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MSPs Discuss Vendor Relationships, Vetting and Onboarding

Published: July 11, 2024
Vendor relationships need to be evaluated constantly, as they are there to help MPSs and integrators grow their business. If that's not happening, it's a problem. suriya / stock.adobe.com

Recently, Commercial Integrator asked five members of The ASCII Group, the world’s largest and oldest independent IT community, to share thoughts about how they interface with vendors. The conversation, reproduced below, touches on a range of topics, including how these MSPs vet prospective partners, how they evaluate existing partners and how potential new partners can stand out from peers and catch an MSP’s attention. 

This conversation includes the following members of The ASCII Group: Mike Nunn, CEO, TLC Solutions; Stanley Louissaint, principal and founder, Fluid Designs; Felicia King, vCISO, security architect, QPC Security; Denase Harris, president, Diversified Computer Resources, Inc.; and Joshua Liberman, president and founder, Net Sciences, Inc. 

Commercial Integrator: Do you have specific processes and protocols in place with respect to vetting prospective vendor partners? 

Mike Nunn: No, we don’t have a specific process. But what that supplier needs to do, most importantly, is align to our vision and values. 

Stanley Louissaint: During vendor selection, the most important thing is understanding what the problem is that I’m trying to solve. That has to be the primary reason to seek out a new vendor relationship. Once I understand that, I can move forward with seeking out the vendors in that space. The next thing is where it gets interesting: How hard does the vendor make it for us to work with them? Are they responsive? Can I get my questions answered? If I ask some of the deeper questions, will they pawn the answer off or be truthful? 

There are a lot of things that are taken into consideration before “getting in bed” with a vendor. Many of them are conscious decisions, but some of them are not. One of the biggest things for me is this: Will this vendor work with us the same way in which we work with our clients? A lot of vendors in the space refuse to work the same way as many of our MSPs in terms of flexibility based on user/device count on a month-to-month basis. Yet, this is the way in which most of us work with our own clients. If a vendor is unwilling to work in that way, they are automatically X’d off my list. 

Felicia King: QPC Security has specific processes and protocols for vendor, product and services vetting. We use a rigorous, enterprise-quality process for our own resources. We provide a formal or informal third-party information security risk management (TPISRM) service to clients based upon what they agree to. It is amazing how efficient a good vendor-vetting process can be at preventing time and resources from being wasted. Most vendors, products or services will just drop out of the vetting process within an hour when that vetting process is done by the correct person. 

We have repeatedly saved clients from mistakes that would have cost them hundreds of thousands of dollars, [all] because they invested a few hours of CISO or CTO time with QPC. 

Denase Harris: Yes, we have an SOP that governs both vendor and product evaluation. The vendor criteria include a review of industry rankings, by independent organizations, that gauge the quality of the partner program and pre- and post-sales technical support. Separately, we gather specifics of the number of years the vendor has been in business; the ownership [and] company culture; and whether the pre-sales and post-sales technical support is on- or off-shore. 

Joshua Liberman: There is a method, but not a process with fixed steps and metrics. It starts with nailing down the nature of the offering. What problem does it address? How is it superior? And what other offerings might it usurp (especially in the security space)? 

Related: MSP Community Talks Security Awareness Training, Key Tools

CI: How often do you reevaluate existing vendor relationships? Once a vendor is “in” with your MSP firm, does that vendor still have to prove itself to retain the relationship? 

Nunn: Vendor relationships need to be evaluated constantly. Vendors are there to help grow our business. And, if that’s not happening, they need to know it right away, without waiting for an annual vendor review. Always have the pulse on things like lead-time changes, price increases, quality or customer service improving or worsening, and, lastly, putting you on credit hold without notification (one of my pet peeves) instead of partnering and growing with us as volumes increase. 

Louissaint: Vendors are technically proving themselves through the delivery of the solution and our interactions with them. We are loyal to a vendor up to the point that they are loyal to us. We are not loyal when a vendor tries to take advantage of us — either by not delivering on the product and/or service delivery or by not honoring their price commitments to us without fair warning. If a vendor is doing what they say, and the product is doing what it’s supposed to do, we will continue with them for the long haul. 

King: QPC continually reevaluates vendor relationships. Vendors, products and services are evaluated at least annually, but a variety of events could trigger an immediate re-evaluation. Consider the Datto sale to Kaseya. That was something that caused a lot of MSPs to reevaluate their relationship with Datto. Vendors are being evaluated on an ongoing basis informally, whether they realize it or not. The vendors who help us and provide value — especially by having good products and services, which make us look good to clients — with low TCO are the most favorably perceived. We seek to do more business with those vendors. Vendors that fail to take feedback for years are abandoned. 

Harris: Most of our vendors require an annual partner meeting to discuss satisfaction and performance. Some larger vendors, such as Microsoft and HPE, address this during annual program renewal, which is done virtually. If the vendor does not request the meeting, we do. To make minor corrections, as needed, we report problems with billing, sales, support or product to our partner account manager as the situation arises. 

Liberman: There is no fixed schedule for re-evaluation; rather, I depend upon triggers to spur a review. These triggers might include product or support challenges, large cost increases, relationship deterioration or other factors. From a higher view, as we are doing now, I might redesign an entire security stack with an eye toward efficacy, cost, or reduction of data silos and vendor sprawl. 

CI: What advice would you give to members of the vendor community who might want to establish a relationship with your firm. What can a vendor do to catch your eye or grab your ear? 

Nunn: All too often, the vendor sales process starts off with verbal diarrhea about how/why the vendor is amazing…the best in the industry…all the other companies they’ve sold to…blah blah blah. On rare occasions, they take the time to learn some things about my business and how they may be able to complement or improve something. Lead by showing that you’ve taken the time to understand me and my business. 

Louissaint: Don’t find me; I’ll find you. I’m sure you have a great product and nobody else does it like you, but, truthfully, I probably have a solution that does what you do. And, if I don’t, your phone call isn’t going to make me buy. When we have a need, we go out there to fill the need. It never works the other way around. 

King: Regarding vendors, they should look to the WatchGuard partner program as an example of how to do a partner program well. WatchGuard provides on-demand, self-service, nearly unlimited training to partners at no cost to the partner, other than their time. WatchGuard has excellent products that make us look good to clients. The product suite is about as comprehensive as one could expect, enabling us to be able to get the most leverage out of a single vendor relationship. Furthermore, WatchGuard does not base partner levels [on] revenue levels except at the top tier. WatchGuard cares more about technical competencies and associates other benefits with sales volume — not partner level. WatchGuard provides NFR assets at reasonable prices. 

Another great vendor is Tenable. Their partner program is extremely beneficial in many ways, although their partner levels are [related to] sales volume. 

Vendors must understand that, if their product [entails] a high labor burden rate to manage their product or service in delivering outcomes for clients, it won’t be successful. The ability to deliver outcomes to the SMB market is contingent upon having quality resources, with low burden rate, which are reliable. 

Harris: Participating in vendor showcases at quality industry sponsored events, and/or being a speaker at those events, is a great way to catch my attention. Unsolicited email and requests to connect via social media platforms like LinkedIn are the least successful way to engage with me if I don’t already know the vendor rep or their company. 

Liberman: Be concise, eschew obfuscation and avoid “buzzwording” us. And be sure to provide peer reviews, case studies, success stories, etc. Most of us care far more about the experience of our peers than about industry pundits’ reviews or vendor pitches. 

Posted in: Insights

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