Cloud Watching: What You Need to Know in 2017

Once upon a time, the neighborhood of your business was made up entirely of the clients whose systems you could physically access. We’ve supported you through the shift from that limited break/fix space to a larger world of managed services, which opened up your IT neighborhood to include even more clients.

Technology never stops evolving. Now there is a new shift on the horizon, with cloud services paving the way to your new global marketplace. Maybe you’ve spent the last several years considering a move to the cloud and decided to stick with on-premise service, but now is the time to start looking at your business as a player in the worldwide IT market by expanding to offer cloud services.

Diminishing Returns

Managed services aren’t going away, but they will start to slide in the next few years. 50% of your clients will be running 100% of their IT from the cloud, according to recent surveys. Which means the demand starts now. If you aren’t ready to meet it, you run the very real risk of losing clients to someone ready to start offering this new practice area sooner, rather than later.

I know you’ve come to know and love the recurring revenue associated with managed services. The good news is that the rise of the cloud doesn’t have to mean losing out on that revenue. If you play your cards right—which means establishing a team 100% focused on delivering an incredible cloud experience to your customers—you’ll see any loss in managed service revenue balanced, or even overtaken, by revenue from cloud services.

The transition from break/fix to managed services didn’t happen overnight. In fact, it took more than eight years for the market to embrace that transition. If that was light speed, the opening up of cloud services will happen at warp speed. As clients look for cloud services, and massive entities like Microsoft advertise the necessity for it, you have to move fast to stay ahead of the change. Move on this now.

The Success Platform

If you’re on a business trip, how do you cut down on travel time and reach your destination faster? You step onto the right platform at the train station. If you’re on a business success journey, how do you stay agile in the face of hyper-speed market moves? You align with the tools and resources that allow you to get onto the Success Platform.

At ConnectWise, we’ve made it our mission to understand where the market is headed, and to make sure we’re prepared to propel our partners to the forefront. Which is why we’ve developed the ConnectWise® Business Suite™, with solutions specifically engineered to provide seamless, simple resolutions to your current problems and the proactive support to meet your future needs.

It’s time to step up to the Success Platform. ConnectWise CloudConsole is your entry point to supporting your customers in the cloud, offering a simple way to manage, monitor, and bill for Microsoft® Office365™ directly from ConnectWise.

A Solution for Every Phase

As your business—and your clients—move through each phase of the journey to cloud services, the ConnectWise suite has the solutions to support your cloud practice.