Finding True Value in Third-Party Unified Support.

The value of something changes based on the person, situation, and service or product in question. While third-party Unified support may seem like a minimal upgrade over Microsoft for some businesses, others see it as a golden opportunity to get the services and support they need while saving money that can then be reinvested into other company goals. Where and how you spend your money determines true value, but third-party alternatives can increase the value of the support you receive in more ways than one.

Most businesses utilize 5-8 Microsoft products to keep their business running. While this isn’t the case for everyone, you’ll find most businesses aren’t using the full suite of Microsoft products. It’s expensive to hold that many licenses at once, and often your teams only need the bare minimum support to competently do their job. The less you must spend, the better, but when it comes to support, you don’t get to choose which products are supported by Microsoft.

Yes, all of them technically are, but under Unified, you pay for the support of every Microsoft product. If you only use 5-8 of those products, you still bear the brunt of the support costs for the entire spectrum. While you can get concessions on your Unified contract, the price is still well above what it should be.

With third-party Unified alternatives like US Cloud, you get to pick and choose the support you get. If you don’t use certain Microsoft products, we don’t lump those into a bundle and call it a deal. We support exactly what you want when you need it. This way you aren’t paying for more than necessary and our team knows exactly what you need and how to get out ahead of potential issues. Two birds with one stone, three if you count the value, we generate for your business by saving you 30-50% on your support spend.

Some would define true value as the money saved in a service contract. While third-party support helps create greater value through selective support and improved pricing, it doesn’t stop there. Unified Support no longer uses a tier system like Premier. Some would call this a win, as previously the Performance tier offered the best support options while also being the most expensive. Unified is now supposed to be the more flexible version of Premier, creating a single tier that has everything you need.

However, combining solutions into a single tier actually increases the price. This new pricing calculation factors in Azure, server, and user spends from the last 12 months, meaning your yearly spend goes up if any of those factors increase. If you need more server space or to add more users, your Unified price goes up accordingly. Unified is also subject to economic changes. Microsoft raises or lowers the price of Unified regionally and selectively depending on economic climate and new determinations.

These changes occur three times a year now, so your contract could look vastly different at the end of the year versus now. While they aren’t going to go out of their way to rob you blind in the dead of night, you could be looking at a potential 10-20% increase on support costs over the year. A third-party alternative like US Cloud recognizes that this isn’t the best way to support your customers. You have goals that require a rigid budget. If anything, paying less for your support would go further than hoping Microsoft decides to lower the price. So, US Cloud offers contracts that are determined by your needs and unchanging. The price we agree on is the price that stays for the duration of the contract, even if you increase users or server needs. No surprises, no hidden fees, just 30-50% savings on your support costs and proactive support staff that carefully track your needs.

Microsoft once boasted the ability to have formal access to your Product Engineering teams, but that has gone by the wayside in recent years. Most clients that move to US Cloud attest that they don’t have access to these product teams, thereby getting no value from this service. Is there a commitment to accessing these teams in your Unified contract? What does “formal access” mean to Microsoft? Next time you must work through your contract with them, these may be questions to start with.

Rapid response brings true value to your support services, which direct correspondence improves drastically. Having a support service on the line that can proactively provide help or talk through an issue with you will help overcome process stoppages immensely. A partner like US Cloud has our engineering team on standby to support you through any crisis, big or small. We provide you with the latest information around the services you are using, how to optimize their usage, and lend a hand within 15 minutes should an issue arise that needs a more in-depth review or fix.

US Cloud wants every company to get the true value they deserve out of their Unified support services. While Microsoft was once the only option on the market, US Cloud now offers nearly everything Microsoft does on the Unified support side. If a ticket requires that direct Microsoft expertise, we can escalate. Otherwise, we handle the majority of our tickets in-house.

Value comes from saving you time and directly saving you money. Our guaranteed 15-minute responses to tickets of all severities ensure that you aren’t wasting any time waiting for an answer that should have arrived hours ago. Our services are tailored to your needs, so much so that we save our clients 30-50% on their annual support budget. Spend less and get more when you partner with the experts at US Cloud and find the true value you deserve.