Many managed service providers (MSPs) often struggle with communicating the value of an actual business continuity and disaster recovery (BCDR) solution to their small-business clients and prospects.

Why is that? For starters, many business owners don’t understand how a BCDR solution differs from traditional backup. More cost-conscious business owners may find it difficult to justify spending an additional amount for data protection than they have in previous years, particularly when they’ve never suffered any severe data loss or outages.

To nail the BCDR pitch, MSPs must take the time to nurture their customers and prospects with educational content. This article shares three perspectives that will help your clients understand the benefits of a fully managed BCDR solution over traditional backup products.

Explaining the Cost of Downtime 

A few hours of downtime, never mind days or weeks, can be devastating for a business. When a company is down, customers cannot make purchases or access account information, employees can’t work, and the lost revenue adds up quickly. In 2019 we asked 1,400 MSPs we partner with worldwide to shed some light on the cost of downtime as a result of cybersecurity attacks. The survey revealed that downtime costs went up by 200% year-over-year, increasing from $46,800 in 2018 to $141,000 in 2019. These are figures no company can afford.

Excellent news: BCDR solutions eliminate downtime. Companies that make BCDR implementation a priority are better protected. In fact, 92% of MSPs surveyed reported that clients with BCDR solutions in place are less likely to experience significant downtime during a ransomware attack. Furthermore, our survey revealed four in five MSPs indicate that victimized clients with BCDR in place recovered from the attack in 24 hours or less.

Meet with your client or prospect and determine the amount of downtime the company currently faces, what downtime would be in the event of a cybersecurity attack and what the cost of downtime could potentially be. In fact, many MSPs approach BCDR conversations with their customers as if they were talking about business insurance. For just pennies a day, a BCDR investment makes a lot of sense when you compare it to the average cost of a downtime event. This conversation provides a clearer picture of the benefit that BCDR provides.

Discussing Your Client’s Backup and Storage Needs 

Your client needs to think about their recovery point objective or RPO. Their RPO refers to the amount of data that their company stands to lose between backups. Here’s a potential scenario to work through with them. Imagine they created 10 GB of new data in a day, and a pipe burst, flooding a server at 4 p.m. If the previous backup occurred at 6 p.m the night before, that 10 GB of data is lost forever. That’s why today’s businesses have a standard practice of taking periodic data backups throughout the day. Next, look at their current backup solution and analyze if that is genuinely protecting their data, both in the cloud and on-premise. If not, talk about what weaknesses may exist and how you can help shore up their data’s safety.

With this information, you’ll be able to discuss the value of their data and share with your prospect the importance of a constant, all-encompassing continuity solution. If a business owner can put a dollar value on what they stand to lose, it’s much easier to explain a BCDR solution’s value.

Bringing Brand Reputation to the Equation 

Downtime can also have a severe impact on a company’s reputation, which is an important concept to communicate. One way to illustrate this to potential customers is to get them to think about how their customers would react if they were unable to serve them for an extended period—say, an entire day. Consider the nature of the business and tailor the message accordingly. If you have a client that left another IT service provider because they couldn’t recover IT operations quickly, you might build their story into your pitch. Security breaches can harm a business’s reputation, particularly if they are in an industry that involves sensitive customer data. While a BCDR solution isn’t exactly a security tool, it allows users to recover from a security breach quickly and, therefore, potentially strengthens their reputation in the service industry.

Selling the value of BCDR to your clients will result in a more secure business and higher recurring revenue numbers for you. Learn more about the benefits of Datto’s Unified Continuity solution and how it can help you earn more revenue by registering for Datto’s upcoming MSP Tech Day virtual event.

Christian Kane is Product Marketing Manager, Continuity.

This guest blog is part of a Channel Futures sponsorship.