Visit our blog: www.datto.com/uk/blog

Datto’s European State of the MSP Report

Report

Follow us on:

IntroductionDatto surveyed 200+ managed service providers (MSPs) across Europe to learn

about their day-to-day lives, businesses, and IT Channel predictions. The result: a

wealth of statistics covering everything from the technology MSPs are using and

business challenges they’re facing to where they get their news and how many

industry events they attend annually.

With Datto’s European State of the MSP Report, we go beyond a snapshot of

today’s MSPs and take a deeper dive into their lives and businesses. MSPs are

the core of the IT Channel, and by sharing these insights, we hope to help them

overcome challenges and highlight resources to help them succeed.

datto.com | 3

Today’s Managed Service Providers

Primary Role:

Age:

38% of MSPs are between the ages of 40-49.

Under 21 2%

21-29 14%

30-39 31%

40-49 38%

50-59 13%

60-69 2%

46% of MSPs wear multiple hats and describe their primary role as a mix between both technical and business responsibilities.

Technical 23%

Business 31%

A mix of both 46%

4 | datto.com

CEO

Meet the MSP Leader

Watch: • Game of Thrones• Star Trek• Anything Marvel

Roles:• C-level (CEO, CTO, CISO, etc.)• Managing Director• Executive Management (SVPs)

Age: 40-49

Struggle with: • Acquiring new customers• Ransomware/

Cyber security issues

Socialise on: • Facebook• LinkedIn• Twitter

Consume:• Online training videos

& books

Subscribe to: • CompTIA, • Datto Downtime Blog• CRN

Attend: • 3-4 industry

events per year

4 | datto.com

datto.com | 5

Tech Support

</>

Socialise on: • Facebook• LinkedIn• Twitter• Instagram

Consume: • Online training

& webinars

Age: 30-39

Meet the MSP Technician

Attend: • 1-2 industry

events per yearRoles:

• Service Desk/Help Desk• Engineering

Subscribe to: • CompTIA • IT Business• TechTarget

Struggle with: • Work/life balance• Cyber security/

Ransomware issues• Technology vendor issues

datto.com | 5

Watch: • Big Bang Theory• Anything Marvel• Mr Robot

6 | datto.com

The Business of Managed Services

Years in Business:

49% of MSPs have been in business for 16+ years.

Less than three years 6%

3-5 years 6%

6-8 years 8%

9-11 years 12%

12-15 years 19%

16+ years 49%

NEARLY 100%of MSPs state that now is as good a time as ever to be in their industry.

datto.com | 7

MSP Staffing Trends

Hiring Projections:

1-5 74%

6-10 7%

11-15 3%

16-25 2%

26-50 1%

50+ 1%

None 12%

Recruiting Difficulty This Year vs. Last:

About the Same 53%

Harder 45%

Easier 2%

74% of MSPs plan to hire between 1-5 employees in the next year.

Regionally, 45% of MSPs in Europe report it will be harder to recruit new talent this year, compared to 37% globally.

Geo Trend:

In the UK, we’re seeing some nervousness in the job market,

likely due to Brexit. People appear to be riding out this period

of economic uncertainty before they think about taking up a

new role, with a new employer. As soon as the uncertainty is

out of the way, we hope to see a stronger job market, filled with

more confident candidates.

Steve Stokes, New Business Director,

Aura Technology

datto.com | 9

Annual Revenue:Recurring Revenue:

Less than $200k 13%

$200-$500k 20%

$500k-$1M 20%

$1M-$5M 24%

$5M-$7.5M 13%

$7.5M+ 10%

NEARLY 100% of MSPs in Europe report driving a portion of their revenue from recurring services, compared to 80% globally.

24% of MSPs report their businesses make between $1M-$5M in annual revenue.

Making Dollars and Cents of Managed Services

10 | datto.com

1-100 48%

101-200 20%

201-300 8%

301-400 4%

401-500 4%

501+ 16%

MSPs and their Clientele

48%

91% of MSPs also report making at least one client site visit per week.

Face Time with Clients:

OVER 70% of MSPs predict adding between 1-10 new clients in the next 12 months.

Size of Client-base:

of global MSPs report having between 1-100 clients.

datto.com | 11

MSP Specialisation

Top Industries Targeted by MSPs:*

Finance 43%

Education 41%

Healthcare 39%

Construction 37%

Legal 36%

Manufacturing 35%

Non-profit 33%

Real Estate 26%

Startups 23%

Government 15%

of MSPs are specialising their services for a particular industry. 36%

Of this group, the most popular verticals MSPs report targeting are Finance, Education, and Healthcare.

We specialise in the Nuclear and engineering industry and target our service offerings specifically towards this vertical. With our track history, engineering team,

and specialist managed services, we have given ourselves an advantage when bidding opportunities in

this space.

Mike Douglass, Commercial Director, Yellowbus Solutions

*Survey respondents were able to select multiple choices.

12 | datto.com

Popular MSP Learning Tools

How MSPs Consume Industry-Related Content:

MSPs utilise a solid mix of written and visual formats to consume content. Blogs, videos, and books ranked as the top three mediums MSPs use to learn about what’s new in the IT Channel.

Top 3 Consumed Daily: • Blogs/Articles

• Videos

• Email Newsletters

Top 3 Consumed Monthly:• Online Training Courses

• Webinars

• Books

Go-To MSP Business Resources

Top IT Channel Publications:

MSPs around the world ranked their top three publications and/or IT Channel websites as Heise, IT Business and CompTIA.

Heise

IT Business

CompTIA

Channel Partners

TechTarget

Datto Downtime Blog

MSSP Alert

Tubb Blog

ChannelPro

Redmond Channel Partner

Dutch IT Channel

Channele2e

IT Europa

Channel Futures

Reseller News

ARN

Channelnomics

Channel Asia

datto.com | 13

Sign up for the Datto Downtime Blog today!

Sign Up Now

14 | datto.com

MSPs and Screen Time

When it comes to leisurely content consumption, some things never change. The majority of European MSPs rank Game of Thrones as their go-to series followed by Star Trek and The Orville. IT professionals enjoy science fiction? Who knew!

What MSPs are Watching:

• The Punisher• Ozark• The Avengers

• Suits• True Detective • Killing Eve

• Star Wars• The Big Bang

Theory

Game of Thrones Star Trek The Orville

datto.com | 15

Socially Savvy MSPs

Social Media Platforms MSPs Access Daily:*

Industry Event Attendance:Facebook 68%

Linkedin 63%

Instagram 33%

Twitter 32%

Popular Online Communities MSPs Access:*

Reddit 36%

Spiceworks 32%

Synaxon 20%

ComTeam 14%

IT Alliance 7%

The majority of MSPs are on Facebook and LinkedIn on a daily basis.

Globally, Reddit, Spiceworks, and Synaxon are the top three online communities.

30% of MSPs report attending 1-2 industry events annually.

*Survey respondents were able to select multiple choices.

Reddit is popular amongst many MSP. The average user is

dedicated to their chosen topic, making their discussions

candid and in-depth. Reddit provides unfiltered opinions

from the people whose opinions matter most to your market.

Observing these conversations will give you broader insights

into industry trends.

Pippa Loveridge, Head of Marketing,

Mirus IT Solutions

datto.com | 17

What’s Keeping MSPs Up at Night?

Top Business Pain Points for MSPs:*

In Europe, good help is hard to find. MSPs in that region ranked hiring good people as their #1 pain point.

Hiring Good People 41%

Work/Life Balance 40%

Marketing/Sales 34%

Internal Operations 34%

Ransomware/Cybersecurity Issues 31%

Technology or Vendor Issues 30%

Profitability 20%

Revenue Growth 19%

Compliance or Data Privacy Issues 17%

Company Culture 15%

Competition 5%

Customer Churn 5%

Geo Trend:

41% of MSPs report hiring good people to be their leading pain point, followed by work/life balance.

*Survey respondents were able to select multiple choices.

18 | datto.com

MSP Pain Point #1: Hiring Good People

Why do managed service providers struggle to recruit new staff?

Tips from MSPs who have recruited the best talent:

7 Best Practices of Successful MSPs

IT Staffing Made MSPeasy

Whether it’s a lack of resources or a lack of

suitable candidates, many MSPs struggle to find

the IT talent that best fits their business model.

Part of an effective recruitment scheme means

investing in your hiring process and sourcing

experienced, qualified employees - which not

only grows your company’s reputation, but the

desire to work for it too

Dan Sharp, Mirus, Director

datto.com | 19

MSP Pain Point #2: Work/Life Balance

Why are managed service providers struggling to attain work/life balance?

Operations Made MSPeasy

5 Tips for Break-fix to MSP Success

Tips from MSPs on time management:

A lot of MSPs find it hard to balance business and

personal time. A common issue is finding yourself

working IN the business, not ON the business. Many

MSPs find themselves doing a lot of the work and

firefighting. The key is to find the tasks that can be

outsourced, either to employees or partners. When

you are planning your work, ask yourself if the tasks

you are scheduling will add value to you and your

business, if not, delegate it.

Mike Douglass, Commercial Director, Yellowbus Solutions

20 | datto.com

MSP Pain Point #3: Marketing and Sales

Why do managed service providers struggle with marketing and sales?

Tips from marketing and sales savvy MSPs:

Lead Generation Made MSPeasy

Sales Made MSPeasy

Marketing Made MSPeasy

Cold Calling Made MSPeasy

MSPs need to build out a sales and marketing

strategy that aligns with the wider business goals. As

long as the sales and marketing teams have a strong

relationship and common goals, the whole function

will run smoothly together. A strategy shouldn’t be

rigid, it should adapt as trends in the market change

and different functions in the business grow. This

requires regular organisational meetings with clear

objectives and actions for both teams to ensure

business targets are met.

Jessica Symondson, Marketing Director,

Complete IT

datto.com | 21

MSP Pain Point #4: Internal Operations How can managed service providers achieve operational efficiency?

Tips from MSPs who have achieved operational efficiency:

How to be an MSP

Operations Made MSPeasy

Repetition, Rationalisation and Standardisation

are three really important considerations. If you

have to do something manually more than once,

try to automate it. Working with one specific

vendor will help you service your customers better,

rationalising your portfolio and standardising your

approach. Everyone ends up knowing the products

better, leading to shorter sales cycles and faster

support ticket resolution.

Toby Stephenson, Business Technology

Consultant, Neuways

Datto Unified Continuity

Learn More

22 | datto.com

Top Products and Services Offered by MSPs

85%of MSPs report help desk services as their biggest offering, followed by office productivity software services.

Technical support/help desk 85%

Office productivity software services (Office 365, G Suite, etc.) 77%

Networking (WiFi, switching, routing) 75%

Virtualisation services (server, desktop, networking) 66%

Business continuity and disaster recovery (BCDR) 62%

VoIP telephony 60%

Security management software/tools 57%

Cloud-based infrastructure design and management 56%

Data services (VPN, Fiber, MPLS, Metro Ethernet) 45%

Storage design and implementation 30%

Products and Services:*

*Survey respondents were able to select multiple choices.

Fewer MSPs are offering break-fix services and are evolving their business models to be managed services focused. Once they’ve achieved the standard MSP offerings, like technical support or BCDR products, multiple

layers of security solutions make their way into the mix.

Eric Torres, Channel, Development Manager, Datto, Inc. & former MSP

datto.com | 23

44% of MSPs report that HPE is the top recommended server to clients.

MSP Technology Favorites

HPE 44%

Dell 25%

Other 13%

Fijitsu 9%

lenovo 6%

I build my own servers 3%

Microsoft Hyper-V 53%

VMware 41%

Other 6%

Most Popular Virtualisation Software:

Top Servers Recommended to Clients:

Geo Trend: In Europe and Asia-Pacific, HPE server is king.

24 | datto.com

MSP Security Offerings

Most Critical Security Solutions, According to MSPs:*

81% of MSPs consider anti-virus the most critical security solution for small-to-medium-sized businesses, followed by advanced firewall and RMM.

Anti-virus 81%

Advanced Firewall (UTM, NGFW, etc.) 73%

Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM) 64%

Patch Management 69%

Anti-spam 62%

Two-factor Authentication 57%

End User Training and Education 51%

Password Policy Management 49%

Intrusion Detection and Prevention 46%

Web content filtering 46%

Vulnerability Scanning 41%

Data Loss Prevention (DLP) 38%

Virtual Private Network (VPN) 37%

Traditional Firewall 33%

Threat Intelligence 28%

Identity and Access Management (IAM) 16%

Privileged Access Management (PAM) 15%

*Survey respondents were able to select multiple choices.

Cybercrime is evolving daily, and as a result, businesses must have

more than just an antivirus package to keep them protected. When we

onboard a new client, we review their existing network security. We’ve

found most of our clients to have older firewall technology, which

we replace with the latest cloud-managed firewalls. These have

intrusion detection and prevention and real-time malware

protection, giving our clients another layer of protection. Keeping

our clients safe online is of paramount importance.

Steve Stokes, New Business Director, Aura Technology

26 | datto.com

Driving Managed Services Forward

Solutions that Positively Impacted MSP Businesses in the Past Year:

MSPs are providing more cloud-based solutions to their clients,

such as Office 365 and G Suite. SaaS Protection from Datto offers a

true backup solution which allows you to easily recover data from a

single portal.

Matt Takhar, CEO, Inbay Ltd.

Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM)

Cloud Storage and Management

Productivity Software (Microsoft Office 365, G Suite)

Professional Services Automation (PSA)

Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery (BCDR)

Documentation Software

Cyber security

Networking

Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP)

datto.com | 27

Key Takeaways• Today’s MSPs are between the ages of 30-49 and report their organisations have been

in business for 16+ years. Nearly 100% of MSPs surveyed say that now is as good a

time as ever to be in their industry.

• The majority of MSPs report annual revenue between $1M-$5M. Nearly 100% of MSPs

report driving a portion of their earnings from recurring services, compared to 80%

who report driving revenue from recurring revenue services, globally.

• 28% of European MSPs report having between 1-100 clients. 91% of MSPs also report

making at least one client site visits per week. In the next 12 months, over 70% of

European MSPs predict adding between 1-10 new clients.

• MSPs in European ranked their top three IT Channel publications as Heise, IT

Business, and CompTIA.

• The majority of MSPs are accessing Facebook and LinkedIn on a daily basis and

list Reddit, Spiceworks, and Synaxon as the top three online communities they’re

hanging out on.

• Hiring good people and work/ life balance are the top two pain points for European

MSPs, followed by marketing and sales, internal operations and ransomware/ cyber

security issues.

• Nearly half of MSPs report recommending HPE servers to clients, followed by one

quarter who recommend Dell. 50% of MSPs report utilising Microsoft Hyper-V as

their virtualisation software, closely followed by 40% who report using VMware.

• The majority of MSPs plan to hire between 1-5 employees in the next 12 months: most

predict the ease of hiring to be about the same compared to last year.

• The top 3 most critical security offerings according to MSPs are anti-virus, advanced

firewall, and Patch Management.

• MSPs report RMM, cloud storage management, productivity software, professional

services automation (PSA) AND business continuity and disaster recovery

(BCDR),among the solutions that positively impacted them the most last year.

Additional Resources:

MSPeasy Series

Pricing Made MSPeasyDiscover the Best Pricing Model for Your Needs

MSPeasy Series

Sales Made MSPeasyThe Ultimate MSP Guide to Successful Sales

MSPeasy Series

Recurring Revenue Made MSPeasy7 Best Practices for Success

About the ReportDatto’s 2019 European State of the MSP Report is comprised of statistics pulled from a survey of 200+

managed service providers across the globe. To learn more about the results, please reach out to

Katie Thornton, Director, Content and Marketing Programs at Datto, Inc.

About DattoAs the world’s leading provider of IT solutions delivered by Managed Service Providers (MSPs), Datto

believes there is no limit to what small and medium businesses can achieve with the right technology.

Datto offers business continuity and disaster recovery, networking, business management, and file

backup and sync solutions, and has created a one-of-a-kind ecosystem of partners that provide Datto

solutions to half a million businesses across more than 130 countries. Since its founding in 2007, Datto

has earned hundreds of awards for its rapid growth, product excellence, superior technical support,

and for fostering an outstanding workplace. With global headquarters in Norwalk, Connecticut, Datto

has international offices in the United Kingdom, Netherlands, Denmark, Germany, Canada, Australia,

China, and Singapore. Learn more at datto.com.

Copyright © 2019 Datto Inc. All rights reserved.

Follow us on:

Subscribe to our blog: www.datto.com/uk/blog