Micro-Business IT Baseline
Cyber insurers now mandate baseline security controls to bind a policy, and 43% of attacks target small business — but no MSP wants a 3-person client. A flat-fee retainer built for 1-10 person firms fills that gap with automation-heavy tooling that keeps one person's time spread across dozens of clients.
A real, underserved gap — micro-businesses are too small for MSP minimums but increasingly required by insurers to have baseline controls. Margins are strong once RMM automation is set up, but growth is still gated by one person's support capacity until you hire or subcontract.
The wedge is pricing, not technology: standard MSP contracts start at 10-25 seat minimums because per-client onboarding and account management overhead doesn't pencil out below that. A flat, templated bundle — same five services, same price tiers, no custom scoping calls — removes that overhead and lets a solo operator profitably serve 3-8 seat firms. The insurance angle is the accelerant: cyber-liability underwriters increasingly require MFA, endpoint detection, and documented backups just to issue or renew a policy, which turns "nice to have IT" into "can't get insured without it."
Suits you if
- ✓You have hands-on IT/helpdesk experience and can speak to non-technical owners without jargon
- ✓You're comfortable with recurring-revenue sales — cold outreach to local businesses and referral partners
- ✓You want a service business that scales through automation (RMM, scripted onboarding) rather than more billable hours
Skip it if
- ✕You want fast, large contracts — individual retainers are small ($400-800/mo) and volume takes time to build
- ✕You're not willing to be on call for security incidents, even as a side/part-time operation
- ✕You dislike sales and referral-relationship building; this is a local B2B trust business
Skills: Core requirement is practical sysadmin/helpdesk competence — Windows and Mac device management, MFA and password-manager rollout, basic networking, and cloud backup verification. Security-awareness training delivery and plain-language client communication matter as much as technical depth, since most clients have zero IT literacy.
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