The Smart Way To Land A $100,000 Managed Services Sale
By The Business Solutions Network
Conducting a network assessment and providing RMM (remote monitoring and management) services were keys to this MSP’s (managed services provider) big IT project win, which included monthly recurring revenue and ongoing upsell opportunities.
When you’re an IT solutions provider who lands a new client that just fired its previous solutions provider, you never know what you’re in for. For instance, is the customer going to be unrealistic about what it costs to have a secure network and reliable IT? Or was your competitor really not doing its job? When Brent Wolff, owner of f8 Tech, first met with the general manager of Henna Chevrolet, a 165-employee automotive dealership with five buildings, located on a 20-acre plot in Austin, TX, it didn’t take long to find out the answer to that question.
Validate Customers’ IT Troubles With A Network Assessment
“The symptoms the customer was describing were slow computer response times and frequent downtime, but when I started investigating the situation I found a worst-case scenario IT 
situation,” says Wolff. His investigation started with a walk-around, observing the dealer’s IT closets, computers, switches, and servers. “In a couple of the rooms, servers were lying on the floor, the wiring was a total mess, and a lot of the equipment was very outdated. For example, they were handling the email for 165 employees on an outdated Microsoft server that was designed to accommodate only 75 email accounts. The server was often running at 98 percent capacity and crashed on a regular basis.”
Before proceeding further, Wolff recommended a complete network assessment and told the client he needed to establish an IT foundation in order to solve their IT problems and help prepare them for their upcoming GM audit. After getting the go-ahead, Wolff installed a network assessment tool from SolarWinds on the customer’s network and allowed the software to inventory the network, including all applications and IT endpoints connected to it. Upon completion, several additional issues were revealed. “The dealership was out of compliance with its Microsoft licensing, plus it was using several different brands of Wi-Fi routers — some of which had no security turned on — plus they had no antivirus in place,” he says.
After the assessment was completed, Wolff put together a proposal that spelled out his recommendation of a complete IT overhaul. “They went with everything we recommended, including moving servers out of dusty closets and putting them in secure, properly cooled and vented server rooms,” he says.
Perform A Major IT Overhaul With Minimal Disruption
One of the biggest challenges with the implementation was completing the overhaul in the least disruptive way possible. “Our team worked on the project on the weekends, immediately after the business closed, and completed the installation over a four-month period,” says Wolff.
The implementation included replacing legacy routers with secure, enterprise-class wireless routers from Ubiquity. The MSP also replaced the legacy servers with two HP DL380G7 servers, complete with an HP P2000 SAN with Windows 2008 R2 data center licenses running VMware. “We also upgraded the network with Cisco 3750X and 2960 switches and migrated them from Exchange 2003 to Exchange 2010,” adds Wolff.
Gain Server And Network Insights With RMM
f8 Tech also sold the customer several IT services, including a backup solution that combined a local disk-to-disk backup with a SAN appliance with Intronis cloud backup, plus McAfee SaaS-based email and Web filtering services. The MSP completed the overhaul with N-able by SolarWinds’ N-central RMM services, which allowed it to continue monitoring its customer’s network and IT assets to ensure everything continued working smoothly after the initial deployment.
N-central allows f8 Tech to be more proactive with its customers, alerting the MSP to server disk space or outdated firmware concerns and allowing it to perform application updates remotely.
“Henna Chevrolet’s network has come a long way since we first started working with them less than two years ago,” says Wolff. “In fact, in our most recent monthly report, it shows that last month alone the spam filter caught 27,088 spam messages, including 425 emails containing viruses — all of which would have previously made their way onto their network. The customer has been so pleased with the turnaround with their IT network that they’re now serving as a champion referral and helping us to become the IT services provider for other Chevy dealerships.”