MSPmentor Launches Sister Site: Talkin’ Cloud

Nine Lives Media Inc., parent of MSPmentor, today launched Talkin’ Cloud — the first video blog and forum for cloud computing in the IT channel. Once you read the official news release you’ll understand how Talkin’ Cloud complements our existing brands (MSPmentor and The VAR Guy). Here are some quick thoughts on the topic.

When we launched Nine Lives Media Inc. in January 2008 we had two clear goals:

• Define emerging IT media markets
• Disrupt established IT media markets

All of our sites achieve those goals:

• Talkin’ Cloud is the first video blog, online forum and community where VARs and MSPs can sort out their cloud computing strategies.
• MSPmentor is the ultimate guide to managed services and the world’s leading blog for MSPs.
• The VAR Guy tracks what’s next in the IT channel, and has emerged as the world’s leading IT channel blog.
• Our Tweet sites — MSPtweet and VARtweet — track the loudest third-party voices in managed services and the IT channel.

Here Comes Talkin’ Cloud

We certainly brainstormed a few ideas before launching Talkin’ Cloud…

Close Cousins

Think of The VAR Guy, MSPmentor and Talkin’ Cloud as close cousins. Sure, they are related — but they are highly targeted, unique sites.

• The VAR Guy tracks what’s next in the IT channel. Yes, that includes managed services and cloud coverage. But there’s a whole lot more on The VAR Guy’s agenda… including virtualization, open source, unified communications, mobile, wireless, security, storage, distribution… and the list goes on.
• MSPmentor tracks everything you need to know about managed services, remote monitoring of customer networks, and recurring revenue models. Sure, it offers some cloud computing coverage. But cloud and managed services are not one in the same. Managed services include remote monitoring of customer networks and customer devices, while cloud is more fixated on new application distribution models.
• Talkin’ Cloud covers everything you need to know about emerging cloud partner programs for VARs, MSPs and even cloud services providers (CSPs). We’ll explore hybrid cloud services as well.

We know there’s some overlap on each site. But check each destination daily and you’ll see how we segment the market more clearly.

Continued Investments

This has been a great year for Nine Lives Media Inc. Traffic on MSPmentor and The VAR Guy is up more than 50 percent and 60 percent, respectively, so far in 2010 vs. the same period in 2009. So we’re continuing to build and expand both MSPmentor and The VAR Guy, even as we launch Talkin’ Cloud.

Most notably, Charlene O’Hanlon joins us as contributing senior editor, managing day-to-day blogs for The VAR Guy and MSPmentor. Our editorial director, Joe Panettieri, continues to drive our content strategy across all brands. We expect to announce some more staff expansion over the next few weeks.

Thank You

In the meantime, we’d like to thank you for reading MSPmentor and The VAR Guy. And we invite you to visit Talkin’ Cloud, where the conversation is just getting started.