On The Record With Robert Cohen & Autotask's Bob Godgart 27 August, 2009 By Robert M. Cohen

Name: Bob Godgart Company: Autotask Corporation Title: CEO BIO: Since 1982, Bob has been an award winning software entrepreneur and businessman. Today, Autotask Corporation's CEO, Bob directs all investment and business strategy for the company. Last year, he became an elected member of CompTIA'sboard of directors and continues to serve as a champion growing and supporting global IT services businesses. Personal Favorites: Movie: I really like the older James Bond movies Book: Biz Book - Patrick Lencioni is my favorite author. Love the book Death by Meeting. Music Group: Beatles Song: Day Tripper Sports to play: I race cars - little cars, radio control cars at a national level, and I do it at varying capacities. I raced big cars for years and got into the business world and couldn't find the time to do it anymore. Both of my kids play soccer and I am very into participating and I coach. My kids are 18 and 14. I chaperoned a team in Italy last year - travelled all over playing soccer. I did like the coaching. It's just fun to be around the kids when they are passionate about things. Sport to watch: NFL Football, I really enjoy it Food: I like pasta Drink: Ice Tea. I am not a fruity guy CAR: I love all old muscle cars. Mustangs, Cameros and Firebirds. I've owned about 30 Cameros and Firebirds in my life time Super Hero: Captain America - red white and blue with the big A on his chest (like Autotask) Villain: The Joker. Heath Ledger was a great villain IT company: I have to remain neutral on this one IT CEO: I learned a lot and worked early on at GE and have enormous respect for Jack Welch but however, I read his book but I am not a MAC guy, not an APPLE guy, but I respect that company's ability to always be innovative and unique. That was pretty cool. Huge level of respect. I don't own a mac, but we own a handful of ipods Gizmo: Flip Video Family: Boating. I take my kids tubing Other: Sitting on the porch up at the lake

Robert: Bob, where does Autotask fit into the managed services business?

Bob: Autotask is a hosted IT service business management platform. It gives IT service professionals everything they need to manage their people, tasks, service tickets, projects, time and costs - all through the web browser from any PC connected to the internet. We are at the heart of the VAR's business, giving them the tools to manage service level agreements, implement new managed services, and track the work being done around the new installations. It also allows VARs to manage all of the service and support, after they install a new IT solution.

We offer a very strong contracts module that manages profitability and quality through an account centric system. Autotask's automated workflow protocol also allow MSPs to set their own workflow rules to manage internal staff and external contractors, as well as better automate the administrative and financial operations of their business.

Robert: What major opportunities do you see for VARs?

Bob: Looking beyond the technological stuff, the opportunity for the VARs is to leverage managed services as a way to position themselves as a strategic partner to their clients, as their trusted technology advisor. Think of the '70s with the mainframes, the '80s with PCs, the '90s with the Internet, and now the 2000s with networks and managed services. VARs have always had a place in this evolution and the ones who have adopted a managed services model are in a prime position to take advantage of the next incarnation.

I think cloud computing will be an enormous opportunity. I asked during my keynote presentation: If your customers go into the cloud will you still have a job? My answer to the audience was: yes, and I think it will be a better job. It will be exciting to move the customers into that next generation. The apps will all run up in the cloud. The VARs who figure out how to leverage the cloud from the infrastructure side in their own business, and the support side within their customers' businesses - will have all sorts of new solutions that they will be able to deliver.

Robert: How will they deliver these solutions?

Bob: As both technology advisor and broker . . . and maybe even technology developer and provider. As advisor, they'll help their clients strike the best balance between business need, costs and technology applications. We're positioning Autotask to be the Cloud Control Center, managing and billing for all technology applications and solutions built in a cloud. Innovations like this will be really important. Autotask can serve as the one place where all the technology applications are provisioned and reported.

Robert: If you had to look at the whole managed services business, what did it give to the Vars? Why is it so important?

Bob: It gave VARs a new business model, moving them off a project-based business cycle into more predictable, recurring revenue. If VARs can figure out how to build out their managed services and fund it while they're building it -- that's the key. We believe the cloud strategy is a great way to get into managed services. It's a low-cost, low-risk way of doing this. That's why we introduced our own cloud based solution - called Taskfire - which our customers can offer as a managed service to their clients. There's no investment required. They just sell it, provision it, bundle it with other services, and bill it.

Robert: I think Managed Services is the most significant thing to happen to the channel in years. It allows them to charge for the value (services) they provide. There's a business model in there: they can build a real business around it that allows them to charge for what they do and get paid what they are worth.

Bob: And they can scale it. With tools like Autotask, they can easily capture the information and bill it.

Robert: This gives VARs so much more freedom. They can actually have a social life without running out at the drop of a dime to service a customer.

Bob: Another opportunity is to build a strong ecosystem. Service providers can't do it alone. They need to be the one-stop shop and trusted advisor. They need to surround themselves with others who have specialties to fill in the holes.

Our platform allows them to outsource and manage the work being done by others - it's a universal tool. You can outsource to a partner who does work for you all the time, or to an entire network.

Because the Autotask platform exists in the cloud, our customers can use it to create their own business management networks, allowing them to collaborate in real time with three audiences: 1) the partners they work with; 2) any service network like IMSN or ONForce; and 3) their client's internal IT staffs. This latter relationship is managed through the Taskfire product I mentioned earlier. It's essentially a hosted task management for the client that is tethered to the service provider's Autotask platform, which gives the VAR complete visibility into their client's internal service requirements and allows them to be an even more valuable partner.

Robert: Who sets rules of engagement?

Bob: VARs. We don't get involved. We do offer options to put the rules into a monetary form and track activities against them, as well as profitability.

Robert: Does it give them an option to negotiate?

Bob: Yes. The VARs can call the shots in any way they need to in order to manage their business, Autotask just allows them to manage it better.

Robert: If you look at the typical VAR - three years from now - what would that VAR org look like compared to today?

Bob: Good question. There's so much change going on right now, I'd say the VARs of tomorrow will become the clearing house for many managed services. They will spend less time on the road. We are already seeing VARs that have a very specialized business and surround themselves with other VARs who can fill in the holes. It is a great model!

Robert: Lots of VARs say they don't know how to bill for managed services? Can you go in and help them understand what they can bill?

Bob: Absolutely. We train them on how to use the product, track what they do and we offer a Professional Services training team who can lend insight on the best ways to operate and manage their business. Our customers find that they are 15% more profitable on billable time with our product, on average. We track the total cost of ownership and allow MSPs to deliver a true profitability report. It allows them to see where they are profitable and where they are losing money & and they can dig in to find out why? If an MSP needs more training, there are lots of options. Having a tool like this is paramount to profitability.

Some MSPs do their own billings, others use Autotask. It's kind of a chicken and egg here, but the guys that get in trouble are the ones that are creative and have a billing model for each customer. You want to standardize all your business processes, so they are repeatable.

Robert: And this brings us back to helping the VAR/MSP make money!!!

Robert Cohen, a passionate and enthusiastic channel advocate, is the founder of the ChannelLine Advisory Council as well as president and business editor of Integrated mar.com, publishers of Channel Advisor, eChannelLine and ConnectIT. Since 1980 he has worked with 350 IT vendors, distributors and resellers in developing and implementing strategic go-to-market programs, using a variety of direct, channel and hybrid models. Integrated mar.com, in conjunction with Robert has created the Trusted Business Advisor program. Robert can be reached at 1-800-465-2059 or by email at rcohen@integratedmar.com.


Previous Trusted Business Advisor articles by this author:
08/27/09 Solving the business dilemma for That Computer Guy
08/27/09 On The Record With Robert Cohen & Ingram Micro's Justin Crotty
08/14/09 On The Record With Robert Cohen & Cisco's Dave O'Callaghan
08/14/09 Keeping the IT industry in touch via social marketing
08/14/09 On The Record With Robert Cohen & Westcon's Anthony Daley
07/30/09 On The Record With Robert Cohen & N-Able Technologies'Gavin Garbutt
07/30/09 On The Record With Robert Cohen & Dell's Greg Davis
07/23/09 On The Record With Robert Cohen & McAfee's New VP of Channel Operations Fernando Quintero
07/23/09 On The Record With Robert Cohen & D&H's Co-President, Dan Schwab
07/08/09 On The Record With Robert Cohen & Tech Data's Joseph Quaglia
07/08/09 On The Record With Robert Cohen & CSG Openline's CEO Jay Leon
06/25/09 On The Record With Robert Cohen & Synnex' Bob Stegner
06/25/09 On The Record With Robert Cohen & Hewlett Packard's Tom LaRocca
06/11/09 On The Record With Robert Cohen and Level Platform's CEO Peter Sandiford
06/10/09 On The Record With Robert Cohen and Level Platform's CEO Peter Sandiford
05/21/09 On The Record With Robert Cohen & CompTIA's New Head: Todd Thibodeaux
05/21/09 Grassroots marketing for those 'Computer Guys' - Part 6
05/21/09 On-The-Record with Robert Cohen & Keith Bradley, President Ingram Micro North America
05/15/09 On-The-Record With Robert Cohen & Gary Gillam, Xerox's VP, North American Resellers, Channel Operations
05/15/09 On-The-Record: Robert Cohen with Synnex Canada CEO Jim Estill
04/24/09 Twitterdee, Twitterdo, Part 1 of 2
04/15/09 On-The-Record with Arlin Sorensen
03/25/09 How vendors should partner with Those Computer Guys - Part V
03/25/09 The Trusted Business Advisor/Trusted Business Partner Code of Ethics
03/18/09 8 reasons why you need "That Guy" to penetrate the SMB -Part IV
03/11/09 Part III: Vendors Wanting To Penetrate The SMB market Need That "TBA Computer Guy".
03/04/09 That "Computer Guy" is what we call a Trusted Business Advisor (Part II)
02/25/09 Reaching SMBs through their 'Computer Guy' (Part I)
02/18/09 TBA: The program built with you & for you!!!
02/18/09 Without a code of ethics, a professional industry isn't 'professional'




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