The global cybersecurity market reached $139.77 billion in 2021 and is projected to grow from $155.83 in 2022 to $376.32 billion by 2029, at a compound annual growth rate of 13.4%.
As an MSP, you probably noticed that more clients are demanding security services. Becoming a Managed Security Service Provider (MSSP) can help open up many business opportunities and increase your profit margins.
Even though many MSPs already offer some form of commoditized services like email security, perimeter protection (firewall), endpoint security and DNS filtering, they don’t have the sophisticated Security Operations Center (SOC) technologies and specialized knowledge in regulatory and compliance requirements to become an MSSP.
But adding these capabilities to your offerings is a complicated and costly process. It takes time and resources to put the right people, processes, and technologies in place and keep up with the fast-evolving threat landscape. Also, you need to integrate these new services into your existing packages to maximize sales and revenue.
The good news is that you don’t have to reinvent the wheel to shift from MSP to MSSP. A turnkey SOC as a Service (SOCaaS) can help you quickly add cybersecurity offerings to your packages to shorten time to market, increase revenue opportunities, and stay relevant in the competitive marketplace.
SOC as a Service – Where to Begin?
Here’s how you can leverage SOCaaS effectively to transition to selling cybersecurity services and become a successful MSSP.
1. Start with a Comprehensive Strategy
It’s complex to deliver cybersecurity services—you can’t just sign up for a SOCaaS program and hope for the best. You should understand what your SOCaaS provider covers and assess what capabilities you need in-house to implement the cybersecurity services successfully.
Evaluate the competitive landscape and see how you can gain a unique market positioning with your new offerings. Do the math to ensure that the endeavor will be profitable. Also, consider how you can integrate the new services into your existing solutions to create attractive bundles for new and existing clients.
For example, the inSOC team helps our MSP partners evaluate their existing packages and incorporate cybersecurity services into their offerings to ensure they’re getting the most from working with us.
2. Determine Your Readiness Level
The stakes are much higher when you become an MSSP thanks to the additional legal accountability. While your SOCaaS provider will take care of the day-to-day operations, you should have a solid foundation to deliver managed services effectively and profitably before adding security offerings.
Implement standardized and documented procedures for delivering high-quality services. Also, assess your current MSP business financial performance and operational maturity to ensure the company is ready for expansion.
3. Build a Track Record
Since you can lean on your SOCaaS provider for the nuts and bolts, you don’t need to have extensive expertise in each security domain. However, you should identify how these specialties map to your customers’ challenges to position your new security offerings strategically and determine where to focus your sales efforts.
Start by adding one or two services (e.g. log monitoring, vulnerability management) that complements your MSP offerings and meets your customers’ needs. Then, promote the new services to existing clients to gain traction, collect feedback, and get testimonials.
4. Improve Your Security Posture
MSPs and MSSPs are prime targets for hackers in supply chain attacks. You must walk your talk and secure your own environment. Doing so will ensure the safety of your customers’ networks while helping you build trust and protect your reputation.
Conduct weekly vulnerability assessments to identify gaps in your infrastructure and processes. Implement a robust MSP/MSSP specific cybersecurity solution to monitor your infrastructure. Also, be prepared to answer questions like “have you encountered similar security challenges, and what did you do to protect yourself?”
5. Establish a Collaborative Approach
While a reputable SOCaaS provider will take care of the heavy lifting, it doesn’t mean you can stay on the sideline. After all, you’re responsible for delivering client services and ensuring that the cybersecurity components support the rest of your packages to help your customers achieve optimal outcomes.
Your SOCaaS provider should work closely with you to deliver the best client services. It should also provide monthly risk assessments and threat reporting customized for each customer to help you communicate the value you bring to the table to build trust and drive sales.
6. Get Customized Sales and Marketing Support
Adding security services is the first step, but you also need the ability to sell them effectively. Unfortunately, many MSPs and MSSPs stumble at this critical step because they don’t have the support they need to bring their effort to the finish line.
Your sales and marketing strategy must cover all the bases: website, email campaigns, landing pages, webinars, collaterals, events, social media outreach, video pipeline, sales training, demos, and more.
But it isn’t easy to handle all these moving parts—very few MSPs have the in-house capabilities to market comprehensive security offerings. Using a SOCaaS provider with marketing and sales enablement support can help ensure that you’re effectively selling your new services to maximize your return on investment (ROI.)
Introducing inSOC’s MSP Select Program
After helping numerous MSPs transform into MSSPs with our SOC as a Service solutions, we know a thing or two about the challenges they encounter—one of which is marketing their new security offerings.
We also know that when our MSP partners win, we win. To help them make the most of our partnership, we recently launched the bespoke MSP Select Program to provide fully-customized marketing and sales enablement services.
The complete go-to-market package help MSPs increase their cybersecurity revenue using our SOCaaS solution. The collaborative approach means that the inSOC team is heavily involved every step of the way to achieve the best outcomes.
Learn more about MSP Select and see how we can help you capitalize on the latest market opportunities.
