From Client Portal to Unified Client Portal: Why the Difference Matters

If you’ve recently attended DattoCon, IT Nation, or Producers Club, then chances are you’ve heard some discussion about how client portals are evolving.  

Right now, most client portals available to MSPs are often limited in functionality or offer a poor user experience. This is because most client portals don’t actually address the needs of MSPs or their clients — they don’t integrate with the rest of your tech stack or aren’t comprehensive enough to warrant the time spent onboarding clients. 

For instance, how often do you find yourself... 

• Manually searching for your client's data  
• Telling your clients, “We’ll need a couple of days to gather the information requested.” 
• Manually pulling reports and emailing them 
• Thinking to yourself, "Why is my portal so slow?" 

If you're having these issues, you can only imagine how your clients feel. And, with 90% of customers continuing to place such high value on customer service when choosing or remaining loyal to a vendor, investing in the right client portal should be at the top of your priority list.    

As an MSP, you need a unified client portal — a portal that provides the kind of user experience that makes clients loyal so you can focus on growing and scaling your MSP. 

What is a Unified Client Portal?  

A unified client portal offers MSPs and their clients a one-stop shop for all their needs. Think of it as a central hub where you and your clients can access go-to tools and information in one single interface. It connects your clients directly to your tech stack, so your service desk team can get out of the weeds and focus on other projects. 

It offers your clients a place to get instant IT support and answers to questions, so they can troubleshoot their issues and become more self-sufficient. 

Gone are the days of toggling between different interfaces for billing, support, or reports. Whether it's managing support tickets, accessing training needs, or generating reports, each component interconnects, creating a seamless MSP and client experience. 

MSP Benefits  

There are many benefits that a unified client portal will bring to your business, and all of them will help you grow and scale your customer base while ensuring you're delivering top-notch customer service.

Let's take a look at a few. 

1. Improve Efficiency: With all your clients' needs consolidated into one interface, you can automate processes, reduce manual labor, and make operations more efficient. 
2. Provide Self-Service Options: Giving your clients the tools they need to become more self-sufficient will significantly reduce your workload and the number of tickets that hit your service desk. Not only will this help save time and costs, but you'll foster confident clients who know how to navigate their IT infrastructure without relying on you 24/7. 
3. Boost Transparency: By providing your clients with real-time data, performance metrics, and clear insights that show your value, they will look to you as their trusted IT advisor and rely on you to provide strategic solutions to enhance and grow their businesses. 
4. Improve Communication: Proactively reaching out to your clients will help them to feel valued and heard. Whether providing reassurance, proactively solving issues, or just checking in, you will strengthen your relationships and foster loyal, happy customers who will continue to invest in your business. 

Client Benefits 

A unified client portal with an easy-to-navigate interface gives customers the tools and resources they need to solve their own IT needs.  

With unlimited access to an array of features that will equip them with the knowledge they need, you'll no longer have noisy service desks drowning in tickets.  

But the client benefits don't end there. Your clients will have access to: 

• A Knowledge Base: A central hub full of answers to their more technical questions and pressing issues. Clients can equip themselves with the information they need to troubleshoot their issues and enhance their understanding of their IT solutions. 
• Streamlined Ticketing: Clients can submit tickets through their portals, which ensures a seamless process to report issues, receive prompt assistance, and track the ticket's progress, leading to faster ticket resolution times and improved client satisfaction. 
• On-Demand Training: With libraries full of helpful and educational training resources, your clients will be able to use their IT solutions to their full potential and maximize their investment.  
• Intelligent Insights: Clients can access valuable insights, data, and reports, allowing them to make informed decisions, optimize their IT strategies, and align their technology with their business needs.
  

Let’s look at a specific example. 

The concept of a unified client portal means that features don't just exist in a vacuum; they interact with each other.  

Take CloudRadial's ticketing, for example. A regular portal can have a form that submits tickets. While that's technically all you need for a ticketing portal, that's not a unified experience.  

CloudRadial's unification takes the ticketing experience and makes it pervasive throughout the portal in multiple ways, such as: 

• Having a ticketing form area where users can submit 
• Having a ticket viewing area where they can see and add more details to their tickets 
• Having a dashboard area that shows their ticket submission statistics, frequency, and category 

• Having additional integrations that further analyze and identify trends in issues and requests within a client organization  

The key difference is that a unified portal takes a concept or feature and interweaves it throughout the portal so that it's relevant and useful in multiple ways. That makes the portal more powerful and the experience more cohesive for both MSPs and clients alike. 

CloudRadial helps MSPs grow and scale their business as effortlessly as possible, and it all starts with our Unified Client Portal.