Getting the DMARC Message
Over half the world’s email domains have yet to implement a standard now mandated by Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft. That spells opportunity for EasyDMARC and MSPs.
We wrote a few weeks ago about why TLS certificate management, a seemingly sleepy little market, is fast becoming a big and growing opportunity for MSPs thanks to changes imposed by Google and Apple. An RSAC conversation with Mike Anderson, global channel manager at EasyDMARC, introduced me to a second, similarly overlooked opportunity.
This one, embedded in EasyDMARC’s name, stems from changes enacted by Google and Yahoo a year ago and Microsoft mere days ago that require domain owners who send 5,000 or more messages a day to use DMARC, an authentication protocol designed to curb spoofing, phishing, and other email-related threats.
Sounds simple enough, but implementing DMARC isn’t a snap, one of two reasons why 47% of the world’s roughly 300 million email domains don’t have it in place at present, according to research published during RSAC by Barracuda. The other is that a lot of businesses don’t even know that the industry’s biggest email service providers (not to mention the council responsible for the PCI DSS standard) have made DMARC use mandatory.
“It was optional for a long time, and people haven’t gotten the message. It’s no longer optional,” Anderson (pictured) says. “If you’re not DMARC compliant, you’re going to see your deliverability rates go down.”
Lots of businesses have seen their delivery rates for invoices and marketing campaigns go down, in fact, Anderson continues. They just don’t know why. EasyDMARC’s software is designed to help MSPs turn that mystery into margin by both simplifying DMARC adoption and managing continued DMARC compliance.
“We tailored the software specifically for the service provider model,” Anderson says, noting that the system is multi-tenant and integrated with ConnectWise PSA, Datto Autotask, and HaloPSA, not to mention Pax8’s marketplace and the Acronis Cyber Protect platform.
Even better though, he adds, the solution comes with a risk assessment tool MSPs can use to generate leads. Punch in a sales prospect’s domain and EasyDMARC will quickly return seven pages of detailed and often eye-opening information about why their marketing emails are bouncing, their invoices never arrive, and their email address is vulnerable to misuse by threat actors.
“Customers are 80% more likely to engage an MSP and do a deal if you give them personalized data-driven analysis that creates emotional connections,” says Anderson, citing EasyDMARC research. Those deals produce one-time DMARC implementation revenue followed by recurring monitoring and management revenue, he adds.
EasyDMARC’s grown its partner base from about 50 to over 2,500 MSPs in two years telling that story. That leaves tens of thousands of other MSPs, though, either unaware of why they should be offering DMARC services or wondering if it’s too late to get started.
“I’m like, no, this is only the first quarter,” Anderson says. “Get in the game.”