How to Choose the Best IT Managed Service Provider

MSPs help organizations by providing expertise and complex services to fill gaps in their IT infrastructure. They help free up organizations from worrying about glitches or IT fortification and allow them to focus on core business operations instead.

Choosing the right MSP for your business is a critical task, and the choice can significantly impact how services or products are delivered to customers. This decision requires time, proper research, and buy-in from all levels of your organization.

What does an MSP do?

Managed service providers (MSPs) in IT are third-party organizations that remotely manage customers’ IT infrastructure and end-user systems. They deliver a variety of services across technologies, including network, application, infrastructure, and security, through ongoing support.

Core managed IT services MSPs typically provide:

• Handling IT infrastructure management
• Offering technical support to staff
• Augmenting cybersecurity solutions and strategy
• Providing remote monitoring and management (RMM)
• Managing user access accounts
• Handling contract management
• Offering compliance and risk management

Learn more: To hear directly from MSP owners and operators of all sizes about their offerings, watch or listen to CI: Partner POV, our video podcast series.

What an MSP can provide to a business

If you’re curious about the value MSPs can bring to your business, there are four key benefits you can gain from partnering with a managed services provider.

Outsourced IT services

An outsourced IT model is a cost-effective way for organizations to simplify their IT operations without keeping an internal IT workforce. It provides specialized expertise, allowing companies to benefit from the latest innovations in technology and industry best practices without requiring ongoing skill development and training for their existing staff.

The cons of outsourcing IT include reliance on third-party providers, security risks, and limited customization. 

While the best MSPs have strong security protocols, organizations should screen possible MSP partners to reduce risks. Further, MSP services are often standardized to meet the needs of a wide range of clients, which can reduce the customization alternatives accessible to companies with unique IT needs.

Co-managed IT services

A co-managed IT model provides organizations with an internal IT staff that needs additional support by supplementing existing teams. This is done by providing specialized expertise or extra hands during in-demand peaks. The partnership within a co-managed IT model enables organizations to leverage an MSP’s expertise while maintaining control over their infrastructure.

Specialized expertise and technical depth

Having an MSP partner with expertise or specialization in a specific area can be a cost-effective way to fill gaps in your IT infrastructure. MSPs have varying levels of expertise across tasks such as helpdesk support, antivirus protection, patch management, firewall protection, and staff security training.

Assist in AI adoption, governance, and strategy

An MSP can support organizations looking to integrate AI into their operations. They can provide tailored AI strategies that identify how the technology can enhance productivity, as well as implement governance tools and frameworks to maintain security during AI use. 

MSPs can also guide businesses in scaling AI initiatives and translating them into meaningful business outcomes.

What a business should consider before hiring an MSP

Before inking a deal with an MSP, there are a few key considerations to keep in mind to ensure the investment delivers maximum value for your business.

Decide whether your company needs an MSP first

The first step in choosing an MSP is deciding whether your company needs one at all. Every business is unique, so assessing your needs is critical. 

Does your business require additional expertise but lack the budget or resources to hire? Are you more inclined to build an internal IT team, or is outsourcing to a provider the better move? 

Do you have recurring IT challenges that your current team cannot efficiently handle? Is your existing infrastructure limiting your ability to scale? 

These are the types of questions you should ask when determining if an MSP is right for you.

Assess your current IT setup and identify pain points

What is your current IT setup? The MSP you choose must be able to adjust to your environment. 

Take inventory of your organization’s software, hardware, and systems when on your MSP search. Identifying your organization’s pain points can help create a to-do list for the MSP you hire. 

This also provides the opportunity to ask the MSPs under your consideration how they would approach each challenge.

Evaluate future growth and scalability requirements

One must also consider the business’s future before deciding on an MSP. An IT infrastructure is a load-bearing building block for an organization’s future, so choosing an MSP that supports your organization’s vision and growth is important.

Prioritize understanding of compliance and industry expertise

Additionally, MSPs need to understand how to operate in compliance with the industry’s requirements. Compile a list of compliance considerations that apply to your IT workflows. This adds another opportunity for you to ask MSPs how they intend to meet potential challenges– this time with compliance as the priority.

Overall, the MSP you choose must understand your business. It will put them in a position to make a positive impact immediately and help your organization thrive.

How to find and evaluate an MSP partner

Once you’ve identified your business needs, the next step is to follow a structured approach to finding and evaluating the right MSP partner for your organization.

1. Review the MSP’s services portfolio

When selecting an MSP, review their service portfolio to ensure it aligns with your business needs. Some services include automating time-consuming workflows, designing and implementing business intelligence solutions, or migrating on-premises software to the cloud.

2. Evaluate technical expertise and industry experience

Evaluating an MSP’s technical expertise is key because a deep skill set from the MSP you choose means that they could be able to finish jobs faster and with higher quality. 

Check what applications the MSP uses, the environments they work in, and the architectures with which they are comfortable. You’ll also want to ensure that the MSP you choose has experience in your industry.

3. Define communication and availability needs

Like many business partnerships, it’s important to determine how responsive, available, and communicative you want your MSP partner to be. 

Service providers should be available when you need them, either 24/7 or during certain business hours. Ultimately, your MSP partner should be able to address your needs within a reasonable time.

4. Check references and customer reviews

Furthermore, ask for references and consider reviews for any potential MSP partner. This is a key indicator of future performance, determining the services they provide and the satisfaction level other businesses have with the potential MSP partner.

5. Assess proactivity and problem prevention capabilities

Among other determining factors in choosing an MSP is the proactivity of a potential partner. It’s nice when an MSP can react to evolving needs, but having an MSP partner that proactively designs solutions to prevent issues before they occur can help avoid downtime, data loss, and other issues that can disrupt continuity. 

6. Understand contracts, pricing, and SLAs

Additionally, ensure you understand the contract terms when deciding on which MSP to utilize. Examine the contract thoroughly and analyze the pricing structure, including whether it uses a flat fee, per-user pricing, or other models. 

Also, consider agreeing only to Service Level Agreements (SLAs) that specify response times, uptime guarantees, and performance metrics.

Evaluating the partnership and determining ROI

While the cost of partnering with an MSP may seem daunting at first, it’s important to understand that reliable IT service is an investment, not a typical expense. Ensuring your technology functions well, improves your operations, and enhances your bottom line is critical.

Breaking down the basics and seeing how the benefits of working with an MSP can affect your revenue and productivity is essential. While it’s hard to put a numerical value on some benefits, identifying them remains important to the business decision-making process.

To achieve a positive return on investment (ROI), an MSP should save time by handling the small details of your technology, reducing downtime, improving revenue and savings, and providing the latest tools and practices to prevent cyberattacks, along with training your team in cybersecurity practices to protect your data and technology.

Bottom line: Finding the right MSP is crucial to success

Ultimately, the right MSP for your organization should enhance your business by providing expert services and high-quality customer service and communication. MSP returns aren’t always immediately evident or quantifiable, but as long as the MSP is transparent and provides reliable services that reduce downtime, enhance cybersecurity, and keep your technology functioning and up to date, the long-term ROI will reveal itself.

When evaluating cloud partners in 2026, MSPs are prioritizing profitability, vendor stability, flexibility, and long-term alignment. Discover the key factors MSPs consider when choosing the right cloud partner.

This article was originally written in 2025 and updated by Luis Millares in March 2026.