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The BMK Vision Podcast
The BMK Vision Podcast episodes
- #126 - MSP Owner Sales - Never Leave Without the Next Meeting | BMK VISION ROUNDTABLE
Josh Peterson opens with a claim most MSP owners will recognize: the owner who says he can't sell and the owner who says he's great at it often end up with the same pipeline. The difference, Josh argues, is not talent. It is the steps both of them skip in the first meeting.
He walks Gary Boyle through the order of selling and the four things every first appointment has to produce before you leave the room: a budget, a time frame, the next meeting date, and a referral request. Then he shows how to stop chasing prospects by making the proposal a formality rather than a surprise.
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What We Cover in This Episode
- Sell yourself first, the company second, and goods and services last
- Build rapport by getting curious about the person, not their golf trophy- Ask for the referral at the end of a first meeting- Set the next meeting with a command instead of a question- Anchor the prospect's deadline and work backward from it- Estimate revenue from headcount to open the budget conversation- Frame the IT budget as a share of the prospect's revenue- Deliver proposals instead of sending quotes, and trial close before you write them----------
Subscribe & Follow BMK Vision
YouTube (Video Podcast):
https://www.youtube.com/@beringmckinleyvision?sub_confirmation=1Learn More About the Vision Platform:https://beringmckinley.com/visionApply to Be a Guest:https://beringmckinley.com/blog#speaker-form----------
SEO Keywords
- MSP owner sales
- MSP sales process- first sales meeting- set the next meeting- sales call next steps- order of selling- IT budget- referral request- trial close- MSP proposals----------
Credits
Host: Josh Peterson
Co-Host: Gary BoyleProducer: Bering McKinleyEpisode: MSP Owner Sales - Never Leave Without the Next Meeting42 min - #125 - MSP Effective Hourly Rate - Why Time Entry Finally Matters | BMK VISION ROUNDTABLE
Josh Peterson has pushed MSP owners to enter all forty hours for more than twenty years, and lately he has noticed something new: they have mostly stopped arguing. Gary Boyle thinks the reason is money. Labor costs keep rising while contracts priced years ago never moved, and owners who want to know where the margin went end up at the timesheet.
The two work through the one number Josh says explains nearly every weak service P&L: the effective hourly rate on your agreements, measured against the rate you would charge for a project hour. For most MSPs it comes out at roughly half.
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What We Cover in This Episode
- Explain why MSP owners have stopped fighting time entry
- Connect complete time entry to agreement gross profit and utilization- Trace how frustration with managed services is reviving project and hourly billing- Show how rising wages erode contracts that were never repriced- Calculate the effective hourly rate on a managed services agreement- Compare a $95 agreement hour against a $200 project hour- Diagnose weak service revenue and gross profit from a single number- Make time entry stick by explaining what leadership will measure with it----------
Subscribe & Follow BMK Vision
YouTube (Video Podcast):
https://www.youtube.com/@beringmckinleyvision?sub_confirmation=1Learn More About the Vision Platform:https://beringmckinley.com/visionApply to Be a Guest:https://beringmckinley.com/blog#speaker-form----------
SEO Keywords
- MSP effective hourly rate
- effective hourly rate vs standard rate- managed services agreement profitability- agreement gross profit- MSP time entry- technician utilization- service gross profit- MSP pricing- labor costs- project billing----------
Credits
Host: Josh Peterson
Co-Host: Gary BoyleProducer: Bering McKinleyEpisode: MSP Effective Hourly Rate - Why Time Entry Finally Matters11 min - #124 - MSP Action Items - How Detailed Is Too Detailed | BMK VISION ROUNDTABLE
Josh brought a live client problem to this one. He had given a single leader about thirty action items for one initiative goal, and that leader told him it felt like being treated like a child. The feedback was fair. The instinct behind the thirty items was not wrong either, and that tension is the whole episode.
Josh Peterson and Gary Boyle work through where action items actually belong in a strategic plan, when a step deserves to be its own task, and how you tell whether a plan is working or the quarter simply went your way.
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What We Cover in This Episode
- Locate action items correctly: yearly plan, quarterly initiatives, monthly goals, weekly actions
- Separate a genuine action item from a step buried inside one- Understand why a consultant over-specifies, and where that stops helping the client- Spot action items that carry no link back to a larger goal- Resolve the trap of ten things that are all kind of the one thing- Prioritize and time bind, so what is next is settled rather than renegotiated weekly- Catch the drift that happens when good ideas keep joining the weekly meeting- Ask the uncomfortable quarterly question: did I pick the right initiatives, or did the year help- Reframe results over a one-year horizon instead of a one-month one- Accept a C plus process when it produces A plus results----------
Subscribe & Follow BMK Vision
YouTube (Video Podcast):
https://www.youtube.com/@beringmckinleyvision?sub_confirmation=1Learn More About the Vision Platform:https://beringmckinley.com/visionApply to Be a Guest:https://beringmckinley.com/blog#speaker-form----------
SEO Keywords
- MSP strategic planning
- action items- strategic plan execution- managed service provider- EOS level 10 meeting- quarterly initiatives- weekly meeting cadence- accountability- micromanagement- business coaching for MSPs- prioritization- time horizon----------
Credits
Host: Josh Peterson
Co-Host: Gary BoyleProducer: Bering McKinleyEpisode: MSP Action Items - How Detailed Is Too Detailed23 min - #123 - MSP Owner Pay: Stop Paying Yourself Like an Employee | FROM THE TRENCHES
A million dollars in revenue, a hundred and eighty thousand to the owner, three percent left at the bottom. The owner is not careless. They are comfortable, and comfort is what stopped the examination.
Read the full breakdown:
https://beringmckinley.com/blog/msp-owner-pay-why-you-should-take-profit-instead-of-a-salary?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=short&utm_campaign=ep123&utm_content=short1Watch the full episode:
https://youtu.be/9ypR77IFGIMApply to be a guest on the show:
https://beringmckinley.com/blog#speaker-formLearn more about the BMK Vision Operating System:
https://beringmckinley.com/vision#MSP #ManagedServices #BMKVisionPodcast #MSPOwner #Profitability #BusinessGrowth
1 hr 12 min - #122 - AI Outreach for MSPs: What to Ask Before You Sign | BMK VISION ROUNDTABLE
An MSP owner asked Josh Peterson a question with an obvious answer, right up until you look at it closely. He pays fifty to sixty thousand a year for a capable appointment setter. An AI outreach service quoted him thirty-six thousand to do more of the same work, across far more of the market. He goes on the sales call either way.
Gary Boyle settles the technology question quickly, then moves to the part that decides whether the money works. A vendor controls nothing after the email lands, so a click reported as a lead marks the boundary of their control rather than a lie. The buyer's job is to name the outcome first and make the vendor answer against it. The back half is about fixing your message before you buy any channel.
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What We Cover in This Episode
- Whether cold calling still works for MSPs in 2026, and what actually changed
- What an AI outreach vendor can control, and the hard line where their influence stops- The single question to ask before signing with any marketing vendor- Why the buyer is often the one doing the lying- How AI killed the purchased broadcast list and what replaced it- Why your ideal client profile matters more once the channel gets ten times faster- Auditing the message your owner, salespeople and appointment setter each give- Bonus: the thirty-day rule for killing a deal without losing the contact----------
Hosts
Josh Peterson: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshdpeterson/
Gary Boyle: https://www.linkedin.com/in/garyboyle/----------
Subscribe and Follow BMK Vision
YouTube (Video Podcast):
https://www.youtube.com/@beringmckinleyvision?sub_confirmation=1Learn More About the Vision Platform:
https://beringmckinley.com/visionApply to Be a Guest:
https://beringmckinley.com/blog#speaker-form----------
SEO Keywords
- AI outreach for MSPs
- MSP marketing vendor evaluation- MSP appointment setting- Cold calling for MSPs- MSP sales messaging- Ideal client profile- MSP pipeline management- Managed service providers- BMK Vision Podcast----------
Credits
Hosts: Josh Peterson and Gary Boyle
Producer: Bering McKinleyEpisode: #122 - AI Outreach for MSPs: What to Ask Before You Sign34 min - #121 - MSP Acquisitions: Not Every Buyer Is a Roll-Up | FROM THE TRENCHES
Every MSP owner gets the same email. Someone would like to talk about acquiring your company. Most go straight to the trash, and the rest get filed under one mental category: private equity, roll-up, spreadsheet, faceless. Mitch Pulver is the person on the other end of one of those emails, and he is none of those things.
Mitch is the CEO of Quality Network Solutions, a managed services provider supporting more than 200 K-12 school districts across Illinois and Missouri. A Naval Academy graduate and former surface warfare officer, he spent two and a half years searching for a business to buy, moved his family to a town where he knew nobody, and has run it ever since. In this conversation he explains what a search fund actually is, how it differs from the institutional capital everyone pictures, and what he sees coming for owners of smaller MSPs.
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What We Cover in This Episode
- Distinguish a search fund from the institutional private equity most owners imagine
- Understand why a two and a half year search turned out to be a sales process- Hear what the first months after an acquisition actually feel like from the inside- Watch a bank balance fall through a seasonal buying cycle toward payroll- Translate military standardization into a company that documented almost nothing- Learn why going too hard too fast breaks the culture you just bought- See why the investment committee exists to poke holes rather than approve deals- Rethink outreach: why the bought email list stopped working years ago- Meet the river guides who actually connect buyers and owners- Understand where the buyer market for subscale MSPs is heading as capital moves upmarket----------
Guest Links
Guest LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mitch-pulver-10739b13b/
Company Website: https://www.qnsk12.com/----------
Subscribe & Follow BMK Vision
YouTube (Video Podcast):
https://www.youtube.com/@beringmckinleyvision?sub_confirmation=1Learn More About the Vision Platform:
https://beringmckinley.com/visionApply to Be a Guest:
https://beringmckinley.com/blog#speaker-form----------
SEO Keywords
- MSP acquisitions
- Search fund- MSP private equity- Selling your MSP- MSP exit planning- Entrepreneurship through acquisition- MSP valuation- Managed service providers- MSP succession planning- K-12 IT services- BMK Vision Podcast----------
Credits
Host: Josh Peterson
Producer: Bering McKinleyEpisode: #121 - MSP Acquisitions: Not Every Buyer Is a Roll-Up1 hr - #120 - MSP Software Costs: When Building Your Own Actually Pays | BMK VISION ROUNDTABLE
Josh Peterson is three billing cycles into a licensing dispute. His team submitted cancellations four months ahead of renewal, in writing. The renewal date passed without acknowledgement, the next invoice came back larger because the annual increase had been applied to seats that should have been gone, and the eventual resolution was a credit rather than a refund.
Gary Boyle declines the villain reading and offers a mechanism instead. Bundled low entry pricing built an installed base too cheap to grow into, which left price on existing customers as the only lever, and longer contracts followed to protect it. From there the two work toward the question an owner can actually act on: whether an MSP should build its own software instead of paying for it, and the tool spend threshold that decides the answer.
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What We Cover in This Episode- Trace how a correctly filed cancellation becomes three billing cycles of dispute
- Separate a credit from a refund and price the difference- Explain why bundling produced the annual price increase- Connect longer contract terms directly to stalled expansion revenue- Isolate the input costs no vendor or customer controls- Test the Arizona Iced Tea theory that a company can simply hold its price- Compare flat fee and consumption models on client alignment- Run the real arithmetic on building your own tooling with AI assistance----------
Your HostsJosh Peterson: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshdpeterson/
Gary Boyle: https://www.linkedin.com/in/garyboyle/Bering McKinley: https://beringmckinley.com----------
Subscribe and Follow BMK VisionYouTube (Video Podcast):
https://www.youtube.com/@beringmckinleyvision?sub_confirmation=1Learn More About the Vision Platform:
https://beringmckinley.com/visionApply to Be a Guest:
https://beringmckinley.com/blog#speaker-form----------
SEO Keywords- MSP software costs
- PSA pricing- RMM pricing- MSP vendor lock in- Build versus buy- Managed services pricing- Consumption pricing model- MSP profitability- MSP tool stack- BMK Vision Podcast----------
CreditsHost: Josh Peterson
Co-Host: Gary BoyleProducer: Bering McKinleyEpisode: #120 - MSP Software Costs: When Building Your Own Actually Pays55 min - #119 - MSP Sales Calls: Stop Over-Explaining, Answer the Question | FROM THE TRENCHES
Ask an MSP owner what a good per user rate is and watch what happens. Most of them will not say a number. They will contextualize, credential themselves, and explain the whole methodology before the answer ever arrives. Andrea Lipton has spent thirty years studying why we do that, and she has a framework for stopping.
Andrea Lipton is Director of Delivery for Training as a Service at ISG (Information Services Group), with a career that runs from JP Morgan to Harvard Business Publishing to NIIT. In this conversation we explore why explaining before answering costs you trust, how to build rapport without running an interrogation, and AEIOU, the self-coaching framework she built and now teaches to her teams.
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What We Cover in This Episode
- Trace the habit of explaining first back to school, credentialing, and the fear of being challenged
- Flip the funnel with the pyramid principle: deliver the conclusion, then the analysis- Run AEIOU in a live conversation: answer, explain, inquire, onboard, update- Separate relational selling from diagnostic selling, and why both get called salesy- Replace "why" questions with what and how questions that do not trigger defensiveness- Ask someone to put the real question on loudspeaker when the stated question is not the real one- Diagnose why early career technicians lose client trust without knowing it- Plus: a bonus segment on poker, game theory, and mapping a buyer's utility curve----------
Guest Links
Andrea Lipton on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aflipton/
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Subscribe & Follow BMK Vision
YouTube (Video Podcast):
https://www.youtube.com/@beringmckinleyvision?sub_confirmation=1Learn More About the Vision Platform:
https://beringmckinley.com/visionApply to Be a Guest:
https://beringmckinley.com/blog#speaker-form----------
SEO Keywords
- MSP sales calls
- MSP sales training- Managed service providers- Client communication- Rapport building- AEIOU framework- Pyramid principle- Direct communication- Soft skills for technicians- MSP business growth- BMK Vision Podcast- Game theory in sales----------
Credits
Host: Josh Peterson
Guest: Andrea LiptonProducer: Bering McKinleyEpisode: #119 - MSP Sales Calls: Stop Over-Explaining, Answer the Question1 hr 16 min - #118 - MSP Strategic Plans: How Many Initiatives Is Too Many | BMK VISION ROUNDTABLE
Most MSP strategic plans do not fail because the goal was wrong. They fail because the plan carried more initiatives than the company could ever execute.
In this BMK Vision Roundtable, Josh Peterson and Gary Boyle take apart a real example: a client plan Josh built that Gary told him was overbuilt. The goal was sound. The volume underneath it was not. What follows is a working definition of an initiative, the reason most owners misfile efficiency work under a revenue goal, and a hard number for how much a six month plan can actually hold.
Gary Boyle is a Partner for Strategy & Business Development at Bering McKinley and co-hosts the roundtable with Josh.
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What We Cover in This Episode
- Why excitement in a planning session reliably produces an unexecutable plan
- Where the attainable half of SMART quietly breaks- Defining an initiative as a driver, and what sits below it- Why "two new clients a month" is a trap without the math behind it- The reason efficiency drives gross profit and not revenue- The full set of revenue levers available to an MSP- How many initiatives fit in a six month window, and how they split by quarter- The rule that disqualifies anything already working from your plan----------
Subscribe & Follow BMK Vision
YouTube (Video Podcast):
https://www.youtube.com/@beringmckinleyvision?sub_confirmation=1Learn More About the Vision Platform:
https://beringmckinley.com/visionApply to Be a Guest:
https://beringmckinley.com/blog#speaker-form----------
SEO Keywords
- MSP strategic planning
- Strategic initiatives- MSP revenue drivers- Goal setting for MSPs- SMART goals- Six month planning- Managed service providers- BMK Vision Podcast----------
Credits
Host: Josh Peterson
Co-Host: Gary BoyleProducer: Bering McKinleyEpisode: #118 - MSP Strategic Plans: How Many Initiatives Is Too Many20 min - #117 - MSP Contracts and Collections: When a Client Stops Paying | FROM THE TRENCHES
Most MSP owners think the risk in a contract is the part the client might sue over. The real damage is quieter: the work you never priced, the increase you never took, and the invoice you let age past ninety days. Tom Fafinski has spent 35 years as an attorney to managed service providers, and Alexander Caplan runs an international MSP out of London. Josh Peterson puts the two of them in a room and works through the agreement from first handshake to final collection.
Tom Fafinski is co-founder of Virtus Law in Minnesota, a firm he describes as a general counsel's office for MSPs, covering master services agreements, mergers, governance, and estate planning for owners. Alexander Caplan is founder of Synergy Associates, a London-headquartered MSP running for more than twenty years with teams in Paris, New York, Los Angeles, Hong Kong, and the UAE. Between them they see the same contract from both sides of the table.
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What We Cover in This Episode
- Diagnose why a small managed services agreement now gets routed to a client's legal team
- Replace the twenty eight page MSA with a staged four page document plus addenda- Avoid the unlimited liability hiding in a client's standard NDA- Document what is excluded, not just what is included, and log every declined service- Build an inflation clause that earns more than inflation- Calculate what a two percent cost increase really does to a twenty percent margin- Set a termination fee a judge will actually enforce- Escalate AR before ninety days instead of after- Convert a payment plan into a promissory note secured by a confession of judgment- Withdraw services without it reading as an act of aggression----------
Guest Links
Tom Fafinski LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thomasfafinski/
Virtus Law: https://www.virtuslaw.com/Alexander Caplan LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexandercaplan/
Synergy Associates: https://synergy.tech/----------
Subscribe and Follow BMK Vision
YouTube (Video Podcast):
https://www.youtube.com/@beringmckinleyvision?sub_confirmation=1Learn More About the Vision Platform:
https://beringmckinley.com/visionApply to Be a Guest:
https://beringmckinley.com/blog#speaker-form----------
SEO Keywords
- MSP contracts
- Managed services agreement- MSP collections- Accounts receivable- Termination fee- Contract negotiation- Agreement gross profit- Out of scope billing- Managed service providers- BMK Vision Podcast----------
Credits
Host: Josh Peterson
Producer: Bering McKinleyEpisode: #117 - MSP Contracts and Collections: When a Client Stops Paying1 hr
About The BMK Vision Podcast
From the publisher's feed
Welcome to The BMK Vision Podcast — the show for MSP leaders, IT professionals, and the vendors who support them. Hosted by the team at Bering McKinley, each episode delivers real-world insights,…
strategic guidance, and no-BS conversations to help you grow, scale, and profit in the managed services space. We challenge outdated models, highlight proven standards, and share stories from the front lines of consulting. Whether you’re just getting started or running a mature MSP, this podcast helps you bring clarity, structure, and profitability to your business.