Kaspersky shares a new report detailing the needs, priorities and goals of Managed Service Providers (MSPs) in North America in 2023. Overwhelmingly, the results found that the most important characteristic MSPs look for in vendors is price, with 89% of respondents listing that as their top priority. Full-time technical support was also a major consideration (58%). These and other findings can be found in Kaspersky's MSPs in 2023 report.

Given the vital role that Managed Service Providers play for channel-driven vendors such as Kaspersky, it is important to understand MSPs goals and priorities heading into the new year. To that end, Kaspersky commissioned a survey of 500 MSP decision makers in the U.S. and Canada for a comprehensive view of how vendors can better serve them based on their needs and business objectives.

While price point was ranked the most important factor MSPs consider when thinking about what characteristics are most important to their business when working with a vendor, features and functionality tied with support for second place (88%), followed by efficacy (87%) and market share (84%).

Further, the survey results show that when it comes to technical support, MSPs place the most value on around-the-clock availability. This was followed by telephone support (56%), regular business hours (55%) and support via email (54%).

"It comes as no surprise that MSPs are looking for a competitively priced solution. However, almost neck and neck are the requirements for features/functionality and efficacy," said Trevor Serebro, MSP and distribution territory channel manager for Kaspersky North America. "This data highlights that while MSPs that serve the SMB market need to be competitive from a pricing standpoint, they understand that providing resilient layers of security and effective solutions is just as important."

For vendors specifically in the cybersecurity space, insight into what products MSPs think will be most popular in the year ahead was a priority. The top four services Managed Service Providers are currently selling or plan to sell in the next 12 months include Managed Detection and Response (50%), threat detection (47%), Endpoint Detection and Response (46%) and Endpoint Protection (45%).

With cyber insurance on the rise, MSPs were also asked if they require their customers to have coverage. An overwhelming 90% of total respondents said they require customers to have cyber insurance, proving this relatively new model is mandatory and here to stay in 2023.

For more survey data insights and to read the full report, please visit Kaspersky Daily.