The MSP Centrifuge, an emerging managed services peer group, has partnered with Service Leadership Inc., Paul Dippell’s well-regarded consulting firm for solutions providers and channel-centric vendors. Meanwhile, the market for MSP peer groups appears to be growing. In addition to MSP Centrifuge and HTG Peer Groups, it sounds like Stuart Selbst is preparing to launch virtual peer groups (online gatherings) for MSPs in the SMB market. Here’s the update.

First, the MSP Centrifuge-Service Leadership Index relationship. According to a press release:

At MSP-centric conferences over the past two years, I’ve sat in on a few business and financial sessions hosted by Dippell. I always learn something new about sales models, pricing models and compensation plans.

I’m less familiar with The MSP Centrifuge, which launched in 2010. The organization, led by Kevin Gibson and Todd Wahl, positions itself as an “application-centric peer group for Managed Service Providers of all sizes. The MSP Centrifuge is unique in the peer group arena because of the focus on the unification of remote monitoring and management (RMM) tools with Professional Services Automation (PSA) platforms.”

The More the Merrier?

Generally speaking, it’s good to see more education and peer sharing in the managed services market. But I also have to concede… the list of new consulting, educational and peer groups moving into the managed services market is getting pretty long.

The early advocates included MSPAlliance (an association that’s pushing towards cloud computing), MSP University and MSP Partners (acquired by CompTIA in 2009). More recent entrants include MSP Accelerate, MSP Leads and MSP TeleMarketing. Plus, MSP-centric software companies have launched user groups across North America, Europe and Australia. The best-know effort on that front comes from ConnectWise.

Next up, it sounds like Stuart Selbst is preparing to launch a virtual, online peer group for small MSPs (sub-$500,000 in revenues). Details of the effort may emerge in time for the CompTIA Annual Member Meeting (April 6-7, Chicago).

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