Blog News

Report from Sage Summit - Atlanta

By MiaCate Kennedey I (Atlanta GA)

I had the recent opportunity to attend #SageSummitUS, in beautiful Atlanta, Georgia this past week, and it was a terrific summit! For those of you that don’t already know, #SAGE is primarily an accounting software that goes from desktop to the cloud, bringing solutions to SMB’s and large businesses at affordable solution rates that may be less costly than a typical ERP.

A New Twist to A Mature MSP Business Model

The Small and Medium Business (SMB) space was shaken about a month ago when Forrester’s Jay McBain shared that his research showed approximately 70% of the SMB managed services provider (MSP) field is seeking change in the way of an exit (retirement, getting acquired, getting a job). I believe this reflects the ongoing maturity of the MSP market.

Enter ARG, a quasi-investment and technology entity

On the Road: Blog Passion Project and Profits (Fort Lauderdale, FL)

Long time SMB technology player Rob Leon has reemerged in the South Florida area working with a larger MSP. His day job is to focus on helping small businesses do better with technology. But there is more to Rob than meets the eye.

SoundLine: Everyone Loves Money

More goodness from our telephony community member SoundLine! We return for more wisdom from CEO Barrett Adams. This is a serious conversation about money! We hit is head-on about how MSPs can make money with a Unified Communications (UC) and telephony attach.

MSP to ISV Part II: Reputation Management

An MSP with a new venture - fits right into our MSP-to-ISV coverage pillar! Ramey Bell is a Pacific Northwest tech/sales/marketing entrepreneur who has extended his managed services provider business

Check-in: Acronis

I catch up with a busy Pat Hurley, Vice President and General Manager/Americas at Acronis and we discuss baseball, F1 racing and a new October 2019 conference (Acronis Cyber Protection Summit) plus much more.

From MSP to ISV

Late this week I was speaking with thought leader and analyst Howard Cohen (contributor at Redmond Channel Partner magazine) on a catch-up call and he shared how his scope of coverage has expanded to include Independent Software Vendors (ISVs). I proffered that the momentum at Microsoft itself has been to make ISVs the “flavor of the month” often at the expense of its SMB partners. It’s all about getting the love.

Help Take Your MSP Business from Silent to Social with These 4 Steps

By Stacy West, Vice President, Marketing, SolarWinds MSP

Long before social media became a cultural phenomenon, it was simply a platform for connecting people who shared similar interests or common experiences. Fast-forward to today and social media still serves as a connector, but it has also become a valuable business tool.

Helping ISVs manage partner programs better

TIDWIT is focused on digital interconnectivity of ecosystems. They are working with some of the largest brands: Microsoft, Accenture, CenturyLink…and some of the smallest. Simply stated, it’s a partner digital ecosystem that connects partners together in the ISV’s partner program.

Wrap: SxSW 2019 in Austin

Whew – what a whirlwind mega conference South-by-Southwest (SxSW) is! Over 300,000 people attended over ten days in what I consider a top ten conference in the world. SxSW was it all.

Women in Technology

At the recent Ingram Cloud X conference, I made “Women in Technology” a pillar coverage area. There are important reasons for this – Ingram Micro has made it a solid pre-day session at it’s spring show. And more research is coming out that speaks towards the “Middle School cliff”