Mind Your Channel Manners (MSP-Vendor Etiquette) EP 813

Hello friends, Uncle Marv here with another episode of the IT Business Podcast, the bitch show for... No, that's not what this is. This is the show for IT professionals and managed service providers, where we try to help you run your business better, smarter, and faster. This is Wednesday night, the live show, and ooh, look at that.

You guys have a full view of the shelf and everything behind me. Usually I have that a little tightened up, but I had an earlier thing with another thing, and I'm going to tighten up this screenshot here. It's not many people watching, so it's not really going to matter, but let me tighten this up here, and there we go.

That looks a little better. Fill in the screen. Thank you for joining me here.

So tonight, I do not have a guest, and I am doing this on purpose a lot, where I'm going to have a few shows where it's just me, and we're going to talk about some topics that are out there. I'll explain a lot of that a little bit later. Another reason is that I've done a ton of shows.

I'm almost done with the recorded shows from the ASCII Edge event in Orlando, and I've started the NSITSP member profiles, and I've got some other shows that are coming up, and then this summer will be all about IT Nation and Pigeon. So what I'm trying to do is balance that, so I'm going to have some solo shows where I talk about actual topics that will help us as solution providers. I'm going to have other business owners, MSPs, techs on, and we're going to talk about all of those things.

Tonight, two topics. One is going to be about billing. It's a question I'm going to ask you about something I did to see if you think I did the right thing or responded in the right way.

And then, of course, the title of tonight's show, Mind Your Channel Matters, and in parentheses I have MSP Vendor Etiquette. We have talked a lot about the etiquette that happens at conferences afterwards, so I've got some opening thoughts about that. I'm going to pursue that topic a little bit more.

And then on the third segment, Florida Man, I was going through my Florida Man stories and I had several picked out. And too bad I don't have a guest, because what I came across, I came across a video that I said, whatever these other stories are, doesn't matter. I have to bring you the video, and that is going to be a very special Florida Man segment tonight.

We do have, actually I should say we do not have a guest on, so if you want, you can throw questions in the chat. This will be kind of a ask me anything show tonight, so you can go ahead and feel free to put comments and questions in the chat. I will answer them.

And if you are so inclined and you really, really, really want to join the show, go to www.itbusinesspodcast.com slash join, and you can actually get in. And it would be good to have somebody come in and be with me during the Florida Man video because I don't want to be laughing alone. I make fun of people that do stuff and laugh at their own jokes.

It's not my own joke, but I don't want to be laughing alone. So there it is, itbusinesspodcast.com slash join. You will be vetted, meaning you just don't come right on stage, so don't think you're going to punk me or something like that.

So let's get started first with the billing question. So a lot of times we have discussions, whether at conferences, in peer groups, and stuff like that, everybody wants to know, you know, how do you bill? You know, do you bill, you know, time and materials? Do you bill all you can eat per user, per device, yada, yada, yada? And the one thing that we don't talk a lot about is billing based on a project. And my billing per project is completely different than the way I bill for everything else because all projects are billed separately.

And it doesn't matter what the project is, new system installations are billed separately as a project. They are not included as part of the per user, per device cost for the monthly. I know that some people do just simply install it and it just gets added on as a part of the next month's billing or however they add it on and do that.

I charge for my time because most of the time it's going to take minimum two to three hours to set up a new station. I do a lot of physical networks where we still have domain controllers on-prem. So either myself or one of my juniors have to go and set the workstations up.

We have to connect it to the domain. We do have legacy client software that has to be installed. Some of them are, I'm not going to say they're super complicated, but they're not something where you just hit a couple of buttons and go.

Things have to be configured. We've got a client management system at one office where you actually have to configure an ODBC database setting. You've got to manually put in license information.

We've got to manually make sure that drives are mapped in the background because of where the data's location. I've got several offices, well not several, I mean I've got let's say two of my law firm offices where we've got multiple servers. We've got a domain controller, an SQL server, a QuickBooks server, and other stuff, remote terminal service and stuff like that.

So these are, I mean they're not super complex. I mean it's me. I'm not super special.

I'm not super smart, but these are things that can't be counted on as part of the monthly recurring revenue that we do. So I bill for those whenever there's a server installation. It's a big bill.

I'm not going to lie. I bill pretty high for me. So we had, I'm going to try to be delicate with this because I do talk about my clients.

My clients know that I talk about them. Some of them do listen to the show. So this client, if they ever listen, will probably, excuse me, be able to figure out who they are.

So I'm going to be delicate with this. But we had a recent move of an office and it wasn't a big move. It was just probably two miles down the road.

It wasn't a ton of workstations. The client actually downsized. They were downsizing their office.

We went from I think 20, 22 workstations down to 12 currently. But we're going to be adding four down the road here. So not a big deal.

And this was something that it was just me and the wife. She came up with me and we did the move. Normally I would contact a junior to help me with the move, but she did, came with me.

I came up, actually I was already there because I was at the Ask the Edge event. I stayed for the weekend. She came up Friday afternoon.

We did a moving of the network equipment and stuff on Friday and then we moved workstations on Saturday. And there was some other stuff that happened. If you follow me on the Facebook, you'll be able to figure out what that is.

So that happened. So the next week I sent the bill and what I have on the invoice is this. So I do my invoices where I have the top one or two lines that will be what the actual invoiced items are.

So it's, you know, monthly invoice, monthly service, and I list all the things, but they don't see it. They just see the monthly invoice and I'll say this includes workstation support, patches, updates, antivirus, web protection, secure remote access, blah, blah, blah. But they don't see the individual line items.

I do underneath the summary, once I give them the total of what that invoice is, and again, it's only a few lines at the top, then I will list all of the work completed that is associated with that invoice. And in this particular case, I did two lines of actual invoice, gave them the subtotal of the office move and then I listed all of the days that we did work, including a day that I went up to inspect the new space, look at the cabling, and then, of course, the day of the internet testing, which was the day before the move, and then we did basically two full days of moving because we were there Friday, Saturday, and part of Sunday. Okay.

What it comes out to and what I have actually listed on the invoice, the invoice is 70.4 hours. Now, that's not everything. That does not include all the phone calls that I had to make back and forth with the cable people.

That doesn't include the time that I actually had to help with a project that was not mine to begin with but kind of fell into my lap. It does not include, you know, trip time in the sense where I don't, you know, we're not billing per mile when it comes to our car usage, so we weren't, you know, every trip back and forth to, you know, we had to go to Home Depot for some stuff. So I ended up doing block billing and I did three full day of network support and then three half day of network support, and the half days were really for the time that my wife was there.

It was time for one of the trips where I came up. It wasn't a full day, but let's just say three full days and three half days, and it came out to, you know, I'm not going to say it was cheap, but had I billed the full hourly rate, even with a discount, the discount would not have come anywhere close to the amount that I charged them. So I got an email back from A.J. and A.J. had highlighted the two lines at the top and basically said, hey, can we chat about this? And he did not understand how I was billing and I tried to explain and I said, well, I'm billing you a block time or project rate and we did it to here.

And it was funny because as I was looking at it, I realized I left a day off. So that was over $1,000 that I left off the invoice. And some of you will be like, man, I can't be losing $1,000.

The wife was not happy, but it is what it is, my fault, my mistake. We lost out on that. But if I had added all of the time together and stuff like that, like I said, if I had billed my full hourly rate, even with a 20% discount, they were still far better off with the project billing that I had.

So I had to explain this to the person. And this is somebody that I've worked with for a very, very long time. And part of the reason I'm telling you this story is because this was after a conversation that we had where the person literally said to me, I'd like to be able to have you be more available like nights and weekends for us, you know, 24-7 access.

And I said at the time, well, you need to pay for 24-7 pricing. And we all laughed and I realized, yeah, it wasn't that funny when he was saying that. And I just thought, you know, how in the world is, let me try to say this as delicately as possible, what the hell do customers think that they want to get 24-7 support but not pay anything more? That's the, yeah, I'm struggling with this.

Bear with me. And I see you, Matt, out in the chat, yes and yes, what a pickle, answering the questions from the description of tonight's show. So anyway, so I just wanted to throw this out there in terms of when you guys do project billing, do you do something similar to what I do? And part of the reason that I do it this way is because, look, they're already paying me the monthly support.

So that's a big chunk and it's not to be discounted or anything like that. But doing a project where you are being taken away from the office and you're essentially on-site for them for days at a time, and even if you were helping another client, it's not that much. You're talking 10 minutes here, 10 minutes there.

Or a lot of you, I know, you have other techs back at the office and they handle that. But for somebody like me, yes, I have subcontractors, but I don't put them on call while I'm gone. For instance, I do have a helper here in Fort Lauderdale.

And if I know that I'm going to be out of pocket completely, meaning I can't respond to email or I can't respond to a call, and remember, the calls, I can get them on my phone. So like a lot of you, it's not like I'm unavailable. But from the standpoint of I'm not available for all of my clients while I am on-site for you, that deserves separate billing.

So that's why I do that. And I think what happened is, is I think that AJ was not happy with the fact that I was doing this extra billing. However, for 10 years, I have billed like this when it comes to server projects, when it comes to upgrades, when it comes to those workstation installs that I told you about.

So it wasn't really anything different. It's just weird that it come across. So I just want to throw out there, if any of you have any comments, have any suggestions on how to handle that going forward.

It's a weird thing. I'm not going to say I've never had a client question a bill, because they have. But I guess in this way, and what I ended up saying at the very end is, well, I could bill you for every single line, every single hour, and then show you what the true cost is.

And I'm thinking I might do that. So let me know if you think that's a good idea. So some of you probably do that.

That's where that is. Okay. So done with that portion of the show.

Let me grab a drink here. It's hot tonight. Don't know why.

Okay. Subject number two. Been getting a lot of vendor calls.

And not a big deal. I expect it, especially when I attend a conference. And I've been paying attention to the vendor calls and the vendor emails.

And it is time to tackle this topic of MSP vendor etiquette. It has been something that has been talked about quietly behind closed doors. It has been talked about at the bar.

It has been talked about in peer groups. It has been talked about in social media forums. And it seems as though some people don't want to say things out loud that needs to be said.

And I'm actually taking this from both sides. There is, of course, the vendor etiquette side where we talk about, you know, how do vendors treat solution providers. But there's also the side of how do MSPs treat vendors.

So I have got a couple of surveys that I put out there. And that's where we're going to start. And at least for the next few weeks, I'm going to have the links on the IT Business Podcast website.

So if you were to head there and look at the website, of course, if you're listening by audio and you never go to the website, I will have the link to each in the show notes. But there is going to be, or there is, and it's live already. So this is already done.

I have at the top of the page a link for a vendor survey and a link for an MSP survey. And it's three questions each. So it's not a big ask, at least I don't think so.

And they're basically going to be two multiple choice questions and then an open essay question. And I want to hear from vendors and MSPs what are the things that are good, what are the things that are bad, and give me an idea of what you think would be the best way for us to be partners. And we're going to figure out a way to talk about this.

But before that happens, I need to get some hardcore black and white written answers that we can refer to because what I don't want to do is get on here and start recounting hearsay stories because I'm not going into the forums and copying what somebody said and I'm not attributing stuff to the wrong people. The surveys are going to be anonymous. However, when you go there, it is going to ask for your email and that's basically to weed out random answers.

Weed out people that are just trying to figure stuff out. But just jerk with the system, let's put it that way. So I am going to ask for an email and in most cases if I don't recognize the email or I don't recognize the name or the vendor or the MSP, I might do a little research to see if it's legit because what I don't want is for somebody to use it as a place to just poop in the channel.

This is going to be a legit, serious discussion where we want to know, okay, what things are good, what things are bad, and we're going to tackle it from both sides because I know that MSPs complain a lot about the vendors. However, vendors also have a lot of stuff they would like to say to the MSPs, so I want a chance for that to happen. Again, two separate surveys.

So MSPs, you guys have one survey, vendors, you have another survey. They're similar. I'm not trying to hide that, but hopefully we'll get some answers and stuff.

I already know that one person is filtered out because I did send out, I've got a special group of people that I sent the stuff out to ahead of time, so I've already gotten one response. Thank you for that response. Let me tell you from my perspective because I have tried really, really hard to be neutral and be supportive of everyone in the channel.

I think most of you know that I've only gone off a couple of times on people here. We shared a long time ago a story about an MSP that basically screwed over a client and we wanted to find out the story. I have talked about one particular vendor in the channel.

I shouldn't say that. Not quite a vendor, but somebody who was taking money for a service that they did not do. I will leave it at that because that is going to be a special story later.

For the most part, I don't poo-poo on anybody because I want this to be an open show. I want for MSPs to be able to hear from all the vendors in the channel. I want all the vendors to come on, even if I don't use you.

Listen, let's be honest. I can't use every vendor in the channel. I can only have so many stack items.

And just because I don't use you as a vendor doesn't mean that your product is bad. So that's where we are with that. But I do want the opportunity to showcase vendors because other companies, other solution providers might find it valuable and might find it useful and may use you because of listening to the show.

So that's what I want to do with that. On the other hand, I also really never get into the discussions that are happening at the bars. One, because I don't really drink and I don't want to be around.

I don't want to be out late. Let's just leave it at that. But I know those discussions happen, so I want to have a little bit of that.

So when I tell stories here, these are my stories. These are my experience, my opinions, and that's where we leave it. And I will say this.

So today we had a phone call and it was somebody that claimed that we spoke at a conference, which we did not, and somebody who claims that I was very interested in a particular part of that, which I was not. I'm used to that happening, but it is a little frustrating when we know that the caller is lying. And when Kim put them on hold to ask me if I wanted to talk to them, I thought about it, and I was like, okay, get their number so that I can call them back.

And when she went back, they weren't there. That's not good. Don't hang up.

And I don't think we took that long. I mean, it was probably a minute that she had the person on hold. That's not cool.

So of course, if you call back, she's going to remember that. And I don't hear all the discussions that she has, but she tells me a lot of them. And I think that's frustrating for her, especially if she does not know the relationship that I have.

There are some vendors where I'm like, yes, I want them to call. Or I want this person to call because I have another thing that we're working on. It might not be a discussion about the stack.

It might be a discussion about the podcast. It might be a discussion where I'm referring business. She doesn't know.

So as the gatekeeper, I try to keep her informed. But listen, I don't know every vendor in the channel. I know that our names are given to vendors at the conferences.

They were going to be vendors that I never spoke to, never saw, never went by the booth, don't have any swag. But my name is on their list. They're going to call.

All I'm saying is, understand the gatekeepers not being a jerk if she puts you on hold for a minute. There was another call that actually I did take. And again, I'm not saying these vendors' names only because I'm trying to be respectful.

And especially this vendor, because the person called and said, hey, we know that you signed up for our product before and wanted to see if you were still interested in using our product to grow. And I said, well, I signed up for this particular reason. It wasn't really for me to use.

So I'm not going to do it. And the comment was, oh, so you're not interested in growing. And my comment was not with your product.

And they said, thank you and hung up. Now, was that the right thing for me to say? Probably not. It was towards the end of the day.

I had had a long day, had some other discussions. So I probably wasn't in the right frame of mind. But I just thought that I don't know if that's a tactic, a sales tactic, because I don't follow the sales stuff.

But listen, I'm trying to be respectful. I'm taking the call. I'm explaining, here's the situation.

Here's what happened. Yes, I did sign up. We did have another call.

And this was one that she took. And it was something where the person said, yeah, Marvin signed up and did a demo a while back. We wanted to know if they were still interested.

And she did say, oh, I remember he did that. Yes, it was something at the time. He was looking for another solution for a client.

And the client ended up not wanting to change. And so that fell through. And that vendor was very polite, very thankful, and said, OK, glad they're happy.

And just remember us next time if anything changes. Perfect. Lovely call.

I'm happy with that. Those are my stories, my perspectives. I have a lot of vendors that I talk to that are fantastic.

And I don't use their products. And again, it's not that I have anything against them. If I have a solution that works for me, I don't need to look at another solution.

And I understand that, you know, there's a chance that, oh, our solution might be better. It might be. But my solution works for me.

And at least respect me for that. So I'm saying all of this to kind of preface where we're going with the MSP vendor etiquette. Might be a series.

I don't know. But we're going to see. I have asked MSPs to kind of give us feedback or give me feedback.

OK, what are the things that we do that really piss you guys off? I think that's a fair question. And I want them to share that with us. So that is what we're going to be doing.

So again, in the show notes, click the link that's appropriate to you. Don't click another link and fake answers and stuff. Click the link that's appropriate to you.

Fill that out. And that will get to me. Forward the link to anyone, to everyone you want.

So if you are a solution provider and you are in another group, peer group or something, send it to them. I don't care. They listen to the show or not.

I want to hear feedback throughout the channel. So that's where we are. ITBusinessPodcast.com, top right corner.

MSP survey and vendor survey. Click on those links. All right.

Speaking of vendors, let me show you. Of course, you know, do it. Of course, the show is presented by NetAlly, fast, reliable network testing.

Yes, this is a vendor that I use. This is a vendor that is very nice to give me product. They provide simple, secure ways to troubleshoot your network with the number one ally in network testing.

Good vendor. I believe it at that. I'm going to go through the rest of these because I probably don't give them all enough love.

Rhythms, the internet in a box, revolutionized connectivity with portable, reliable 5G and satellite solutions. You have seen me use them out in the field. And they are my internet sponsor for when I am on the road.

And we'll be doing much more stuff with them later. BVOIP. Cloud communications built for MSPs, streamline your operations and enhance client engagement with reliable VOIP, perfectly clear.

I do not use them. But BVOIP, from everything I have heard, has been a great product. George Bardissi is a great friend in the channel.

He doesn't hassle me. He doesn't bug the hell out of me. As far as I know, he doesn't say crap about me behind my back.

So there's an example of a vendor that I work with that I don't work with, if that makes sense. LionGuard. Automate, protect, and empower your IT services with Liongard’s ATT&CK Surface Management.

A new product to my stack that I got a few months ago. And I'm happy with it. I do use it.

I don't use it as much as I should. And there's probably a ton of stuff in there that I need to go through and finish my onboarding. And that would be a perfect example of something that a vendor probably would be upset with.

And an MSP for not finishing your onboarding. That's my bad. I've explained that to them.

They understand. But I will get back to that. And Mr. Stoic in the house, you probably missed the good part of the rant.

And probably have comments for me later. So I'll look forward to that. Let's see.

TruGrid. Secure RDP connections without VPNs. Eliminate vulnerabilities and ensure compliance.

So here's an example of a product that I came across that I use. I did have a customer get quite upset with TruGrid a couple of times when it didn't work a particular way that they thought it should. And they're like, get us something else.

And I did evaluate some other products. And turns out that those other products were not going to gel with the customer because of one thing or another. But we ended up getting the TruGrid solution fixed and resolved.

So thank you to the TruGrid technical support team. We found out that this was a client where we had two agents installed. And one was on a machine that had direct access to Active Directory.

One was not. And it turns out that if you put it on a machine that does not have Active Directory tools on them or direct access to AD, you're going to have connectivity issues. So that's what happened with that.

Since then, the client has been happy. TruGrid has been fantastic. And that is that.

And who else? I have Designer Ready. White label web design, innovative control panels, and wiring. Wiring.

I don't know what that means. Let's just say tailored for OEM excellence. I am in talks to get them on the show so they can explain more of what they do.

Full disclosure, my MB Systems website is hosted by Designer Ready. That is what they give to the show here. I don't know anything about the back end.

But I do know that when I want something changed, I simply send an email. And it's done pretty quickly. And always verified with me, is this what you wanted? Does this work? And it is.

It works out pretty good. So those are the sponsors that I want to make sure that I give a little love to. And keep that MSP etiquette discussion as positive as I can.

All right. Let's now go into our Florida Man story for this evening. And I told you I had gone through.

Normally what I do is, every day there are Florida Man stories. And if I wanted to, I could literally pick out a story a day from all over the state of Florida. And something would be absolutely crazy that you would think is, really? That happened in Florida? Yeah, it did.

So I was going through my stories tonight. Usually I go through the news alerts that I have because I've got several news alerts that give me, they send me all the curated Florida Man stories. And then I have another tool where I can go and say, okay, give me stories in the last week, blah, blah, blah.

And I had, oh, I had a bunch. And when I say a bunch, let me just give you, let me see. Let me give you some of the stories.

A crewless shrimp boat washes ashore in Flagler Beach. Orlando woman lost entire nipple after surgery by unlicensed Miami doctor. Florida woman runs over another woman after seeing her ex-husband with, oh, yeah, Florida woman runs over another woman after seeing her with her ex-husband.

And that story, folks, I thought that was going to be the story for the night. Because that happened in Polk County. And if you have heard this show and you have heard Polk County, you know the name Grady Jug, sheriff in Polk County, Grady Jug.

And oh my goodness, he has some comments about that. But what I have for you is in my mind so much better. And it is a video that I'm going to play you.

So here is your Florida man story for tonight. Driving down the road on U.S. 1, there's a car on the shoulder with his hazards on. So move it on over, move it on over, move it on over, and move over my ride because I'm driving safely again.

Cruising down the highway 95. There are workers on the sides trying to stay alive. Get it on over, move it on over, scoot it on over, moving over my ride because I'm driving safely again.

I know I could just slow it down, but I'm driving safe in my hometown. So ease it on over, move it on over, drag it on over, moving over my ride because I'm driving safely again. Florida law requires you to move over a lane when you can safely do so for stopped law enforcement, emergency sanitation, utility service vehicles, tow trucks or wreckers, maintenance or construction vehicles with displaying warning lights, and any disabled vehicle on the side of the road.

If you can't move over or when on a two-lane road, slow to a speed that is 20 miles an hour less than the posted speed limit. When a driver fails to move over for stopped or disabled vehicles on the roadside, they put the safety of law enforcement, first responders, service professionals and the motorists they assist gravely at risk. Violating the move over law can result in a fine, fees and points on your driving record.

For more information, see section 316.126 Florida statutes. Hey Jim, what sound does the cow make? Move it on over. You're not going to put that in the video, are you? No.

I'm sorry. If you are, um... I'm sorry. If you were listening to this by audio, you need to click on the link.

The link will be to the YouTube video. I'm probably going to get dinged by YouTube content saying that I will not be able to monetize because of that song. But let me describe the scene to you.

This is... This is my hometown area. Well, not hometown, but home county. Brevard County, Florida.

The person singing is Sheriff Wayne Ivey. He is accompanied by a man in a cow costume and a dog. And they are performing a parody song called Move Over.

And of course, it is supposed to raise awareness about Florida's move over law. And the news story describes it as utterly ridiculous. And that is spelled, yes, U-D-D-E-R-L-Y.

And, um, wow. I don't know what to say. I am a little bit embarrassed about... That's my own county.

And, um, yeah, that's your Florida man video for tonight. Yes, Frank. Hello.

Welcome. You made it just in time. So... You people can go to bed with that earworm in your head.

Move it on over. In the images of a man in a cow suit in the back of a pickup truck with his dog. I'm sorry.

I gotta go. This is ridiculous. Thank you all for tuning in.

We'll see you next week.