The managed service provider (MSP) business is booming, meaning it’s a great time to be a part of it while at the same time, it’s more difficult to stand out from the competition. Moving from a break-fix model to managed services is the first step to building a more lucrative business, but where do MSPs go from there? From building and deploying cloud infrastructure to helping clients strengthen their security postures, continuing education can help MSPs get the knowledge and skills they need to grow their businesses.
In this blog, we’ll explore why continuing education is so important for MSPs, what topics MSP business owners and engineers can train themselves on, and how to get it done.
The current state of the MSP industry
The MSP industry is massive — and growing. Research shows the global MSP industry is valued at around $300 billion as of 2023. It’s estimated to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 13.6% from 2023 to 2030.
However, because the industry is so healthy, it’s getting harder for MSPs to differentiate themselves — and providing a new or different service than other MSPs in your market is one way to accomplish that. For instance, if you provide a wide breadth of everyday services to your clients, such as email and productivity solutions, you can expand to offer desktop infrastructure or networking, along with the managed services associated with that solution (e.g., for desktop infrastructure, that would be desktop setup, patch management, user and application provisioning, backup and recovery services, and more).
What can I learn about through continued education as an MSP?
When it comes to expanding your knowledge base so you can offer more services to your clients, it can be tough to know where to start. There are several topics to focus on, given their importance to both MSPs and small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) across industries. These include:
- Cybersecurity: Even for SMBs with fewer than 500 employees, the average data breach costs $3.31 million. Convincing your clients to strengthen their security postures via strategies such as implementing CIS security controls helps you not only provide greater value to your clients by protecting their vital data but also elevates your business by becoming their trusted security advisor.
- Automation: As you grow your business, you need to be able to manage multiple clients who may be operating multiple workloads on different clouds. To simplify your business, you can learn more about centralizing your operations using professional services automation (PSA) tools such as ConnectWise and Autotask.
- Management: As you move from the humble beginnings of managing just a handful of employees to hiring more engineers and support staff, you need to develop your ability to manage your business at scale. Management training can help you and your fellow managers hire the right employees, better retain talent, and keep your employees happy, which, in turn, helps your bottom line.
- Legal and finance: Your agreements may become more complicated as you work with bigger clients, and you want to cover all your bases legally to protect your business as it grows. Learning more about the financial and legal aspects of the MSP business can help set you on the path to greater success.
- Technical training: You and your technicians may be well equipped to deliver office communication and productivity solutions, but more complicated deployments, such as cloud infrastructure, may be beyond what your current training allows. Education on more technical deployments can open your business to lucrative new sources of revenue and bigger clients.
How can I continue my education as an MSP?
Finding the right continuing education opportunities is easier said than done. MSPs may be restricted by cost, the ability to travel, and the number of staff that it is feasible to train.
Online courses can help you get the training you need to future-proof your business while still running your day-to-day operations. Some MSPs may want to learn from expert instructors to deepen their learning, while the virtual classroom environment gives them the convenience of never having to leave home or the office. However, most legacy distributors only offer on-demand or in-person courses, hampering MSP business owners’ and technicians’ ability to learn remotely. And many online courses may be too generic to dig deep into topics such as cybersecurity, AI, and cloud infrastructure, which demand more in-depth discussions.
What are my options for continuing my education with Pax8?
It’s important to have the right partner who will help you find the most impactful educational opportunities. Given the current MSP landscape and the state of educational options, we offer instructor-led courses as part of Pax8 Academy, the continuing education arm of the Pax8 Marketplace.
These instructor-led courses give partners the depth of education they need to successfully deploy new lines of business, increase efficiency, and scale upward. Partners who took these courses have experienced better internal strategy alignment and a consistent increase in revenue.
While we offer on-demand courses partners can sign up for as they like, we’re also now offering a subscription model that allows partners more flexible options. Our subscription model allows you to pay one monthly fee and sign up more employees for more courses, so you don’t have to choose who receives training and which courses you can take. Subscription tiers depend on the number of employees in the organization; learn more in our instructor-led course subscription guide.
