adoptie MSP klanten
Why does adoption fail so often at MSP clients?
Adoption fails at MSP clients because it is tacked on at the end of the process instead of decided at the start. Clients often use only 20% of their licences, while the MSP focuses on technology and the behaviour change stays uncovered. Without adoption, an implementation is an expensive handover with no result.
MSP Late Night · 20 August 2026
How do you stop adoption becoming an afterthought?
Adoption belongs at the front of the sales process, not as the last implementation step. If it only comes at the end, it is also the first thing to fall in a discount discussion. Four layers decide whether adoption really lands: policy, how the environment is set up, how data is used, and end user behaviour. An MSP that only delivers the technology and leaves the rest to the client is selling licences that largely sit idle.
Why is 20% usage the real problem?
Clients buy a licence stack such as Microsoft 365 and in practice use only a fifth of the functionality. The rest is shelfware the client pays for without getting any result.
Where does the MSP structurally drop out?
MSPs are technically driven and manage the availability of the environment, but often leave policy, the setup of Teams or SharePoint, data labelling and end user advice to the client. That is exactly where the mismatch sits between what mid-sized business expects and what the MSP delivers.
Why does doing adoption on the side not work?
One or two interns running training sessions under the label adoption is communication in disguise, not behaviour change. Anyone serious about adoption chooses it as a core proposition or outsources it to a specialist partner while keeping the client relationship.
Anyone can implement, but changing behaviour is a different game.
Frequently asked questions
What falls under adoption, besides a user training?
Adoption covers four layers: policy (why and how a product is used), how the environment is set up (for example structure in Teams and SharePoint), data (which information is used, how it is secured and labelled) and end user support. A button-clicking session touches only that last layer and does not cover the behaviour change underneath it.
Who is responsible for adoption: the MSP or the client?
Adoption is a shared responsibility. The client has to articulate what they want to achieve and free up time and budget for behaviour change. The MSP has an advisory role to make the business translation early in the process and connect the right licences to concrete use. If either party sees adoption as an afterthought, usage stays behind.
Should an MSP deliver adoption itself or outsource it?
That depends on where the MSP is strong. Doing adoption on the side as a small extra rarely leads to results, because the internal focus is on technology. The choice is: make adoption a core proposition and hire people for it, or work with a specialist partner and keep the margin in the service through a reseller or service model.
Why is a discount on onboarding a bad signal?
Onboarding and adoption are the steps where the return on the licence is made. When they are cut to close a deal, the chance the client actually uses the product disappears with them. The result is a satisfied buyer and a dissatisfied end user, and in time a client who reconsiders their contract.
How do you measure whether an adoption programme succeeded?
Success is defined in advance in concrete goals: which behaviour changes, which scenarios are set up differently, which tools are actively used. In Microsoft 365, usage is measurable down to user level. Measurement without a goal set in advance only produces reports with no judgement on whether the programme succeeded.
Effy Shkuri