On The Air: Acapella Technologies On Adapting To COVID-19 And Ongoing Best Practices

Adapting To COVID-19 And Ongoing Best Practices

While the MSP community was worried about how the pandemic would affect their business, there hasn’t been a considerable effect in the end. If you’re like Acapella Technologies, you may have prepared for the worst, but found the pandemic to be less damaging than expected.

“We’ve been very, very fortunate, we’ve suffered no financial ramifications,” says Matt Mercier, Acapella Technologies. “Our company is virtual as it stands, so we’re accustomed to working from home. We have been virtually unaffected by the COVID situation.”

Gain some insight into the process, and best practices for MSPs in general, all explored in the latest episode of On The Air’s MSP show with Stuart Crawford, featuring Acapella Technologies’ very own Matt Mercier:

While the work-from-home transition was certainly busy for MSPs, once they adapted to remote work, things quickly became manageable again.

“Going into March, things were pretty frantic,” says Matt. “We were running around pretty hard. But now, everyone’s still busy, but it’s much more relaxed.”

Matt and Stuart talked further about their approaches to marketing and networking with potential clients, and touched on a few key points:

• Farming, Not Hunting: Too many people in the business world think of themselves as hunters, stalking, and pouncing on the next potential lead. Matt has a different approach. “You have to be a farmer and not a hunter,” says Matt. “A hunter will go out for a day, and if he hasn’t come back with a couple of appointments, then he’s failed. For me, I go to a couple of chamber of commerce events, and if I’ve met a half-dozen people that may be great referral sources, I’ve had a good outing.”
• Don’t Rely On Business Cards: You don’t want to be the guy covering the room with their business cards, putting one in everyone’s hand. That’s a very surface-level way of making connections in your business community. “It’s all about relationships, right?” says Matt. “You walk into a room, and if you’ve been successful in your networking, the first thing you have to do is say hello to the first half dozen people you come across. It’s a very relationship-oriented thing; I don’t hand out a lot of business cards.”
• Referrals, Not Leads: The business world, and networking in general, are not what they were five, ten or twenty years ago. You can’t approach networking the same way the last generation did. “We don’t tout the fact that we’re “referral only”, but we don’t do any traditional advertising,” says Matt. “All of the business that comes to us, with very few exceptions, is the result of someone that knows someone and introduces us to them.”

Even as the COVID-19 pandemic appears to be slowly drawing to a close, it’s important to note that the business will likely never be the same as it was before.

“Things will never go back to fully normal, but businesses that can adapt will be fine,” says Matt. “Some businesses will perish, some will flourish – those that can change with the times will make it.”

Whether it’s in how your MSP has approached the COVID-19 pandemic, or how you choose to network and market at your next Chamber Of Commerce event, you need to be ready to adapt. Change is the only constant – don’t get stuck in your ways, or you’ll be left behind.

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