Research Firm Confirms Significant Revenue Increases for Integrators Who Offer The Planet’s Hosted Microsoft SBS Solution

December 11, 2007; 03:19 AM

HOUSTON – The Planet, the world’s largest privately held dedicated hosting company, today published a new white paper that details wide-ranging economic benefits and business value for system integrators (SI’s) and their SMB customers who use the company’s Microsoft SBS solution.  More specifically, the paper clearly outlines how integrators who partner with The Planet can increase their profits by more than 20 percent per customer, without incurring upfront costs.

The research -- titled “The Planet’s Hosted Microsoft SBS Service: Delivers More Customers, Revenue and Profits to System Integrators” – was conducted by analyst Michael Suby with Frost & Sullivan’s Stratecast Partners. 

The Planet offers a complete enterprise-class “IT portfolio-in-a-box” that includes Microsoft Exchange Server, Microsoft Outlook®, Microsoft Office SharePoint® Server and Microsoft SQL Server™, bundled with anti-virus and spam protection, and a comprehensive data backup solution.  

“System integrators are the trusted advisors for their customers, and they are tasked with providing IT solutions that enable their clients to focus on running their businesses,” said Carl Meadows, senior product manager with The Planet.  “By partnering with The Planet, system integrators can expand their product portfolios.  They can offer many of the same services they provide on-site, all hosted in our world-class datacenters.  This allows SI’s to move toward a richer, service-based model versus one based expressly on hardware purchases and billable hours.  Even better, their clients gain access to enterprise-class service without the burden of having to manage or finance the infrastructure.”

About the Microsoft SBS Hosted Solution

In his evaluation, Suby notes that integrators can not only make more money per customer, the support time per customer is reduced, which enables them to increase their customer engagement ratio.  The service provides a broad range of benefits for SI’s interested in offering their clients a hosted solution from a world-class provider:

• Increases top-line revenues and profit:  With no capital investments, SI’s can increase their profit by more than 20 percent per customer, compared with traditional on-site time and materials deployments.
  
• Boosts staff productivity:  No longer is it necessary to waste time ordering server hardware, configuring systems, scheduling customer visits, driving to the customer’s site to install a server or refining configurations.  Using The Planet’s Hosted Microsoft SBS service, SI’s gain an on-demand, at-your-desk operation that consumes less than one week. 
  
• Eliminates server disruptions:  The Planet’s six world-class data centers provide redundant power sources and Internet connections that are designed to withstand extreme weather conditions.  Servers are monitored and secured 7x24x365, which allows SI’s peace of mind so they can focus on more critical, business-building activities.
  
• Enables deeper customer relationships:  The dependability and value of The Planet’s Hosted Microsoft SBS service deepens the professional relationships between SI’s and their customers, a financial benefit that creates longer-term relationships and adds to the trusted-advisor role. 
  
• Retain complete client ownership: Relationships are hard won and valuable, which The Planet values and understands.  SI’s retain the primary point of contact for their customers, while The Planet supports the SI customer and his staff. 
  

According to Suby, “if customers have their SBS servers hosted in a world-class data center, such as The Planet’s, they can expect to experience significantly higher service levels compared with on-site hosting.  This represents a significant increase in value.  For IT integrators who are their clients’ trusted advisors, this high-demand solution is more affordable and enables greater profitability.  A partnership with The Planet is worthwhile.”

To download the white paper, please visit The Planet Web site and register:  http://www.theplanet.com/forms/register.asp?type=MSSBS2_WP&utm_campaign=SBSWPRB120307
           
About The Planet

The Planet is the leading provider of On Demand IT Infrastructure solutions, hosting more than 22,000 small- and medium-size businesses and 3.1 million Web sites worldwide.  By offering the best choice of servers, software tools and world-class support, backed by state-of-the-art facilities and unmatched network connectivity, The Planet helps turn information technology into a powerful competitive advantage that enables customers to successfully grow their businesses.  For additional information, visit http://www.theplanet.com/.