MSP Cloud Guide
The MSP’s Guide to Choosing the Right Cloud Provider for Small Business Clients
Why IT MSPs Need the Right Cloud Partner
For IT Managed Service Providers (MSPs), your success depends on delivering reliable, secure, and cost-effective technology solutions to your small business clients. And in today’s IT landscape, that increasingly means moving customers from on-premise physical servers — costly to maintain and vulnerable to downtime — to cloud-based infrastructure.
The right cloud partner can help you:
- Increase recurring revenue with healthy margins
- Reduce support workload with simple management tools
- Offer enterprise-grade services at small business prices
Key Factors MSPs Should Look for in a Cloud Provider
Partner Support
You need a cloud provider that understands your business model, offers quick technical assistance, and supports your customer onboarding process. Strong partner programs can help you grow your services and scale faster.
Easy-to-Use Platform
The cloud platform should make your life easier, not harder. Look for:
- Quick VPS creation
- Simple network and firewall setup
- Clear, transparent billing
- The ability to segment projects for different clients
Cost-Effective VPS Hosting with Markup Potential
Your hosting partner should allow you to deliver enterprise-grade performance while leaving room for healthy profit margins. Licensing-heavy solutions (VMware, Hyper-V, Nutanix) often charge per CPU core, RAM allocation, or add-on features, eating into your margins.
Common MSP Cloud Service Offerings
Hosted Windows Desktops
- Used heavily by accounting firms to run QuickBooks Desktop
- Ideal for law firms, medical offices, real estate agencies needing secure access to applications from anywhere
Cloud Backups & File Systems
- Secure, offsite backups for disaster recovery
- Shared file systems for team collaboration
Application Servers
MSPs frequently host applications for industries such as:
- Dental: Dentrix, Eaglesoft
- Medical: eClinicalWorks, Kareo, Medisoft
- Accounting: QuickBooks, Sage, Xero server editions
- Legal: Clio, Timeslips, Amicus Attorney
- ERP/Manufacturing: Odoo, SAP Business One, NetSuite on-premise editions
Security Should Be a Priority
MSPs can boost their service value by including advanced security configurations:
- Firewall features: Geo-fencing, IP blacklisting/whitelisting
- VPN tunnels: Site-to-site and client VPN connections
- Zero Trust networks: Deploy Perimeter 81, Cloudflare Zero Trust, Fortinet, Cisco AnyConnect, ThreatLocker, and other solutions directly on virtual instances
Why MSPs Should Move SMB Clients to the Cloud
On-premise physical servers often mean:
- Higher maintenance requirements
- Frequent hardware refreshes
- Downtime from local issues like power outages or disasters
Cloud hosting offers:
- Reduced maintenance costs
- High availability and uptime SLAs
- Scalability to grow alongside the client’s business
VMBYTE MSP Partner Program
Once you’ve identified the features you need in a cloud provider, VMBYTE checks every box.
- License-free, OpenStack-based infrastructure for cost efficiency
- Hosted Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) model to allocate vCPU, RAM, and NVMe SSD storage across multiple client projects in fully isolated environments
- Full automation: Create VMs, networks, firewalls, and gateways in seconds
- Included bandwidth with each VPS – no hidden data transfer fees
- Global data centers for low-latency access to client environments
VMBYTE gives MSPs an incredible opportunity to host small businesses in the cloud affordably, while maintaining excellent profit margins.
For MSPs, choosing the right cloud provider isn’t just about finding a place to run workloads — it’s about finding a partner that helps you deliver value, improve margins, and grow your client base.
By combining cost-effective infrastructure, easy management tools, and the flexibility to host everything from application servers to secure desktops, VMBYTE makes it simple to move your SMB clients to the cloud profitably and securely.