy: A detailed analysis of the services, processes, event IDs, etc. that should be monitored. Efficiency Gains: An analysis of the monthly costs associated with the service as well as efficiencies gained by leveraging automation. Reporting Strategies: A schedule of reports to support the management activities. Referenced Documents Required Skills

People
Partner Development Specialists
Everything is easy – once you know how. N-able’s Partner Development Specialists are experts in the business, marketing and sales of managed services. They are experts not only because of the specialized training they receive, but also because they are experienced in working with N able’s partners on their managed services programs. As an N-able partner, your

- 25 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

account will be assigned to a Partner Development Specialist who will help you to plan, develop and accelerate your transition to managed services.

Solutions Architect
N-able Solutions Architects are experts in the deployment and implementation of our products, and will help you to set up your initial customer. Join them for daily online Q&A sessions where you can seek answers to your deployment and usability questions.

Sales Representative
You will be assigned a dedicated Sales Representative, whose mission is to assist you in selling your managed services. The Sales Representative will help you with your customer events to ensure your ongoing success.

Processes
Velocity Blueprint
The transition to managed services is challenging. To accelerate the process and reduce the risk, N-able has developed the Velocity Blueprint – a comprehensive framework designed to help you build a profitable and highvalue managed services business practice as quickly as possible. The Blueprint, which sets out a five-stage process for success, is based on Nable’s seven years in the industry and the experience of helping hundreds of partners build thriving managed services practices. The five stages are: Goals and Objectives, Capability Assessment, Customer Segmentation, Program Creation and Program Marketing and Sales.

- 26 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

Benefits
The Velocity System’s unmatched combination of technology and partner support is why N-able partners are more successful than any other MSPs selling to the SMB market. Using the Velocity System, our partners are delivering highly profitable managed services to more than 36,000 customers, and generating over $360 million in annual managed services revenue. Lower service delivery costs. Velocity System is designed from the ground up to ensure you can maximize the utilization rates of your technicians and staff. You will need fewer technicians to manage more customers, which can only mean one thing – reduced service delivery costs that improve your bottom line and keep you competitive. Remote monitoring and management technology enables technicians to rapidly identify actual and incipient problems and quickly correct them. This allows technicians to monitor and manage multiple customers while maintaining a high customer service level. Increased revenue. With Velocity System’s go-to-market tools, your improved sales and marketing capabilities will help to generate more leads and close more business. In addition, your ability to deliver better service at a consistently higher level will enable you to attract more customers through a differentiated service offering. And since Velocity System supports a greater number of services and operating systems than any other MSP solution offers, you can address the needs of a broader market. The more services you can offer to more customers and prospects, the greater your revenue potential. Highly differentiated service offering. N-central is the most interoperable solution on the market today. Unlike other technologies that lock you into limited tool choices, Velocity System allows you to select and integrate the managed services tools you need for success. They can be N-able tools or other leading third-party tools that interoperate with N-central – it’s your decision. This allows for a highly differentiated service offering that gives you a leg up on your competition. Faster time to market. N-able is absolutely committed to helping you develop successful managed services programs and take them to market in the shortest time possible. To this end, we devote more team members to partner technical and business support than most of our competitors have total employees. Our combination of people, products and processes work together to generate the fastest possible ROI for your business. Increased business valuation. One of the key benefits of managed services is an annuity-based revenue stream. Steady, guaranteed monthly revenue instead of ad-hoc projects and product sales not only increases the value of your business but also improves your profitability by helping you attract new customers and retain existing ones. Increased visibility into company operations. Improve control over your operations by measuring, monitoring and reporting on key business metrics that drive profitability. Since all customer interactions are stored in one database, there is one version of the data that shows where you are making money and where pricing adjustments need to be made.

- 27 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

Comprehensive business-value reporting. Extensive reporting capabilities allow pre-defined reports to be leveraged and custom reports to be created to demonstrate business value to customers. In summary, Velocity System will facilitate your transition to managed services. The result is the ability to maintain consistent, higher-quality services. Allocate work more efficiently. Offer higher-margin services that won’t become commoditized. Attract larger, more sophisticated customers. And create relationships that are difficult for another service provider to penetrate.

- 28 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

Conclusion
Becoming an MSP is a necessary transition for most IT service providers. While there are numerous steps and potential obstacles to success, the Velocity System makes the transition easier and less costly. Tested by more than 1,300 partners servicing 36,000 customers, this proven system empowers you to build a successful business, as shown by N-able’s Million Dollar Club members – partners who have generated over a million dollars each in managed services revenue. N-able has been the market leader from its inception. Every important breakthrough in the MSP industry was pioneered by N-able and we will continue to do so. By committing to N-able, you receive our commitment to help make you a successful MSP.

- 29 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

Disclaimer
This document may include planned release dates for service packs and version upgrades. These dates are based on our current development plans and on our best estimates of the research and development time required to build, test, and implement each of the documented features. This document does not represent any firm commitments by N-able Technologies Inc. to features and/or dates. N-able will at its best effort, try to meet the specified schedule and will update this document should there be any significant changes. N-able reserves the right to change the release schedule and the content of any of the planned updates or enhancements without notice. Publication or dissemination of this document alone is not intended to create and does not constitute a business relationship between N-able and the recipient. N-able Technologies is a market driven organization that places importance on customer, partner and alliance feedback. All feedback is welcome at the following email address: [email protected].

- 30 -

The Fundamentals of a Successful Managed Services Practice

About N-able Technologies
N-able Technologies is the preferred global supplier of remote monitoring and management technology and business transformation services for managed service providers. N-able’s proven platforms offer the right combination of technology, people and processes, which help IT service providers to deliver highly profitable managed services to small- and medium-sized businesses. www.n-able.com

Copyright
Copyright © 2007 N-able Technologies. All rights reserved. This document contains information intended for the exclusive use of N-able Technologies’ personnel, partners and potential partners. The information herein is restricted in use and is strictly confidential and subject to change without notice. No part of this document may be altered, reproduced, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, for any purpose, without the express written permission of Nable Technologies. Copyright protection includes, but is not limited to, program code, program documentation, and material generated from the software product displayed on the screen, such as graphics, icons, screen displays, screen layouts, and buttons. N-able Technologies, Velocity System, N-central, N-compass, N-able University, Remote Support Manager, Remote Environment Manager and Monitor Manage Optimize are trademarks or registered trademarks of N-able Technologies International Inc., licensed for use by N-able Technologies, Inc. All other names and trademarks are the property of their respective holders. www.n-able.com [email protected]
1-877-655-4689
MA-VEL-3.0-WP-1.1-ENUS-SUCCMSP-RES

- 31 -