Podcast main page: www.mspvoice.com/
Show-notes: www.mspvoice.com/msp-voice-episode-68/

Guest: Thomas O’Brien
Company: IDEOLITY (http://ideolity.com/)

This week I welcome Thomas O’Brien with IDEOLITY to the show. Thomas is in the Kansas City area and has been in business since 1988.  While it took Thomas and his partners about 3 years to settle on IT services, they have been going strong ever since. In 2008 they changed the name of the company to IDEOLITY to better reflect what they do and it’s also much shorter than the previous name. Even though Thomas has been doing IT services for over 30 years, this is actually his 4th career. With the introduction of the Microcomputer, Thomas taught himself the platform and started up a training company to train companies on how to use these new computers. This experience eventually led him to IT services.

With an educational background in psychology and government, Thomas went back to school in 1991 and got his master’s in computer and information management. He says this additional education experience really helped him to better understand the business. Interestingly, IDEOLITY has always been “the IT resource” for their clients and has basically had them on monthly contracts. They were doing break/fix in the early days, mostly because things always broke. While they have a core group of clients who have been with them since the ’90s, many of their customers have been with them for about 10 years. Thomas also recommends continuing education and found some great resources at the Kauffman Foundation which helped him tie the technical to the business aspects at IDEOLITY. Listen to the end to understand the meaning of the title of this episode.

MSP Voice Episode 68 - "Clients, not Customers" With Thomas OBrien

Podcast main page: www.mspvoice.com/
Show-notes: www.mspvoice.com/msp-voice-episode-69/

Guest: Andrew Lassise
Company: Rush Tech Support (https://www.rushtechsupport.com/)

Andrew started off with a degree in finance in 2009. Unfortunately, because of the recession, he had to switch gears and focus on IT instead of finance. He found a position at a company doing break-fix remotely and then was approached by some friends about starting their own IT company. While the company didn’t last long, they had managed to get a large number of customers. Andrew worked out a deal with previous owners and was able to transition many of those customers to his own, new business...Rush Tech Support.

Rush Tech focuses mostly on residential and through previous work relationships was able to grow even more through mergers with other tech support companies. Andrew was able to grow from just $36,000 in his first year by himself to over $1.75 million the next year. With a lot of continued merger and acquisition growth over the years, Rush Tech is still about 90% residential and 10% MSP. Andrew says they’re going to continue focusing on business and MSP work moving forward even though he still feels there’s a great market for residential.

Andrew also hosts his own podcast called “Self Made and Sober” (https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/someonetalked-media/self-made-sober) - With long-term sobriety, Andrew views this podcast as about the necessity for like-minded people trying to maintain sobriety while achieving more in their lives, whether it be personal, in business or spiritual. Each episode will feature guests, people Andrew looks up to in sobriety, in business, and in life. They discuss the ups and downs of their lives, how they achieved sobriety and success in all its many forms.

MSP Voice Episode 69 - "Self Made" with Andrew Lassise

Podcast main page: www.mspvoice.com/
Show-notes: www.mspvoice.com/msp-voice-episode-70/

This week my guest is Nigel Moore with The Tech Tribe who joins us from Australia. Having been in the business since 2002, Nigel has an interesting story about how he came to own his own MSP in 2007. 

Starting as break-fix, it took a few years to convert everyone to MRR but along the way, he learned quite a bit. Nigel has documented what he learned in a book he wrote called “Package, Price, Profit - The Essential Guide to Packaging and Pricing Your MSP Plans” available from Amazon. Nigel shares a lot of his experiences in this episode that you can put into use today in your own MSP.

While Nigel is no longer running his MSP, he does own a company called The Tech Tribe where he coaches MSPs on how to grow their business. During the podcast, we kept the topics to MSP business and I hope to have Nigel on the MSP Voice Webinar Series soon to talk about The Tech Tribe.

MSP Voice Episode 70 - "Pricing And Packaging" With Nigel Moore

Podcast main page: www.mspvoice.com/
Show-notes: www.mspvoice.com/msp-voice-episode-71/

Guest: Larry Bianculli
Company: Contemporary Computer Services, Inc (CCSI)(https://www.ccsinet.com/)

This week’s guest is Larry Bianculli, managing director,  with CCSI who provide MSP and MSSP services in the New York City/Long Island area. CCSI (which stands for Contemporary Computers Services) has been around since 1974. CCSI has always been focused on services, the founders coming from IBM. CCSI has a range of customers from SMB to fortune 500. They have customers around the US as well as overseas.

Larry has been with CCSI for 4 years and is focused on growing the enterprise and commercial business. Prior to CSSI Larry spent over 15 years working for vendors (both big and small). For their large customers, CCSI helps to augment their IT staff in specialized areas. They’ve seen some great opportunities with co-managed SIEM. CCSI focuses mostly on financial, healthcare, insurance and manufacturing.

Listen to the full episode for more information on how CCSI has been so successful over the years by essentially thinking of themselves as a startup.

MSP Voice Episode 71 - "Longevity As A Startup" With Larry Bianculli

Podcast main page: www.mspvoice.com/
Show-notes: www.mspvoice.com/msp-voice-episode-72/

Guest: Yigal Behar
Company: 2Secure

This week’s guest is Yigal Behar with 2Secure out of the New York City area. Yigal came to the US from Israel where he had an IT consulting firm and also worked at a company providing security services. Taking his enterprise expertise to the US, he decided to open up a consultancy to help smaller businesses be more secure. Yigal doesn’t like to place his business solely in the MSSP box as he also offers MDDR (Managed Defense, Detection and Response). MDDR has aspects of MSSP but also offers more proactive detection and remediation.

Yigal has also written the book “Digital War: The One Cybersecurity Strategy You Need to Implement Now to Secure Your Business.” Which you can download in ebook form from his website: https://www.2secure.biz/#free

MSP Voice Episode 72 - "Managed Defense - Detection And Response" with Yigal Behar

Cloud expert, backup enthusiast, podcaster

MSP Voice Podcast