In this article 5 sections
Winning MSP business now turns on proof. This week Kaseya published a number that backs that up, and Kaseya has no reason to push our line.
In Kaseya’s 2026 State of the MSP report, which surveyed 1,061 MSPs in November 2025, the share of MSPs who say they struggle to demonstrate value to clients nearly doubled in a single year, from 10% to 19%. Difficulty keeping consistent client documentation rose from 10% to 17% over the same period. Kaseya’s own one-line summary: winning new business now depends on proving value, not just offering more services.
Why this number matters more than it looks
A near doubling in a year is a real change. The same report puts acquiring new customers at the top of the MSP issue list at 71%, ahead of cybersecurity, revenue and profitability. So MSPs find it harder to win new clients, and harder to show existing ones what they get.
Dan Tomaszewski, Kaseya’s EVP of Channel, put it plainly in the report’s foreword: winning new clients now requires clearer differentiation, stronger proof of value and tighter operational discipline than in prior years.
The prospect changed, and most MSPs have not
Kaseya found only 12% of new MSP clients are buying managed services for the first time. Most deals you win in 2026 mean a client leaving another MSP. The prospect is comparing two providers making the same claims and choosing the one who can prove them.
When both sides say “we are on top of it, we are secure, we are responsive,” the prospect picks the one who showed a current report.
What we would do with this if we ran an MSP tomorrow
Stop adding services to the proposal. Spend that energy making three things true:
- Every claim in your pitch has a current artefact behind it, dated this month.
- An independent party checks that your security and operational controls are met now, so the prospect is not taking your word for it.
- That proof is ready before the prospect asks.
We wrote the full method for the first one in a separate playbook on building an evidence library that wins MSP deals. Start there if your proposal is still mostly claims.
Assurix covers the second point. Assurix independently assesses 59 controls: 40 security controls aligned to NCSC CAF 4.0 and 19 operational controls built for MSPs. Live-measured controls are checked every six hours and the rest on a set cycle. The result sits on a Trust Portal a prospect can open, showing that an MSP meets its security and operational controls now. Leave a failure unfixed for 30 days and the Trustmark is suspended publicly.
Little Big Tech’s prospect, a 22-user pharma company burned by its previous MSP, had three other MSPs lined up. It chose Little Big Tech and signed the day after one meeting, once Nick had explained Assurix, the standard and how Little Big Tech is held to it. Founder Nick Haley called it “one of the lowest friction sales processes we have ever had with a brand-new prospect.”
The uncomfortable read
If demonstrating value just got twice as hard and acquiring customers is already your number one problem, the MSPs that treat proof as a marketing afterthought are going to feel this in their pipeline within a year. The ones that make proof the product of the sales conversation will quietly take their clients.
One caveat on the data. Kaseya’s sample is global and weighted towards North America, so read the trend as directionally solid rather than a precise UK figure. The direction is the part that matters, and it is not ambiguous.
What this means for your pipeline maths
Run the numbers on your own funnel. If only 12% of new clients are buying managed services for the first time, most deals mean replacing an incumbent. Your win rate turns on out-proving that incumbent in the room. A 5-point swing in close rate on competitive deals is worth more than any new service line you could bolt on this year, and it costs far less to build.
Picture two MSPs pitching the same 30-seat firm. One presents a deck that says it is on top of things and secure. The other opens a current, independently assessed status and a posture report dated that week. Same price band, same promises on paper. The second one wins, and it wins on something the first could have built too if it had treated proof as the product instead of an afterthought.
