There's an old saying in IT: "three strikes and you automate." Others claim, "don't do anything twice." So, if your tech team has been finding itself performing the same task repeatedly, there's probably a way to automate it. Smart IT helpdesk professionals are increasingly embracing this philosophy, just as the process automation business is expected to grow to more than $20 billion by 2026.
Automation has become an essential part of the MSP toolkit, enabling IT helpdesks to increase efficiency, reduce costs and help deliver a better customer experience.
The advent of machine learning and artificial intelligence has only increased the potential for automation within IT helpdesks, raising the bar on how complex a task can be. Nowadays, not only simple internal processes can be automated, but more complicated client-side service tasks can be too. Let's examine the benefits of automation for MSPs, how to implement some of these solutions on your IT helpdesk, and the most commonly automated processes.
Benefits of Automation For IT Helpdesks
Like any other service business, MSPs and IT helpdesks must ensure they provide the best customer service while achieving a healthy bottom line. Automation can help reach this goal in many ways.
• Reducing Costs: Automation can help MSPs reduce their costs significantly. Automating mundane IT helpdesk tasks and processes can free techs to focus on more important work. This reduces the need for extra staff, enabling MSPs to save money while providing excellent service.
• Increasing Efficiency: When processes are completed quickly and accurately, clients get results faster and with fewer errors. This increases customer satisfaction and the overall efficiency of your IT helpdesk operation.
• Improving The Customer Experience: With automation, customers can access support 24/7 without waiting for an employee or tech to respond. This makes it easier for customers to receive the help they need when they need it, leading to an improved customer experience and repeat business.
• Enhancing Security: Automated processes can also be used to improve security by proactively monitoring for threats and responding quickly with appropriate actions. This reduces the risk of data breaches and cyber attacks, keeping your MSP clients' systems safe and secure.
• Increasing Accuracy: By eliminating the potential for human error, automation can result in fewer costly mistakes.
• Satisfying Your Employees: With fewer mundane tasks to complete, employees can focus on more interesting and challenging work that is better aligned with their skills and interests. This leads to improved job satisfaction and employee retention.
It doesn't stop there. As artificial intelligence continues to evolve rapidly, MSPs can use it to provide more sophisticated and personalized services. For example, AI-driven analytics can allow them to glean insights from data that would otherwise be difficult to uncover. This can help them identify new opportunities or anticipate customer needs with greater accuracy.
Implementing Automation as an MSP
When considering automation, there are two distinct categories:
• Internal Automation: Automating the internal processes of your business, such as sales and marketing.
• Service Automation: Automating services for your clients, such as patching or provisioning.
These can have similar benefits but are usually done in different ways.
Internal automation is generally done using a combination of software and scripts. This can include services like Professional Services Automation (PSA) and other tools designed to streamline processes.
Service automation is typically done through custom scripting. Custom scripting requires more technical knowledge than internal automation, but it provides the most control over how tasks are automated and which tasks are automated first.
Third-party tools such as RMM (Remote Monitoring and Management) solutions provide a more comprehensive solution, allowing MSPs to quickly and easily deploy automation on their clients’ systems.
INTERNAL PROCESSES
No matter how good your client-facing services are, without efficient internal processes, your business will struggle to keep up. Automation is essential for any MSP that wants to maximize efficiency and reduce costs.
Let’s take a closer look at some of the internal tasks that can be automated.
SALES
One of the major areas affected by the rise of automation is sales. From the development of auto-dialers, which could solve customer outreach tasks, to the emergence of advanced AI-driven lead qualification solutions, automation is revolutionizing how MSPs approach sales.
With automated lead generation and qualification tools, MSPs can quickly identify potential customers who are likely to be interested in their services. This helps them save time on manual processes like searching for leads and allows them to focus more on closing deals with qualified prospects.
MARKETING
Marketing is another area where automation can be a huge help. Automated marketing systems allow MSPs to rapidly build and deploy campaigns that are personalized for their customers, helping them reach more potential customers with less effort.
For example, an MSP might use automated marketing tools to create customized email campaigns that are tailored to the interests of each customer. Additionally, they can track engagement metrics like open rates and click-throughs to measure the success of their campaigns and optimize them based on data.
ONBOARDING
A costly and time-consuming process for MSPs is onboarding new clients. Automation can help streamline this process by taking care of tasks like creating accounts, assigning resources, and setting up access rights.
Automated onboarding also allows for more consistent service delivery with fewer mistakes, ensuring that customers have the best possible experience from the first interaction. As technology advances even further, more complex onboarding tasks such as configuration and integration can be included in the automation process.
Up to 90% of companies lose customers during the digital onboarding process. While respondents to a recent study suggest human interaction is necessary, nearly a third say the biggest factor is that the process is too long. Nearly as many say there are too many manual steps, both problems that can be solved with automation.
ACCOUNTING
The accounting department can quickly turn into a nightmare as a company grows. Fortunately, there are invoicing and billing solutions available to streamline these processes. These solutions can automate tasks like invoicing, payroll processing and tracking, and expense management. This saves significant time for MSPs by eliminating the need to manually manage these tasks.
REPORTING
Reporting is an important part of every MSP’s business. Automation can help streamline the process, taking care of mundane tasks like data collection and analysis. Using advanced analytics tools, MSPs can quickly generate reports on customer usage patterns, service performance metrics, or other key indicators. This makes it easier to identify trends or potential issues that need attention so they can be addressed before they become problems.
More than that, automation can also be used to critically examine internal practices such as cost optimization or customer service.
Service Processes
On the other side of the coin are the services that an MSP offers to clients. Automating these tasks helps MSPs to reduce their workload and deliver better service while opening opportunities to scale and grow their business.
HELP DESK
Perhaps the most common area of automation for MSPs is their help desk solution. Automation can be used to reduce the workload on support staff by several means.
• Triaging: Automation can be used to triage incoming tickets, categorizing them based on the issue and assigning them to the appropriate staff member. This ensures that problems are addressed more quickly without overburdening any one employee.
• Routing: Automation can also be used to route tickets to the right team or department. This ensures that tickets are handled correctly and efficiently, reducing wait times for clients.
• Escalation: If an issue isn’t addressed quickly enough, automation solutions can help trigger alerts and escalate the ticket to a higher priority level if necessary.
• Remediation: Simple solutions, like emptying trash cans for disk space or rebooting computers, can be automated with scripts. This ensures that these tasks are done quickly and correctly without the need for manual intervention.
With the proper automation solutions in place, MSPs can quickly and efficiently manage their help desk tickets, freeing up staff to focus on more important tasks.
STATUS REPORTING
Instead of having staff perform manual checks and generate status reports on a client's website or infrastructure, automation can be used to quickly and accurately compile this information.
Automation solutions can check systems for uptime/downtime, disk space, memory usage, patch levels, security issues, and more. This data can then be compiled into easy-to-read reports that are sent on a regular schedule to clients.
Status reports are a great way for MSPs to demonstrate their value and keep clients informed about their systems. By automating this process, they can drastically reduce the time it takes to generate these reports while ensuring accuracy and consistency.
PATCH MANAGEMENT
When it comes to patch management, automation can be used to quickly and accurately identify systems that need patches, deploy the necessary updates, and verify that they were installed correctly. This ensures that clients’ systems are always up-to-date and secure without requiring manual intervention from MSP staff.
Automation solutions can also be used to alert MSPs when new patches become available or when there is a potential security vulnerability in a client’s system. This allows them to respond quickly and protect their clients from threats before any damage can be done. Data breaches are becoming increasingly common, so having a system in place to quickly detect and address vulnerabilities is essential for any MSP. Automation can make this process much more efficient, saving time and reducing the risk of a breach.
INCIDENT RESPONSE
Another service that can be automated is incident response. Automatic solutions can monitor systems for events or anomalies and alert MSPs when there is a potential issue. This allows them to quickly investigate the problem and take corrective action before it affects any of their clients' systems.
By automating incident response, MSPs are better able to protect their clients from downtime, data loss, and other issues. It also helps them to identify problems earlier on in the process, reducing the time it takes to resolve an issue significantly.
BACKUP MONITORING
Another common task in MSPs is monitoring backups. This can be time-consuming and labor-intensive, as it often requires manual checks to ensure that backups are running and successful.
Automation can help by checking systems for backup success/failure, alerting administrators when a backup fails or is incomplete, and automatically creating reports with the results of those checks.
DEVICE MANAGEMENT
Automation solutions can also be used to manage devices and deploy updates. This allows MSPs to quickly and accurately identify devices that need patches or updates, deploy them to the necessary systems, and verify that they have been installed correctly. Device management is essential for any organization with multiple systems spread across different locations. Automating this process ensures that all devices are securely managed without requiring manual intervention from MSP staff.
How AI Has Changed the Game
The addition of machine learning and artificial intelligence to automation solutions has significantly increased their capabilities. AI can be used to analyze data for patterns and detect potential issues before they occur, allowing MSPs to proactively address problems instead of waiting for them to happen.
It is that decision-making potential that is so interesting. AI is expected to start influencing foreign policy, medical treatment, and other processes that would have seemed impossible just a few years ago. As the battle with cybersecurity rages on, leveraging AI is one of the best weapons MSPs have in their arsenal.
Meanwhile, solutions that leverage natural language processing (NLP) can recognize what a customer is asking, provide an appropriate response, and even suggest alternative solutions if needed. Accessibility concerns are a thing of the past with solutions like these, allowing MSPs to provide fast and accurate customer support.
Final Thoughts
The possibilities are truly endless when it comes to AI and automation for MSPs. Automation can reduce the time it takes to complete tasks, improve accuracy, and free up staff to focus on other areas of the business.
With machine learning and artificial intelligence added into the mix, there is no limit to what an MSP can achieve with automation.
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