Pax8 Looks To Automation For Post-Pandemic Partner ‘Hypergrowth’

‘We have put almost all of our eggs in the Pax8 basket. We see them making tons of investments in exactly the areas that are where the vision of our company was going in terms of digital transformation,’ Pax8 Partner Zac Paulson tells CRN.

Pax8 is already laying the groundwork for its MSP partners to achieve hypergrowth as a post-pandemic business market looks to cloud solutions for the digital transformation that customers are demanding, chief product officer and channel chief Ryan Walsh said.

“That used to be a buzzword, but now it’s actually becoming tangible and real,” Walsh said. “The answer and the advice and guidance from partners who are really in that growth mode is that it is coming through automation. It’s the delivery of it. How do you create a seamless experience when you get into the delivery of the services that your customers may want to digitally transform their business?”

The born-in-the-cloud distributor is coming off a year of record growth, the ribbon-cutting of an office in the U.K., and the debut of the full-service Pax8 Pro. However, businesses are still struggling, with some tech companies in “survival mode,” which can prompt decisions that are not in the customer’s best interest.

“During these times it is not the time to talk and pitch and ask for more from customers. It’s time to listen to the business challenges that are popping up,” said Pax8 Chief Revenue Officer Nick Heddy.

Heddy and Walsh headlined the Pax8 panel titled “How Your 2021 Priorities Will Affect Your Post-Pandemic Hypergrowth” at The Channel Company’s virtual conference, XChange 2021. Walsh said one of the startling statistics they found in market research is that for every 2.5 customers an MSP on-boards, they lose one. Heddy said.

“You stop worrying about the customer. You start talking about, ‘How do I save money everywhere I can and not worry about the customer anymore?’ and that could be leading to some of those retention issues,” Heddy said.

Walsh said the answer to meet customer needs is not always found with more employees. He said automation leads 85 percent of the customer’s interactions with their providers, citing a Gartner report. Heddy called the shift to automation a change of mindset for many MSPs.

“Do I improve my customer experience through technology and automation, having a marketplace for a customer to go and get what they need when they need it without having to talk to support or a technician, or am I hiring more people to answer more phone calls?” Heddy said. “Is that fixing the problem at the root or is that causing more problems?”

Pax8 partner Zac Paulson, CEO of West Fargo, N.D.-based MSP TrueIT, said his business is betting big on automation coming out of the pandemic, calling it a “key component” of the digital transformation journey his customers are on. Greenwood Village, Colo.-based Pax8, he said, is the reason he can offer it.

“We have put almost all of our eggs in the Pax8 basket,” he said. “We see them making tons of investments in exactly the areas that are where the vision of our company was going in terms of digital transformation.”