“ I don ’ t think our industry had the tools to monitor to this level before SaaS Alerts . It ’ s added improved monitoring capabilities and watching for threats , whereas previously , it would be a lot more reactive .” – Bret Erickson
MSP Success : What Was The Biggest Challenge You Overcame This Past Year Related To Growth ?
Erickson : Knowing my limits and admitting them . I think I ’ m a good sales engineer . I ’ m a good consultant . I am not a great closer / salesperson . Growing a salesperson and account manager internally who has those skills has taken a huge burden off me . And we are having far more success cross-selling and landing prospects .
MSP Success : Has There Been A Vendor Or Tool That Has Been Instrumental To Your Business ?
Erickson : We needed something to keep an eye on our Office 365 tenants and be able to take action in the middle of the night . There are a lot of competitors out there , and a good friend of mine in a peer group loved SaaS Alerts . SaaS Alerts markets themselves as [ a product to ] detect and automatically remediate SaaS threats . It ’ s spot on .
But 100 % of why we went with them is the personal attention they give is way above anything I ’ m used to and their dedication to the IT community . They have weekly community calls for an hour , and you can hop on and the founder [ Jim Lippie ] and other leadership are on there . It ’ s kind of unheard of , their level of dedication to the channel .
MSP Success : How Is The Cloud Detection And Response ( CDR ) Solution Helping You Protect Your Clients ?
Erickson : I ’ m pretty sure I ’ m stealing this quote , but it sums it up : when it comes to the security of Office 365 , we ’ re basically fighting against organized crime . These are well-funded , multinational crime rings . So we need tools like SaaS Alerts to be fighting the battle .
It ’ s a big part of our security stack because it is constantly monitoring everything that ’ s going on inside a tenant ’ s Office 365 . You can see where people are logged in from , and if we get an alert that someone is logged in from Kazakhstan , we go to the customer . You have an Events [ module ], which is very cool , because it logs everything — whether someone opened a file , copied a file , downloaded a file , who was it , and what time it was . It ’ s really slick . We ’ re getting enterpriselevel tools at a price point a small business can afford .
MSP Success : How Has Incorporating CDR Into Your Cybersecurity Stack Benefited Your Business And Tech Efficiency ?
Erickson : When you get that phone call that says , “ I think I got hacked ,” the first thing is , it stopped it before it happened . The second thing [ the platform ] will do is the remediation , that immediate investigation — it takes a long time to do that . There ’ s the initial investigation and looking at what happened , and after the fact , the in-depth investigation where the client wants big questions answered . So it ’ s either taken those things away or made it way more efficient .
I don ’ t think our industry had the tools to monitor to this level before SaaS Alerts . It ’ s added improved monitoring capabilities and watching for threats , whereas previously , it would be a lot more reactive .
Now [ technicians ] can do diagnostics , investigate , tell a customer the level of damage that may have occurred , or ensure that there wasn ’ t data taken .
MSP Success : What Words Of Advice Would You Give To Other MSPs Looking To Grow Their Business ?
Erickson : There are a few things I live by .
It ’ s important to allow your staff to mess up . You have to let them be human and be ready to change .
Don ’ t overcommit , to either a solution or a long-term deal . Our industry has a six-month shelf life . You don ’ t want to lock in at this much money for three years .
We ’ re here for the customer . I do think a lot of our industry is about profits and what can I sell . That all comes if you focus on your customer .
Esther Shein is a longtime tech and business writer and editor . Her work has appeared in a variety of publications , including TechRepublic , FierceMarkets , Network Computing Magazine , and The Boston Globe .
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