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Welcome to Episode 254 of the MSP Marketing Podcast with me, Paul Green. This week…

• 9 MSP marketing ideas to break into a new vertical: One of the easiest ways to grow your MSP is to target a vertical. Marketing to a vertical is so much easier than marketing to a general audience.


• How to stand out at networking meetings: To get the most from networking meetings you have to stand out but in the right way, in the most authentic way. And I’m going to tell you exactly how to do that.


• How to find another MSP for sale, and start a conversation: One of the fastest ways to scale a business is to acquire competitors and absorb their clients into your business. My guest, Jonathan Jay, shares his expertise on this subject.


• Paul’s Personal Peer Group: Fiona, from an MSP in New Hampshire, wants to know more about exit intent popups – do you use these on your website yet?

9 MSP marketing ideas to break into a new vertical

One of the easiest ways to grow your MSP is to target a vertical. Marketing to a vertical is so much easier than marketing to a general audience because you know exactly who you are marketing to, exactly where they are, exactly what their problems are, and how you can solve those problems. So you can make your marketing message sound so much more relevant to them. A lawyer, for example, is much more likely to listen to you if you are using the word lawyer than if you are just talking about business owners.

Let me give you nine, rapid fire marketing ideas to break into a new vertical. So there are many benefits of marketing to a vertical. You can do it alongside your general business, and once you’ve picked a vertical, there are a number of actions that you should take to get your marketing properly set up.

Here are the first nine actions that I recommend, in the order that you should do them.

Number one: Build a website just for that vertical. Not just a new page on your existing site, do it properly. Put together a four to five page website just for that vertical. The goal is to appear to be a true specialist to your target prospects, and a proper website is a basic MSP marketing fundamental.

Number two: Set up a vertical specific LinkedIn or Facebook, depending which platform most decision makers in your vertical use.

Number three: Start posting regular content so that you have a presence. Make sure to put the name of the vertical into the headline and/or the intro paragraph. Now, sometimes making content seem relevant to a vertical is as simple as mentioning that vertical and also look for how they refer to themselves and their business. So for example, accountants have a practice, not a business.

Number four: Start networking and meet as many decision makers as you can. Look for relevant vertical business shows or other events that you can attend, as nothing beats pressing the flesh when you’re just getting started in a vertical. I promise you’ll have a marketing revelation at every event.

Number five: Build your email list. It’s easy to get started with a vertical because you can just buy targeted data. You can also scrape Google or get a virtual assistant to just go through Google searches and make a database up for you.

Number six: Get your marketing machine working, generating prospects that you can speak to doing all the things we’ve just been talking about, and then pick up the phone and call them. Phone calls will always get you to a new client faster.

Number seven: Once you have a vertical client, turn them into a case study or a testimonial as quickly as you can, and this will give others the faith to buy from you.

Number eight: Look for other forums where your vertical decision makers hang out. Do they have Facebook groups, LinkedIn groups, chat forums… can you become a member of these? Best to do this properly and above board rather than try to sneak in. And don’t try to sell; add value by answering relevant questions. Just make sure there is a link to your vertical website in your profile.

And then finally number nine: Get to know the movers and shakers in your vertical associations. You are ultimately serving the same people, so be persistent in getting to know them, but do play a long game. The key question to ask is – what do these influencers want or need and how can I help them get it? If you help them, of course at some point they’re going to help you.

How to stand out at networking meetings

Let’s talk about networking. And I don’t mean the enjoyable networking with cables and that lovely sound it makes when the plug goes into the socket, that *bink*. No, I mean the networking that’s less enjoyable where you’re getting up early, overpaying for an unhealthy breakfast and getting stuck in a corner, being bored by strangers in order to get the most from the networking meetings that you go to. You have to stand out but in the right way, in the most authentic way. And I’m going to tell you exactly how to do that.

Now I haven’t been networking for a while, but I did once go to a networking meeting where there was a guy dressed in a bright gold, lamé jacket so that he could stand out. I’m not kidding at all. No one took him at all seriously because he just looked like an out of work magician.

The best way to stand out at a networking meeting is not to wear a gold, sparkling jacket – it’s to be INTERESTED, not INTERESTING.

Essentially what I mean is you shouldn’t try to stand out by standing out, by going, woo-hoo, look at me.

Instead, work the room. Make every person feel like they are the most important person there. Give them your full attention with no distractions. Have a poker face if they’re boring, and just ask them lots of open questions about their favourite subject, which is of course, themselves and their business. If they ask any questions back about yours, just give them a one line answer and then flip it around and ask another open question.

Here’s the thing about talking to relative strangers. The less you talk about you, the more fascinating you will be to them. I promise you that’s true. After 10 minutes or so, when you are kind of in that zone where you’re starting to get bored of each other, suggest that you swap business cards and say, Hey, we should go meet some other people, or you and I are going to be chatting all day, as you’re such a fascinating person. Maybe that last line doesn’t quite sound so authentic, but just make sure that the business card you give them has your most recent photo on it, because in reality that’s all they’re going to remember about you, your face. They’ll remember your face, they’ll remember how your face made them feel, and they’ll keep your card. The ideal thing then is, once they’ve got your card, they’re pulling it out three or four weeks later and they’re looking at it like, oh, I remember that person, they were fascinating. And of course, your business card says exactly what you do. Tell me, what’s your advice to really max out a networking event?

How to find another MSP for sale, and start a conversation

Featured guest: Jonathan Jay fell into mergers and acquisitions (M&A) by accident in 1999 with the sale of his publishing business. Fast forward a few years and he’d bought out a large competitor in another sector, merged it with his existing business, and sold it on to a London-based private equity firm in 2007 in a life-changing deal.

Jonathan bought a group of insolvent businesses from a Private Equity firm for £1, turned them around, and sold them 11 months later for £1.25m, and during the pandemic he bought another 48 businesses.

After being asked to share his business buying knowledge, Jonathan founded The Dealmaker’s Academy in 2016.  Since then, Dealmakers.co.uk has become the leading M&A educator in the UK, and Jonathan has taught more than 13,500 people worldwide how to buy their first business.

There are very few shortcuts to growing your business, but one of them is to acquire another MSP. In a single transaction, you can double your revenue and down the line dramatically increase your profits as well. But of course, doing this kind of acquisition is not easy. Never mind the hassles of integrating two businesses. Most MSPs fail at the very first hurdle, which is how to know which MSPs could be for sale and how to start a conversation about that.

My guest has bought and sold so many businesses, he’s going to make it really easy for you. Today’s guest will tell you how to find another MSP for sale and start a conversation about acquiring them.

Hi, I’m Jonathan Jay from Dealmakers.co.uk

And thanks so much for coming back onto the podcast. Jonathan, I think it’s about to get on for three, maybe four years since you were last on. And I know that you’ve been very busy. You’ve been teaching thousands of business owners around the world, including many MSPs, how to find and buy a competitor or another MSP and add it into their own business. And we’re going to talk about exactly that on this interview.

Now, before we jump into that, and I know everyone who’s thinking of buying an MSP always has the same questions which you’re going to answer for us. First of all, tell us a little bit about you. So what’s your background and how did you get into buying and selling businesses?