Using LabTech to Roll Out Managed Services
LabTech is a tool that can be installed throughout your entire environment regardless of which type of service agreement. The competing solutions tell you what your business model is going to be. LabTech is flexible and allows you to create the business model that will uniquely set your firm apart from the competition. LabTech recommends three service offerings: managed services, maintenance, and on-call or hourly. The goal is to move clients from on-call to managed services. To maximize profit from your current client base, LabTech recommends every computer supported by your business run LabTech software.
On-call or Hourly – Install LabTech on these clients’ networks to collect inventory information, event log information, and integrate them with LabTech ticketing and timekeeping. It is recommended that no monitoring or proactive maintenance is done on these customers. None of the automation other than actions that can generate hourly work should be performed. Because accidents do occur that could be prevented by maintenance or managed services, communicate to your clients their value and offer to quote these services.
In order to achieve a return on the investment in LabTech and the time required to implement the powerful tools in LabTech, charge these clients a higher hourly rate and sell them projects found from the inventory information gathered from their network. You can also cover your initial cost of LabTech by charging them a one-time fee for LabTech. This fee payment allows you to remotely support their computers. You can also charge a very minimal monthly fee for the use of LabTech of $1.00 per computer per month which more than pays for the cost of LabTech.
Maintenance Agreements – Maintenance agreements are a set of proactive services that are run on clients' computers. These agreements are very flexible and can contain many services that can be bundled differently to come up with a maintenance plan that fits your clients’ budget.
Managed Services – Managed Service agreements typically include all labor except projects and all the best practices and automation that have been developed by LabTech and your business. With managed services, you can require that the client purchase your various services and products. Your business makes money on the purchase of these services and it standardizes ALL managed service clients on the exact same platform. This is the secret to the cost savings achieved by Managed Services. All clients and computers are setup and supported exactly the same, so they all seem like they are within one business.
