Should I Go Vertical

About This Episode

Going Vertical! Sounds like we may be talking with skater or snowboarders, but the vertical we will be speaking about today is singular focus on one industry.  Many MSP’s have adopted the vertical approach, and quite a few with huge success as we can see in the ChannelE2E’s Annual Top 100 Vertical MSP report.

But the big question is can a vertical focus be right for my MSP, and is the risk associated with a single industry to big a risk to put all your eggs in one basket?

Robb kicks us off with his opinion and we quickly learn that he is not a fan of the vertical approach.  The risk in his perspective of an industry going dry or facing an economic downturn is too big an impact for many MSP’s to survive.  This is being shown here in the pandemic as you see MSP’s that singularly serve the hospitality and entertainment venues seeing big channels.

Brian brings a discussion of not a complete vertical focus, but implementing “pocket verticals” and taking success you may have had as an early stage and leverage that into building these ‘pocket verticals”.  Robb speaks that you need to capitalize and get better at the markets you have the most success and then research how to beat your competition in that vertical.

Tim reflects on the concept of the generalist and how there is too much of a ‘one-off’ approach across your client base and you do need to narrow down to a few verticals to support your business growth.  The reality for many MSP’s the local market is too finite to support pure vertical growth. Brian speaks about how that vertical MSP’s have to be open to moving into new markets and finding a marketing mindset and delivery process that can support that footprint.

We close with a discussion of vertical industries and where the least amount of vertical risk lives and MSP’s can pursue with the least risk.