Everyone agrees that customers need e-mail and web security, but what's the best way to provide it? An extremely efficient approach -- and the one that generates profitable recurring revenue for solution providers -- is to offer email and web content filtering as a managed service.

"The managed services form factor has several advantages," says Ken Totura, vice president of channel sales at MX Logic, which powers Ingram Micro Seismic E-mail and Web Defense Services. "Customers like the fact that it's an operating expense, not a capital expense, freeing them from hardware, software and maintenance fees. They also benefit from the speed of provisioning and the high ROI from reduced costs for bandwidth, storage and power consumption."

Customers also benefit from MX Logic's carrier-grade data center, 24/7 support and multiple redundancies, as well as proprietary filtering technology proven with more than 20,000 current customers. And the service promises the scalability to grow as the volume of e-mail and web traffic grows.

Seismic's Business Benefits
Solution providers can gain a business edge by sourcing Seis mic E-mail and Web Defense Services, as well as E-mail Archiving, from Ingram Micro. "Ingram Micro is always looking for those companies that are strategically balanced between a forward-thinking approach to the marketplace and maintaining a solid, high-quality service," says Justin Crotty, vice president, services, Ingram Micro.

Seismic customers receive the following benefits from MX Logic:

• Sales marketing and training support
• Access to remote monitoring and management software, managed NOC and help desk
• Outsourced services
• Rich tutorials
• Best practices for learning the business.

All these resources help solution providers get up to speed quickly without a big capital investment. That's been the experience of Derrick Jones, president and CEO of JAD Corp., a solution provider just ramping up his managed services business. A provider of "continuous operation" for federal and SMB accounts, Jones is pleased with Seismic services such as E-mail and Web Defense. "MX Logic's service ensures that the customer's infrastructure is monitored and secure 24/7," he says. "And by partnering with Ingram Micro Seismic, I can deliver a solution without having to build any infrastructure in-house."

Jones considers Ingram Micro Seismic services well planned and packaged, so much so that the JAD executives rewrote their business plan from Seismic's best practices and tutorial information. "Seismic allowed us to enter the business quickly," Jones says, "with the support of knowledgeable people who made the investments for us." As an example of Seismic's support, Jones' staff was well trained by MX Logic. "We receive excellent support from MX Logic and the Seismic team," says Jones, who currently uses MX Logic marketing collateral and is working on a telemarketing campaign for customer acquisition that is partially subsidized by MX Logic. "They are actively contributing to our success in managed service."

For More Information
Ingram Micro customers can visit www.ingrammicro.com/seismic, e-mail services@ingrammicro.com, or call an Ingram Micro sales representative at (800) 705-7057, option 5.