Margins are the hot topic in a lot of conversations about the managed services business lately, and it seems that everyone is concerned about the commoditization of our industry. I am concerned as well, but I also want to make sure people in our industry don’t get caught in the trap of telling themselves stories so often that they start to believe them. See a previous post on this subject here.
I think this subject is increasingly important because so many providers seem to think that managed services is just flat-fee support. At the risk of sounding like another Silicon Valley reporter or guru, that is Managed Services 1.0, and we are quickly moving on to a Managed Services 2.0 world.
I’m not saying that these services are going to disappear anytime soon - far from it. But I am suggesting that we will see many new service offerings in the marketplace in the next 12 months, and many of them will be much higher margin than the services we are currently offering.
Don’t get caught in a rut…continue to innovate with your service offerings and look for opportunities to add margin - they are out there. These services could include:
- Backup management
- IP security system management
- Telepresence management
- Etc.
Don’t just think desktop and server support, and you may find that your margins will actually start to grow over the coming year or two.
MRC
