Clive Longbottom

All posts by Clive Longbottom

Clive Longbottom is a UK-based independent commentator on the impact of technology on organizations and was a co-founder and service director at Quocirca. He has also been an ITC industry analyst for more than 20 years.

OK – you’re an MSP. Now what?

OK – you’re an MSP. Now what?

MSPs have varied prospect bases. Some focus on servicing large enterprises where the effective decision maker is a technical person or group. But for the many MSPs that target small and medium enterprises (SMEs), there is often a completely different...

/ January 16, 2019 / 2 Comments
Email? That’s free, surely?

Email? That’s free, surely?

The task of hosting and selling email is often regarded as a thankless one. With the likes of Google mail offered as a free service and many hosting companies providing free (or massively discounted) email accounts with the hosted domain...

/ December 10, 2018
Overcoming obstacles with selling security

Overcoming obstacles with selling security

From “Insecure platforms are a threat to your business!” and “There are millions of malicious people trying to break into your systems!” to “State-sponsored security attacks are a threat to you!”, the “Chicken Little” approaches to selling security never seem...

/ November 19, 2018 / 2 Comments
Clive Longbottom: Helping customers avoid their biggest threat

Clive Longbottom: Helping customers avoid their biggest threat

In talking to customers, you probably find that their biggest concern is how they can protect themselves from external malicious activity.  However, many times the biggest threat to their business is the behaviour of their own employees. The troubling behaviour...

/ October 29, 2018
Clive Longbottom: When selling MSP services is like selling a house

Clive Longbottom: When selling MSP services is like selling a house

I’ll start with a bold statement: being an MSP salesperson is like being a real estate agent. Hold on – don’t stop reading: there is a reason for such a statement. Any real estate agent will tell you what a...

/ September 20, 2018
data rights management
Clive Longbottom: MSPs need to think beyond physical security

Clive Longbottom: MSPs need to think beyond physical security

As an MSP, you probably spend a lot of time making sure that your platform is secure — using long, complex passwords and (hopefully) two-factor authentication wherever possible; specifically named superuser accounts, rather than general shared sysadmin ones; heuristic-based anti-malware...

/ August 15, 2018
GDPR compliant
GDPR: Surely everyone has dealt with it by now … right?

GDPR: Surely everyone has dealt with it by now … right?

The European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation is a regulation in EU law stipulating how organisations must deal with data to ensure that individuals are protected, and that individuals can more easily determine what data an organisation holds about them. It became...

/ July 11, 2018