How Does A Start-Up MSP With Zero Marketing Experience Respond To A Lockdown? With A 5,300% INCREASE In Monthly Recurring Revenue!

Terry Blacksten and Kerry Brown,

BITOS LLC

Who Opens A SECOND Business One Week After Launching An MSP? This Guy…

Just one week after finalizing the paperwork for my new MSP, I got a call from a friend about starting a BIOS company with him. “Sure, I can run TWO brand-new businesses simultaneously. Why not?!” (Insert eyeroll here)

I figured my MSP company would be my “quick hit” since the sales cycle for my software business was 12 to 18 months. I couldn’t have been more wrong. After just four calls, I got a massive deal writing BIOS for Chromebooks, which kept me and my 15 new employees busy for four years!

But when our huge contract ended and revenue dried up, I realized my partner had not done ANY marketing or sales. I guess he preferred to be a “silent” partner, contributing nothing in capital funds or work. His next move: stealing a year’s worth of company revenue and sticking me with payroll. With my software business dissolved, I turned my attention to my poor, neglected MSP. Read full article and comment →

Even After Losing My First MSP And Enduring Massive COVID-19 Shutdowns, I GREW My Brand-New MSP By $89,492 In MRR In Our First 90 Days!

Our $5 Million Unsinkable IT Business
Hit A Massive Iceberg

My business partner and I started our first IT services business in 1999. Yet, rather than focus on LANs and servers like most MSPs, our business model focused more on connectivity services, including VoIP, cloud and cyber security. From day one, we locked onto the monthly recurring revenue model and grew our profitable business to $5 million. Things were good. Until…

Everything went sideways, and quickly. Life came crashing down for my business partner and best friend of over 25 years. It started with an ugly divorce, where he was separated from his seven kids. Things spiraled from there, and while I tried everything I could to rescue him, he threw it all away. I explained the situation to his ex-wife, a long-time family friend, and asked for controlling interest in our business. I told her that without 51% ownership, I would be forced to start a new company. Unfortunately, she didn’t accept my offer and went out of business.

Always one to shed positive light on every circumstance, I gained two important lessons from this experience:

Lesson #1: None of us are above it. We are all just a few bad decisions away from ruin. Like I told his ex-wife: if this could happen to him, it could happen to the Pope. 

Lesson #2: Expect the best, but prepare for the worst. Even the best partnerships can end ugly. Make sure any partnership or business agreement you have is airtight. I was fortunate I didn’t have a non-compete clause in our agreement, which allowed me to continue serving my clients.
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While Our Core Client Base In The UK Was Locked Down, We Still DOUBLED Our MRR And Added £302K In NEW Revenue!

Mark Cronin,

MSC IT Solutions

Without Marketing, There’s Zero Leads And Zero Hope For Growth

Living in the small coastal town of Hartlepool in North East England, I believe I bring a unique perspective of running an MSP from “across the pond.” My IT journey began when I left high school at the age of 16. Classroom education was never really for me, so I went into an apprenticeship and worked my way up from the bottom.

I ran three different businesses, including owning my own wedding DJ service with a staff of eight. As an IT contractor, I followed the work around the UK and even lived in a for 20 months! I made a lot of mistakes in business and lost a lot of money, mainly because I had a bad habit of jumping in feet first without first listening, learning and following a plan.

I wasn’t about to make those mistakes again when I started MSC IT Solutions in 2016. Unfortunately, I fell into the all-too-common mistake of doing ZERO MARKETING! Without spending a dime on marketing, every bit of work came from word of mouth and referrals. Because I ignored marketing, I picked up maybe one new client a year and a smattering of project work. Nothing predictable. No new leads. No wonder growth was stagnant.

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Relentlessly Focused On Planning, Execution And Numbers, Our Revenue Jumped $319,163 And Our Profits Were Up 355% Last Year!

Pedro Nunez,

IT Management Solutions

Knocked Down Again And Again –
But Never Knocked Out!

Standing onstage as a Better Your Best finalist at this year’s Fight Club–themed Boot Camp was most appropriate for me because I have been knocked down more times than I can count. When I came to the US from the Dominican Republic with my mother, we lacked a lot and faced many challenges.

Then, after losing my job through workforce discrimination, I started my own break-fix model IT services business in 2003. Disciplined from the Army, I always woke at 4:30 a.m. and worked 12-hour days seven days a week. After I’d reached $550,000 in revenue and thought I had all the money in the world, the 2008 recession wiped out 90% of my clients! With only a fraction of my revenue, I lost my business buildings and filed for Chapter 13 bankruptcy.

As my business, income and confidence crumbled to the ground, so did my health. The relentless hours and stress caused my blood pressure to reach such an alarming rate, my doctor said, “Pedro, if you don’t slow down, you’re going to DIE!”

3 Reasons I Turned EVERYTHING Around

There’s no greater motivator than learning you’re going to be a father. Learning you’re going to be a father TIMES THREE (Yes, TRIPLETS!) lights a burning desire within you to make more, do more and BE MORE. Along with the birth of those three angels in February 2010, the new and improved Pedro 2.0 was born, and I opened the doors to IT Management Solutions!

I searched online for someone who could help me to create an MSP recurring revenue model and grow a profitable business. I found Robin Robins. After getting the Toolkit and finally EXECUTING, I hit $201,000 with $101,000 in recurring revenue in 2009. Thank you, Jesus! I could finally start giving my babies the life they deserve! Just three years later, I was doing $877,000 in revenue with $467,000 recurring each year. By 2016, this immigrant who came from nothing had built a $1.3 MILLION business!

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As A Better Your Best Finalist, We Grew Our Revenue By $1M, Our MRR By $111,662 And Our Profit By $338,571 – All In Just One Year!

Will Nobles,

Vector Choice

Entangled In The Dark Web Of Doubt For 6 Straight Years

The dark web is not a thing or a place. It lives among us, learning, adapting, embedding itself into the very fabric of our digital footprint, now synonymous with daily life. As CEOs, we’ve come to know the dark web of running a business. It preys upon your every insecurity, finding weaknesses in your defenses and your motivation to proceed, give extra effort and outsmart the competition.

And just when you feign success in lieu of giving in, hoping it will be enough to try for one more day, it swoops in – doubt, fear, hopelessness, desperation – and steals it in front of your very eyes.

Two years in, I thought my business was going strong, then BOOM! Three of my TOP CLIENTS representing 60% of my total revenue…GONE! After that gut punch, we operated with a skeleton staff. Under $1M, I was working IN the business, not ON the business. I was so broke I couldn’t even pay myself! The Dark Web of Doubt loomed large. Zero direction. Zero consistency. Zero marketing tools. Zero confidence… For. Six. Straight. Years! Read full article and comment →

From Better Your Best Finalist To WINNER, We Grew Revenues From $811K To $1.76M And Achieved A Net Profit Of $512,764!

Charles Swihart,

Preactive IT

Servicing 981 Break-Fix Clients At 375 Pounds, I Was Ready To Drop Customers And Weight!

“Wow! He’s the Better Your Best winner…he just won an Aston Martin sports car. He must have it ALL figured out!”

Truth is, I’m no different than most of you. Believe me, I had to LEARN how to achieve this level of success. Less than five years ago, we were a computer repair shop that made house calls servicing 981 break-fix customers. Yes, as Sugar Land PC, our target market was anyone with a pulse and a computer.

Because every month our revenue started back over at ZERO, I was stressed beyond belief. I even had to borrow against our house back then just to make payroll. Not only was my business in bad shape, so was I. Crawling under desks at 375 pounds, I needed to change my business, my health, my LIFE.

Around that time, I remember being in the audience at Boot Camp. I wanted to be on that stage…I wanted to grow my business like so many in that room…but I wasn’t sure if this marketing stuff would even work for me. Read full article and comment →

By Finally Turning Prospects Into Leads And Leads Into New Clients, We Added $18,000 In MRR And $45,000 In Projects In Just 90 Days!

Liam Scott,

Keeran Networks

Not All Marketing Agencies Deliver The RESULTS You Are Chasing

Twenty-one years ago, Rishi Patel started Keeran Networks in the city of Edmonton in Alberta, Canada. As the owner and a natural-born salesperson, he’s always been a strong closer. Problem was, as his responsibilities grew as the CEO, there was no lead generation system, leads were not always followed up on and sales were usually lost in the pipeline.

So, Rishi did what many IT business owners do when they need more leads and sales: he hired a marketing agency. Sure, they designed our company website and managed our pay-per-click Google Ads. Problem was, like most marketing agencies, they were mainly focused on driving traffic and getting clicks. Fuzzy, feel-good numbers that most marketing agencies push don’t work. Views, Likes, shares and traffic don’t add to your bottom line. Your business is only succeeding IF YOU ARE SELLING.

After Failing To Bring On A Single New Client For 9 Months, Something Had To Change

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We Hit The Impassable $3 Million Wall, Then Used A $58,253-A-Month Wrecking Ball And Raced To $4.5 Million!

Nick Knowlton,

RoundTable Technology

50% Growth For 2 Straight Years Seemed TOO Easy.

For the first few years, RoundTable Technology had the great fortune of growing organically through word of mouth, referrals and a couple of small acquisitions. I took my seat at the RoundTable in 2016 to help with sales and business development. At first, my job was a breeze since new contracts basically fell into our laps almost daily, and we enjoyed 50% growth for my first two years. Yes, we grew from $1.2 million in revenue to $3.6 million in just TWO YEARS! We were running at full speed…

Then We Fell Into The “$3 Million Valley Of Death”!

In late 2018, growth was no longer came easy. I’ve learned that in the IT services industry, it isn’t uncommon for companies our size to hit the wall at around $3 million. We called it the “$3 Million Valley of Death” because we just couldn’t claw our way out of it! It’s like everything you’ve done before stops working. Once you reach that point, you have to break apart your company and essentially rebuild it. Read full article and comment →