Smb Community Podcast By Karl W. Palachuk

I interviewed Keith Gillette, founder of TaskTrain, a new documentation tool for checklists and procedures. He describes TaskTrain as "A practical tool to scale your business by eliminating avoidable errors & increasing operational efficiency. Keith Gillette is a "process pragmatist" and Founder/CEO of TaskTrain, a process management SaaS application streamlined for SMBs. Keith has more than 25 years of IT operations management experience in both embedded and virtual CIO roles. He holds a Master of Science in Information & Telecommunications Systems Management as well as a Master of Business Administration from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Keith is a Six Sigma-certified senior member of the American Society for Quality. As a systems administrator, Keith was often burned by lack of system configuration and procedural documentation, so he became diligent in documenting everything he did. He carried that lesson with him when he advanced to IT leadership. His motto became "If it's n

I had a great chat with my old friend Nigel Moore from Australia about his new book, Package Price Profit. (You can buy it on Amazon in paperback or Kindle edition.) This book is a great overview of pricing and bundling options in the IT service industry. I particularly love his analogy about so-called All You Can Eat: Everything at the buffet is included. If you want us to make a special dish for you, that's not included! Of course Nigel is also the founder of the Tech Tribe - www.thetechtribe.com. So we chatted about that a bit. The official book site is www.packagepriceprofit.com. :-)

I had a great chat with my old friend Nigel Moore from Australia about his new book, Package Price Profit. (You can buy it on Amazon in paperback or Kindle edition.) This book is a great overview of pricing and bundling options in the IT service industry. I particularly love his analogy about so-called All You Can Eat: Everything at the buffet is included. If you want us to make a special dish for you, that's not included! Of course Nigel is also the founder of the Tech Tribe - www.thetechtribe.com. So we chatted about that a bit.   The official book site is www.packagepriceprofit.com.   :-)    

This is a great interview with Jennifer Fields of ASTEK Marketing. I have worked with Jennifer for 2+ years now. She’s the real deal. ASTEK Marketing is based in Kenosha, WI. They have an office there for doing call-downs and follow-ups on the marketing services they provide. ASTEK specializes in marketing for MSPs: strategic planning, direct marketing, executing call-downs, and more. They have a new office in Kenosha, but it’s populated with people who have been with ASTEK for several years. We cover a lot of territory in this podcast, but the my favorite part was the discussion of MDF – Marketing Development Funds that are available from many vendors. In addition to simply helping you spend the money, ASTEK actually helps you apply for the funds and makes you they are distributed. The bottom line is that they provide a very technology-specific marketing. Everyone understands your offer. AND they understand the context of what you do. So if you’re doing VOIP or security, their team understands all those othe

It's always great to catch up with my old friend Vince Tinnirello. Vince Tinnirello Vince is the Managing Director of Anchor Network Solutions, a Denver-based managed IT service provider, founded in 2002. He is the immediate past Chair of the CompTIA Managed Services Community, and very passionate about the IT Services industry and the service Anchor delivers to its clients. Vince lives in the foothills of Denver, and when not working enjoys skiing, climbing, mountain biking and golf. He recently completed his goal to summit all of Colorado’s 55 mountains above 14,000 feet and to ski in Japan. After spending many years with Marriott, Vince moved to the IT industry and realized that lots of technicians aren't very good with the personal side of business. So he went to work training and guiding his employees to support his brand. Vince tells a great story about climbing all the major mountain peaks in Colorado (some more than once). Of course that leads to a discussion of relaxing your brain and rechar

Since selling his Managed Service Provider business, Richard has helped dozens of MSPs to grow their own companies. He works with the owners of IT businesses to help them free up their time, concentrate on doing what is important and making more money. In his interactive presentations, Richard offers some practical advice on how he would run a great MSP today — including his tips for selling MSP services. Richard has a great book called The IT Business Owner's Survival Guide. It really is a good guide to getting out of your own way and thriving as a small business owner. Check out the reviews on Amazon. Whether you're new to the IT industry or you've been at it for awhile, this book will help you out! Richard Tubb One tip Richard shares that I am totally on board with: Turn you phone OFF at night and don't sleep with. Don't jump out of bed and grab the phone. Technology is awesome, but we should maintain control. Another great tip: Richard has a world-class out-of-office email process. He describes t

Today's guest is Mr. Tim Taylor, author of How to Start and Run a Successful I.T. Company - Without Using your Shirt, available on Amazon, Amazon Kindle, and Audible. Tim is from Memphis, TN. He has always worked in the IT field. When he was 40, he started his own practice out of the trunk of his car. Today, he runs a multi-million dollar practice in Florida and employs over 15 people. Tim Taylor Tim likes to help people just starting out or struggling in their MS practices. He specializes in helping people turn around their companies and making them profitable. Links: www.timtaylorconsulting.com Facebook :-)

After a 20 year career as a commercial general contractor and 25 years as a small business consultant and IT provider, Bob Nitrio made two major decisions. The first was to move from California to Arizona for family purposes. The second was to move way from managed services and concentrate on his partnership with a software developer who had some amazing ideas for how mobile phones could be used by businesses and organizations. Bob Nitrio As a result, Bob now creates marketing resources that explain SmartConnect Apps by LogicTree It Solutions. As Bob say, "This incredible platform literally transforms mobility into productivity." The mobile apps created with this platform are designed to solve gaps in the way information is acquired and used by both clients and businesses. The evolution of the company's focus is an interesting story in itself, one with many business lessons. There are many businesses and organizations that don't know that they actually have a mobile workforce - their employees who own

I caught up with Terry Hedden from Marketopia for this podcast. Normally, I see Terry on the road, but we're going to miss each other for the next few months. AND he's got a big sales coaching event coming up while I'm down in Australia. So, it was good to catch up on the podcast. Terry started out as an IT service provider. He built and sold a 49 person MSP in 6 years. Now he runs Marketopia, the largest demand generation firm for MSPs. Marketopia provides outsourced marketing and outbound lead generation. As Terry says, they are most successful when an MSP lets them run the lead generation based on their proven process. In other words, when you try to do it differently, you are likely to be less successful. :-) This interview has a lot of detail on the services Marketopia offers (including some very good pricing information). In October, Marketopia is putting on a training event called 4U2Grow - see https://www.4u2grow.com/ for more information. The conference is October 8-11. Primary web si

Jay McBain is Forrester's Principal Analyst, Channels, Partnership, and Alliances. He's always fun to talk to. And get ready to listen to this one two or three times. Jay drops numbers all the time. So go get a pencil before you hit "play." You can connect with Jay at:  https://go.forrester.com/blogs/author/jay_mcbain/ Jay is one of the most visible thought leaders in the global technology channel. He was named to the Top 40 Under Forty by the Business Review as well as numerous channel media top influencer lists, he is often sought out for industry guidance and future trends. He has spent his 25 year career in various executive channel sales, marketing, and strategy roles within IBM, Lenovo, Autotask, and ChannelEyes. A few quick stats: Jay counts 54 Channel magazines across 200 countries 150 tradeshows A dozen associations Plus peer groups 80 LinkedIn groups 30 Facebook Groups and about 600,000 channel service companies overall The conversation covers a lot of ground. I promise you'll get a "bigger" pic

I caught up with Rayanne Buchianico from Sell My MSP (http://www.sellmymsp.com). She gave us the big update on their 2019 Refresh. It’s more than a web site update. They’ve got a new valuation tool and more. Rayanne Buchianico Rayanne owns ABC Solutions in Clearwater, FL. She help MSPs get their finances straightened in order to run their company most efficiently. As you can imagine, this includes some great skills that will help MSPs as they start looking at selling their companies. ABC Solutions is a public accounting firm in Clearwater, FL. They focus on helping MSPs with accounting and bookkeeping services. Rayanne created the very cool valuation tool you’ll find at sellmymsp.com. That tool is newly reconfigured to look at Gross Revenue, Gross Profit, or EBITDA prices. Rayanne discusses this a bit in the interview. We cover a lot of territory here, including both the buyers’ and the sellers’ perspectives. We also talk about the practical side of cleaning up your profit and loss statement so you’re ready t

I always see Mr. Tim Conkle on the road - as places like ChannelPro. Luckily, I got to catch up with him on the SMB Community Podcast. Tim Conkle - The 20 Tim holds over 30 years of entrepreneurial success in the Information Technology and Services sector. As a leading voice in the Managed IT Service Provider space, Tim is dedicated to developing simple, solid IT solutions for SMB clients and MSPs (Managed Service Providers) across the nation. His notoriously energetic nature, along with his deep-rooted passion for technology, has helped him forge solid customer relationships built on trust, dependability, and service. Tim currently serves as President & CEO of Roland Technology, President of the Board of Directors for Cytracom, and is a member of the Forbes Technology Council and Entrepreneurs' Organization (EO). As CEO of The 20, Conkle is the driving force behind a business revolutionizing the IT industry. By utilizing a proven multi-million dollar sales model and an execution framework that he

Dominica DeGrandis is Director of Digital Transformation at Tasktop, where she helps customers improve the flow of work across value streams. Responsible for introducing customers to flow-based aspects of digital transformation, she guides IT teams and business teams to learn and adopt new ways of working to improve performance. Dominica is the author of “Making Work Visible: Exposing Time Theft to Optimize Work & Flow.” She is a huge fan of using visual cues to reveal mutually critical information across organizations to inspire change and spur alignment. Dominica lives in Seattle, WA with her husband and extended family. Dominica DeGrandis Here we talk about metrics, work flow, and the great benefits of minimizing WIP – work in progress. We also talked about engaging managers in the discussion of work flow and metrics. DeGrandis is excellent at seeing how processes work and finding ways to help participants literally see how work flows through the system. She advocates using Kanban boards to create a vi

I think I met Jamison about 2006 at SMB Nation. Since then, he has bought a few companies, built a few companies, and sold a few companies. Even today he owns a few companies. He calls himself a serial entrepreneur, but I consider that a parallel entrepreneur. Personally, I think all small business owners should have at least two companies. But that's another story. Here we chat a bit about TimeZest, a calendaring add-on for ConnectWise. Then we move to EOS - the Entrepreneurial Operating System - as described by Gino Wickman in his book Traction. There are many, many books filled with advice for business owners. Jamison likes the EOS model because it is most easily applied to small business. In fact, as he says, it can be self-applied without a coach. But there are some obvious advantages to having a coach who can help you have those difficult meetings and keep things moving when you get stuck in the weeds. Jamison has been a "serial entrepreneur" for over 20 years. He has a wealth of experience i

I met Allen Edwards all the way back in April of this year. I’ve already seem him at events in two states. We even shared a beer (or two) in Albuquerque. Allen help IT Professionals create great processes. Allen Edwards began his I.T. career in 1994. He founded his first I.T. company in 2002, and in ten short years led his firm through a transition from break/fix to MSP, from custom ticketing to AutoTask before moving to ConnectWise Manage, and a final sale of the business. A sought-after MSP and Process expert, Allen helps Business Leaders and their teams while building meaningful, growth-centered relationships that support next level performance. Link: https://EurekaProcess.com Enjoy the video interview: Download Audio:

In 2008, Brooke Ferguson, MBA packed up her business consulting practice and moved it online. Her objective was simple: keep growing her business while she saw the world. Brooke spent a number of years traveling, while keeping Thailand as her “home base.” Eventually, she realized that she wanted to make beautiful Krabi, Thailand her home. She has since set up her business beachside, and helps others from around the world discover their own personal and business alignment. I don’t normally post photos this grand, but look at that landscape! Here we talk about Brooke’s newest book – The Levels. This is, basically, her approach to using the laws of the universe to understand our personal universe AND how we can use this understanding to influence our success. She uses the language of physics to describe our relationships, our business, and our general activities. Then she connects this to the world of self-awareness and even meditation. Best quote: “No one’s going to argue with the person who’s angry and wants

I caught up with my brother Manuel after he returned from a triumphant tour of Europe and the UK. He’s got some cool things going on the second half of the year, including a big Coaches Mastermind event at CompTIA’s ChannelCon. We talked about Manuel’s coaching and consulting, and then did a deep dive into a few topics. First up: Culture! How do you create culture on purpose? And what happens if you let it grow by itself? I love Manuel’s assessment that it has to grow from the top down . . . or else it will grow from the bottom up. Second: Manuel is organizing a “Coaches Mastermind” opportunity at ChannelCon – Free to attendees. This is a limited event due to the size of the room. First come, first served. To make sure you don’t miss it, sign up for Manuel’s newsletter here: https://manuelpalachuk.com/ Enjoy the video interview:

I always love catching up with Jeff Ponts from DataTel Solutions. If you attend a few conferences a year, you are likely to have seen Jeff somewhere. Jeffery Ponts is COO/Executive Vice President and founder of Datatel Solutions Inc. Datatel Solutions is an Integrated Communications Provider (ICP), and systems integrator focusing on marketing, delivering, and managing best-of-breed data and telecommunication products, services, and applications through the independent sales channel for small to medium size enterprises (SME). As Jeff says, his company does the "heavy lifting" for IT companies that want to resell telecom services. Datatel works with more than 500 agents and 4,700 end customers. In this podcast, we cover a bit about the past and a lot about the future of the telecom industry. Jeff gives some great information about the reality of 5G connectivity and SD-WAN. He makes an interesting point that 4G will be around for a LONG time because it's impractical to have millions of 5G antennae all

I caught up with my good friend Joshua Liberman for this SMB Community Podcast. Josh is a great community leader and the owner of Net Sciences in Albuquerque, NM. Joshua Liberman In this podcast, Josh walks us through the various elements they offer (and bundle) for their clients. I asked Josh to talk about this because it’s the basis for a presentation I’ve seen him make. Josh has worked on this offering for a long time – and sold a lot of these services over the last several years. Note, Josh relies on SonicWall and Datto for their key services. Since Josh brought this up, I asked him why brand names and vendors matter to him. The handout Josh mentions can be downloaded here: How We Secure Your Network. You can catch up with Josh at www.netsciences.com. Watch the interview: Listen to the Interview (mp3)

I interviewed Mas Malik from Virtiant.com for this SMB Community Podcast. Mas is the VP of Sales and Marketing. Mas Malik Virtiant provides “Disaster Recovery as a Service” – without the onsite BDR hardware. It is VMWare-centric and able to recreate your environment in the cloud, so “failover” to the cloud can happen without users needing to repoint IP addresses or make other changes. As they describe themselves, Virtiant is “An all-in-one software-defined platform built on a scalable architecture that resides on commodity hardware. Virtiant is the only on-premise solution available today that can replicate a company’s virtual environment and enable normal IT operations to run while the primary production environment suffers an outage and is being brought back online.” Find out more at: www.virtiant.com Watch the interview: Listen to the Interview (mp3)