MSP Automation: 5 MSPs Share Real-World Lessons on Automating for Growth

Automation in the MSP business can take many forms, but where is it having the biggest impact. We spoke with 5 MSP professionals to get their take on automation in the MSP industry.

MSP automation is quickly becoming the backbone of scalable, efficient managed service delivery. From streamlining onboarding and ticketing to enhancing client reporting and sales follow-ups, automation helps MSPs reduce manual tasks, improve response times, and create more consistent client experiences. But automation isn’t just about tools—it’s about strategy. To uncover what real-world MSP automation looks like in practice, we asked five growing MSPs how they use automation to scale operations, empower teams, and drive business growth. Their answers reveal not only what’s working—but where the biggest opportunities lie.

While automation generally refers to specific tasks, it’s the business perspective that MSPs should really be focused on when it comes to adding automation. From an internal business perspective, MSPs are saying that task automation can be a driver of growth in their business. Our recent Business Growth Survey showed 51% of respondents saw automation as a way to drive growth.

We asked five MSPs what it means to actually automate. While task automation was critical, it was the effects of that task automation that helped grow their business. MSPs who automated were able to take on more clients, have better communication with their clients, and reduce time their technicians were spending on low value tasks.

Automation isn’t about tasks, it’s about opportunities

Frankly, at this point, automation should be part of every MSP and business. But it goes beyond just thinking of ticking off tasks to be completed. Rather, it’s about giving your MSP opportunities to grow in multiple ways that will benefit your team, your business, and your clients.

As part of their growth strategy, many providers are also evaluating which MSP software solutions best align with their automation goals—tools that can support everything from ticketing to reporting and client communications.

Make your employees more productiv e

While many see automation as that way to reduce menial or repetitive tasks, it should be looked at as a way to give employees time to do other things that are more productive. By giving them more time to work on other things, you can scale your business, take on additional clients and services, and allow employees to be more proactive in how they address problems with clients.

Balancing automation with the client experience

Clients aren’t always fans of automation because they just want to talk to someone. It can be a balancing act to find the right fit for automation in your business, without disrupting the client experience too much. If it’s client facing, it might not be great to automate too much to the point the client isn’t feeling a personal connection anymore. Instead, all the behind-the-scenes tasks can be wrapped up in automation, leaving your employees to focus on delivering a better client experience.

And then we have a quarterly check in that our engineer or the team has to get in touch with. If the client blows us off, it's okay. It's hard to build that relationship, but those are short term type relationships. And by short term, we mean three to five years. We've got some clients that we've been working with for 28 years.

But there's still people out there that are craving for that communication. And so that's where, that balance of when do we bring people in, when do we automate. It automates the stuff that the client can't see, that doesn't have interaction, that's the preventative stuff. And that's the reporting stuff, because man alive, you gotta have this reporting stuff.

Get your employees involved in automation

The fear for many is that automation will cost people jobs. If you automate lower level tasks, then you don’t need a person to do them anymore. We have seen automation cost people jobs in the manufacturing sector, however, MSP owners should be looking to remove the grunt work from their employees. They should also be going a step further and inviting all their employees to participate in the automation conversation to see what parts of their job can be automated – not to put them out of a job, but rather, so they can focus on more meaningful work.

Build automation to reflect the customer journey

Automation is changing how MSPs do business

Whether it’s a better client experience or giving time back to employees, automation is turning into a cornerstone of many MSPs' future plans for growth. When any MSP thinks of scaling their business, starting with automation is a no-brainer. It can reduce menial tasks, giving your employees more time back to focus on things that will actually improve your business and the client.

In order to properly implement automation, however, MSPs need to think strategically and long-term. Automation is not a simple check mark beside a task, but rather, a larger business decision that is setting up the MSP for future growth. And those who think of it as a large-scale business growth strategy will see greater rewards for automating their business.