Limiting the Consumer’s Choices
Social psychologist and Columbia University Business School professor, Dr. Sheena Iyengar, is an expert in choice. By that, I mean she has dedicated her life to understanding the patterns of human decision-making and revealing its contradictions. After leading a 15-year study on the subject, she authored a book on the topic titled, “The Art of Choosing.” In her book, she talks about how psychological, biological, and cultural behaviors steer us in making decisions of choice. “We’re born with the desire, but we don’t really know how to choose,” wrote Dr. Iyengar. From her numerous studies, Dr. Iyengar concluded that when given too many option, we are ten times more likely to take action when choice is limited. Anyone who’s ever been to a convenient store for a candy bar will tell you that! I have left stores because the assortment of items was so large, I didn’t know which selection to make.
Have you every been out to a restaurant, looked at the menu, been so confused by all the offerings, and responded, “I’ll just have…?” To most people, that statement would indicate that you made a choice you were happy with. However, the word “just” in this case, subconsciously indicates that:
1. You are not 100% happy with your selection, and/or;
2. You don’t care about your selection.
Now let’s bring this subject into your business. Most of you claim to be Managed Service Providers; and as such, you probably have different levels of “packages” you provide to potential clients. After reviewing them all, do you find your clients stating, “I will just call you when we have problem…?” This could be due to a few things. One of reasons they chose not to enter into an agreement with you could simply be price. Another reason could be the potential Managed Service client is confused by choices you are offering—and not willing to make a mistake, decides not to purchase at all. In her book, Dr. Iyengar described the magic number—seven—at which more turns into less. This is based on a previous study that showed that our senses can easily distinguish five to nine objects of perception. Now, I am not recommending that your have five to seven different offering for potential clients to choose from. I am saying that if you are offering a lot of different services, combine them into packages that don’t exceed five to nine different offerings. I found that the magic number of Managed Services packages should be around two to four offers. This gives an adequate number to choose from—while not overloading the potential client.
This information should not only be considered for Managed Services offerings, but in everything you sell—from hardware and software. If you business still sell computers to it’s clientele, offer two to four different types. Then categorize them accordingly: Home use, business use, gamers, etc. It is easy to argue that limiting the choices of your clients will cause low sales numbers. However, overloading them with choices will cause the same effect. Finding a balance of offerings will still allow you to suggestion choices while keeping you clients corralled just enough so they don’t feel overburden in making a decision.
Michael D. Alligood
Partner Sales & Support, ExchangeDefender & Shockey Monkey
michael@ownwebnow.com
(877) 546-0316 x707
SRV and TXT Record Support Coming Soon…
As more and more services utilizing SRV Technology come online we have to adjust to the demand. Currently, we accommodate these via a support request, but as the technology spreads that is less convenient to you, your clients, and even us.
As such, we have been working on the backend of the code and it is pretty set. We anticipate having this live next week. Obviously no code is perfect, so if you find anything funky please let me know.
Carlos Lascano
VP Support Services, ExchangeDefender
carlos@ownwebnow.com
(877) 546-0316 x737
Discontinuing Exchange 2007 in UK and EU
As previously mentioned we have been forced to discontinue the Exchange 2007 service worldwide. The last day of Exchange 2007 service on our UK and Euro infrastructure will be July 31 slightly over two months from today. We have been reaching out to our partners to schedule and facilitate the migration to Exchange 2010 (or other arrangements) and I’m thankful that so many of you have been able to make a quick switch and upgrade your clients. If you haven’t had the opportunity yet we will be calling, emailing, texting and opening up support tickets to get this job done in a way that doesn’t interrupt client operations.
How does the migration work
The whole backend process is managed by us and facilitated / supported around the clock. So please work with our team to assure a smooth transition.
As the service provider you need to modify clients Autodiscover record (to point to new servers) and restart clients Outlook. After the restart click on Repair Profile and Outlook will automatically switch itself to the new infrastructure.
Is there any way to stay on Exchange 2007?
Technically, yes, but we do not recommend it.
Exchange 2007 will be discontinued worldwide. Just as with Exchange 2000, Exchange 2003 and Exchange 2007 we will still provide the service to the clients on these platforms that require legacy service from our United States legacy platforms. We understand that clients may have line of business applications that require legacy access to Exchange and may not be able to make a quick transition.
Exchange legacy platform is provided on a best-effort basis only, not under our standard SLA. As such the service comes with no uptime guarantee and certain functionality can become restricted without notice if it becomes a security concern (unpatched security issue becomes exploited in the wild). We have made arrangements with our clients in the past for longer term legacy support but please do not consider this as a viable alternative to moving to the new platform.
Will this affect my other services or LiveArchive?
Your ExchangeDefender services will not be affected – LiveArchive, encryption, Compliance Archiving, password policies, two factor password authentication and enterprise services will not be impacted by the infrastructure switch.
Do I have to export all client mail and import it back again?
No, mailbox is migrated on the backend and the only thing you need to do is restart Outlook and repair profile.
We are here for you, please give us a ring and let us help with the move. Call us or open a ticket or email us and let’s go!
Sincerely,
Vlad Mazek
CEO, ExchangeDefender
877-546-0316 x500
Hosted Exchange 2013
We now offer the most recent version of Hosted Exchange available with Outlook 2013!
Our network engineers have spent the last few months designing, testing and implementing the network infrastructure for this new version of Hosted Exchange. This new version comes with all the latest and greatest feature sets, along with a new look and feel.
We have also fully integration this new version (Exchange 2013) into our automatic provisioning process. So you can now order this product directly through our website and have the account(s) provisioned and online within minutes!
How do I sign up for Hosted Exchange 2013?
First if you are not already a partner with us, visit:
http://www.exchangedefender.com/partner_application.phpIf you are an existing partner, visit:
(Once signed in, click on Service Manager-> Hosted Exchange)
https://support.ownwebnow.com
Hank Newman
VP, Development
hank@ownwebnow.com
Are You Really The Boss?
IT business owners have many reasons for starting their own companies. Some were formerly employed in the field, others bought franchises, and some just love technology. Whatever the reason, most had a yearning to be their own boss. This, in theory, has afforded them to make their own hours, manage staff, and be the overall decision maker for their business.
All of this sounds great but, as much as we would like to believe that the business owner is the boss, the reality is that they just might not be. Now I know what you are thinking; the “wife” is the boss! Though this may also be partially true, the real boss is the customer.
Here are the reasons why:
Hiring and Firing – The customer hires you, and just like you can fire a customer or employee, the customer can fire you.
Paycheck – You and your employee’s paycheck’s come from the customer.
Products – Customers generally dictate the types of products you carry whether you are vertical specific or horizontal.
Managing Staff – Often times the customer is your eyes and ears in the field. Based on complaints or praise from them, helps to determine your employee’s status in the company.
Hours – I don’t think any IT professional would argue that the customer dictates your hours. For those of you who have been up at 2:30 in the morning working on a server down issue or some kind of issue or outage can attest to that.
So maybe the customers are at least the co-bosses. Without them you have no business! Treat them like a boss in your business. Seek input just like you would a business partner and watch your customer relationships build. By treating your customers like a boss you will earn respect and definitely earn loyalty.
Frank Gurnee
VP, Channel Services, ExchangeDefender
(877) 546-0316 x4777
frank@ownwebnow.com
ExchangeDefender Service Provider Portal
What is it?
For the most part, the majority of ExchangeDefender services are ordered within the OwnWebNow support portal at https://support.ownwebnow.com. However, ExchangeDefender for Service Providers portal (or ExchangeDefender SP for short,) is where you, the partner, will order and manage the ExchangeDefender service for your clients. The ExchangeDefender SP portal is designed for IT Solution Providers that want to offer their own ExchangeDefender service under their own brand–including color templates and logo uploads.
How do I order it?
To order an ExchangeDefender Service Providers portal:
- Log into your OwnWebNow Support Portal (https://support.ownwebnow.com);
- Click on the Service Manager tab;
- Click on ExchangeDefender SP;
- Click the New Account button on the upper right of the screen;
- By clicking the New Account button, this will initiate the setup process;
Step 1. Contacts and Contracts
- This information should be pre-populated with your administrative contact and billing information. If not, please provide this information.
- Pricing: Although it is listed as $2.00 per month for ExchangeDefender SP portals; as an ExchangeDefender partner, you will exempt from this fee.
- If you agree, check the following boxes:
- Terms of Services;
- Acceptable Use Policy; and
- Service Level Agreement.
- Click Next
Step 2. Service Configuration
On this page, you will start branding your ExchangeDefender SP portal.
- First, provide an MSP ID. The Service Provider ID is a signal word that identifies your company, e.g. ABCTech, OwnWebNow, etc.;
- Secondly, choose a product name. The product name is what you wish your ExchangeDefender service to be called, e.g. Awesome Email Scanning Service, ABCTech AntiSPAM Solutions, etc.;
- Fill in all the necessary Admin contact information;
- Click Review to proceed to the final step.
Step 3. Review and Finalize
If all of the information presented on this page is correct, please click Finalize Order. This will finalize this order and provision your portal. After you finalize your ExchangeDefender SP order, you will receive an email containing information about your new SP portal. After you order the ExchangeDefender accounts within your newly created SP portal, you will need to follow our deploy guide, located at: http://exchangedefender.com/media/ExchangeDefender_Deployment_Guide.pdf.
Ordering an ExchangeDefender SP portal is a one-time process. You do not need to order a new portal every time you wish to on-board a new ExchangeDefender client. You will use this newly created portal to add new client wishing to use ExchangeDefender, as well as manage existing client you previously signup for ExchangeDefender services. However, if you wish to use and resell ExchangeDefender Essentials, you will create and use a separate ExchangeDefender Essentials SP portal.
Remember, you will now use this newly created ExchangeDefender Service Provider portal to order and manage the ExchangeDefender service only. All other orderings, including Hosted Exchange, Offsite Backup, etc., will be ordered in the OwnWebNow support portal (https://support.ownwebnow.com). All service tickets concerning issue for any ExchangeDefender service should be opened in the OwnWebNow support portal (https://support.ownwebnow.com) as well.
Are You Partnering With the Right Companies?
A few days ago, while on the phone with a potential partner, I was asked the following questions, “What makes ExchangeDefender different from other vendors that offer the same services? And why should I do business with your company?” After replying to the caller’s questions, I could tell that he was totally unprepared with my answer. So how did I answer? I’ll tell you what; we’ll get back to that one in a minute. First, I want to ask all the business owners and sales representatives that are reading this post a question: Why are you doing business with your current clientele?
In a previous post, I talked about the Pareto Principle—also known as the “80/20 rule”. I mentioned in that post that when I operated my VAR/MSP business, I implemented this principle and dropped roughly 80% of my clients to concentrate on the top 20% remaining. After all, these remaining clients made up +80% of my revenue that year. However, that aside, these particular clients were… different.
After really investigating my remaining clients, I discovered that the vast majority of them were referrals. They were all like-minded and appreciated how technology enhanced their businesses. Furthermore, they viewed me as an employee of their company—not just a contractor for hire. I would sit in on monthly, quarterly, and annual meetings with most of my clients to discuss technology concerns, allocated funds and budgets, and the overall state of their network and devices. I went from being only viewed as the “computer guy” to being appreciated as their technology manager.
So when I was asked the following questions, “What makes ExchangeDefender different from other vendors that offer the same services? And why should I do business with your company,” how do you think I answered? “We are different because we only want to partner with like-minded businesses that are interested in forming a long synergetic relationship between our two companies. We recently shut down our partner program to concentrate on our current partner base. So it’s not whether you should do business with us; the question I have is should we enter into a partnership with your company. Now, with that said, tell me more about your company and what your do so I can determine if our two businesses have anything to offer each other…”.
Michael D. Alligood
Partner Sales & Support, ExchangeDefender & Shockey Monkey
michael@ownwebnow.com
(877) 546-0316 x707
Best Practices for Pricing Cloud Services
One of the best things about being an ExchangeDefender partner is the fact that you get to name your own price for services. Unlike many competitive products on the market, that predetermines and set the margins you will make with their solutions, ExchangeDefender lets you get exactly what you deserve for your service. But how do you determine what to charge?
There are a few best practices for determining your price:
1. Research competing and online pricing for similar services that are marketed to consumers- It is not about being cheaper than other solutions, it is just about knowing the competition, and pricing with a premium for your service and expertise
2. Determine if the solution is something the customer can easily source on their own, or if it requires setup and regular maintenance- This will help you determine how much of a premium you can charge for your service.
3. A 35-50% margin is a good place to start with cloud service pricing- If you are finding push back on your pricing it is ok to adjust as necessary. Just remember it is always harder to raise prices than it is to lower prices.
Be sure to take advantage of promotions and quantity discounts. ExchangeDefender provides promotions regularly on popular services. Keep an eye out for these popular promotions as they can really boost your margins.
There is no perfect pricing for any solution. The market changes often and technology prices fluctuate. The best thing to do is to monitor the market and adapt as needed. Stick with what works for as long as possible but don’t get left behind when changes do occur. By paying attention and staying two steps ahead you will always end up on top.
Frank Gurnee
VP, Channel Services, ExchangeDefender
(877) 546-0316 x4777
frank@ownwebnow.com
Compare the Choices!
A lot of our partners love our Exchange offerings, but now that we have multiple options for email solutions, they are also asking more questions. What is the difference? What do I get? How does it compare? What are the compromises? How much does it cost?
The objective of our Exchange offerings has always been to provide an easy to use, simple and reliable communications platform; and that is something that has not been compromised in any of our solutions. Currently, we are one of the few Exchange providers that deliver service on local systems, public folders, free archiving, and redundant failover all with the product under your brand. Now, we still do all of that just with different pricing options and models.
Exchange 2010 + SharePoint 2010
You can truly leverage this Exchange 2010 Suite and apply it to your business to increase not only your operational efficiency and increase revenues, but to also lower your costs through the deployment of a completely brandable email hosting solution with a great deal of business appeal. It is offered fully equipped with ExchangeDefender and all of the additional features, SharePoint, Outlook, Outlook Add-In, etc. One major differentiator and value-added feature with this model is LiveArchive. It is important to remember that there is no such thing as 100% uptime, and that is exactly where our LiveArchive cluster comes into play. With LiveArchive you are always connected and can continue working if an outage were ever to take place. Exchange 2010 + SharePoint 2010 is really a turnkey solution that will be reliable for you and your clients as a complete email communication system.
Exchange 2010 Essentials
Exchange 2010 Essentials, at its core, is the same as our Exchange 2010 + SharePoint 2010 offering with a unique advantage – price! Businesses of all shapes and sizes can now have the additional option to rely on Exchange 2010 Essentials just without the additional services such as LiveArchive, SharePoint, Outlook, and so on – Just the best email communication platform at the best possible price! This product also allows you to compete with some bigger players in the industry. Exchange 2010 Essentials is backed by ExchangeDefender Essentials – You will still have the same great spam fighting abilities but you will not receive all of the great features that come with the full ExchangeDefender Suite like: LiveArchive, Encryption, Web File Sharing, Web Filtering, and Compliance Archiving. However, if these features are not needed by your clients and you need to compete on price, then Exchange 2010 Essentials is your answer! Also, Essentials can be very profitable because it could lead to you making more money than selling a higher priced solution.
BRAND NEW!!! Exchange 2013
Exchange 2013 brings a new set of features to Exchange in addition to all the great features that are already in the previous editions of the product. There is a whole new look and feel to the interface making it very user friendly. There is now an additional focus on collaboration within the communication platform where users will enjoy easy to manage public folders, improved searching and indexing that is built into the product, enhanced shared mailboxes, rich integration with SharePoint 2013 and Lync 2013, and much more!
Adding all these options to your solution set will be something that you could make a lot of money on, and also really differentiate yourself from others in the channel and be more versatile.
We are confident that your clients will get hooked on our Exchange offerings because they will truly receive unparalleled support in addition to a phenomenal product that will fit all of their needs. So no matter which offering is chosen, you can be sure that you are providing your clients with a product and service that you can both trust and rely on.
With all three Exchange offerings you have complete control of the client, the branding, and the billing. Your brand, your name, your image, your price, your billing, your solution!
We are currently running a “Cinco de Mayo” promotion for the month of May for Exchange 2013 mailboxes, don’t miss it!
Questions? Contact us!
Stephanie Hasenour
VP Marketing, ExchangeDefender
stephanie@ownwebnow.com
Postini Migration Assistance
As we all know one of the major players in the Anti-SPAM space was being merged into another platform which started earlier this year. We have been getting quite a bit of that business and we’ve had enquiries at the shows about migration assistance. We absolutely will help you migrate to our services as long as you are willing and able to provide us with the admin credentials to pull all of the settings we can take care of the rest for you. Once you’ve joined our partner program and created your Service Provider account for ExchangeDefender, just open a support request letting us know you need migration assistance and we’ll let you know how the process will go. We will keep your involvement to the minimum as well as share some of more robust migration paths that would limit your support overhead.
If you have questions before that please feel free to reach out to me directly.
Carlos Lascano
VP Support Services, ExchangeDefender
carlos@ownwebnow.com
(877) 546-0316 x737