By prioritizing key requirements like multi-cloud design, MSP-optimized capabilities, robust governance/compliance, cost visibility, operational efficiency, and integration support, you can find the right solution.
The right CMP Can Make All the Difference
As an managed service provider (MSP), your clients rely on you to ensure their cloud environments are secure, cost-optimized, and operating reliably. Selecting the right cloud management platform is crucial for delivering on those responsibilities efficiently and profitably. With so many solutions on the market, how can you identify the best fit for your MSP business?
Multi-Cloud
First and foremost, you need a platform capable of spanning multiple cloud environments. These days, most organizations utilize a mix of public and private clouds, along with SaaS and legacy on-premises systems. A siloed tool that only works with a single provider hamstrings your ability to manage a customer’s full hybrid cloud architecture. Prioritize vendors offering a unified experience across AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, VMware, and other common platforms.
Customer-Centric
Secondly, you want a solution built with MSPs in mind. The right cloud management platform gives you the multi-tenant capabilities necessary to segregate and securely manage each customer’s cloud resources, users, permissions, and billing. This allows you to grow your client base without bureaucratic headaches. Features like role-based access controls, custom reporting for each client, and easily provisioned isolated environments are essential.
Governance and Compliance
Next, evaluate the depth of governance and compliance features. The platform should empower you to consistently enforce cloud operational policies and security best practices across customers. This includes policy guardrails that automatically remediate misconfigurations, detailed auditing capabilities for SOC reports, and regulatory compliance packs aligned with commonly applied frameworks. A robust approval workflow engine for change requests is also valuable.
Cost Optimization
Cloud cost management should be a core strength as you aim to optimize spend for customers. The platform should offer multi-cloud cost monitoring, analytics for identifying waste, and showback/chargeback functionality to accurately bill cloud usage. Risk assessment tools that weigh factors like poor architecture practices are also beneficial for long-term financial planning.
Streamlined Operations
Moreover, the platform needs to facilitate efficient daily cloud operations. Look for intuitive dashboards, topology visualizations, unified search across cloud data, authenticated scanning for vulnerabilities/patches, and out-of-the-box automation for provisioning and remediation. These capabilities allow your team to be more productive versus juggling disparate tools.
Easy Integration
Lastly, strong out-of-the-box integration support is a must for incorporating the cloud management platform into your existing IT workflows and toolchains. Most MSPs have an ecosystem of solutions for managed security, backup/DR, ITSM, RMM, and more that need to share context for centralized management. A cloud platform with broad integration support via APIs, scripts, or pre-built connectors accelerates adoption.
In evaluating cloud management platforms for your MSP business, the options can seem overwhelming. However, by prioritizing key requirements like multi-cloud design, MSP-optimized capabilities, robust governance/compliance, cost visibility, operational efficiency, and integration support, you can find the right solution. A strategic platform investment positions your MSP to capitalize on cloud’s momentum while delivering customers the security, performance, and financial accountability they demand.
