Adam Berezin and Jason Gumpert, MSDynamicsWorld Founders
How do entrepreneurs define success?
Adam Berezin and Jason Gumpert founded MSDynamicsWorld.com fifteen years ago when "digital marketing" was a bold new concept. They have seen the channel fully embrace the digital strategy, reaching 100,000 subscribers, 200+ customers, and 30,000 podcast listeners.
Others would say they have "made it."
Yet, they hesitate to say it themselves. They're careful not to become complacent and slow their innovation.
In our first interview, "Two Guys, One Site, Zero Microsoft Ties," at their 10-year anniversary, they explained the backstory of starting the business. Now they talk about the changes they have seen at the 15-year milestone, plans for the future, and advice for other entrepreneurs.
Q: What has changed since the 10th anniversary of MSDynamicsWorld?
Adam: "In the last five years, the shift to digital marketing has accelerated. The pandemic forced marketers to re-evaluate their strategies and not bank everything on traditional activities.
At MSDW, we have always tried to consistently reassess and enhance our marketing offerings, but we've had to take that up a notch in the last five years to further evolve with the fast-growing digital marketing needs of ISVs and VARs in the space, as well as the shifting content consumption preferences of our site members
The number of emails sent out during the pandemic was in the billions, exponentially higher than at any other time in history. For our clients, that means their prospects are bombarded by more email communication than ever.
So, we constantly emphasize that you have to be more targeted with your content to break through that noise and information overload. That means our marketing campaigns have had to become that much more targeted to be more effective for our clients.
We have come up with a lot of new programs for ISVs and VAR partners. For example, we had one webcast program, and now we have five different types of webcast programs. We brought a lot of new clients on board, and our existing clients do more with us each year. That is a testament to the fact that our strategy works."
Jason: "In the last five years, Microsoft customers and partners in the Dynamics and Power Platform space have embraced SaaS-based solutions.
I agree with Adam that the pandemic accelerated the move to a digital strategy, but the move to the Cloud has also impacted marketing. Marketers understand a new approach is necessary when companies are planning cloud migrations or are already getting ERP system updates every six months.
Five years ago, many customers still felt they didn't need to move to the Cloud. And some ISV companies were still resistant to adapting their technology to cloud-based systems. We don't see that anymore.
Now we have ISV offerings that are compatible with Dynamics 365 and Power Platform, as well as legacy ERP and CRM.
In a world of constant updates, marketers need to be trusted guides. They must provide their expertise to different roles and look at what they can offer as a service."
Q: What do you look back on as your best decisions of the last 15 years?
Jason: "Looking back, the decision to focus our business exclusively on the Microsoft business applications ecosystem was undoubtedly one of our best. This space was relatively immature 15 years ago, but we saw the potential.
We have seen the Dynamics product line evolve from purely on-premises to fully cloud-based with Power Platform, and still connected to Microsoft's larger strategy. The Dynamics channel has changed but remains healthy. That is not the case for every Microsoft or enterprise software product.
Deciding to stay fully digital and fully committed to a niche that has proved to be quite robust has worked out well for us.
A large part of our success is due to the help we've received from people in this channel. Microsoft MVPs who've written articles and marketers who let us prove we could deliver results have been invaluable."
Adam: "When we launched MSDW, we were the only digital marketing platform available to ISVs and partners. Everybody was just relying on rented lists, Google ads, or in-person trade shows.
We built a whole digital marketing infrastructure for this channel. We had to sell people on an entirely new concept in the first few years. It was challenging, but we always had fun doing it because we believed our idea would work.
Having faith in yourself is critical for entrepreneurs. There are inherent risks to starting a business, and 15 years ago, we invested our life savings in getting this going. You must be motivated to push through when everything is on the line. I never thought there was a plan B if this didn't work. It had to work.
I am proud that we bootstrapped the whole thing. And we made the decision not to seek private equity funding even after we had a proven concept.
Likely, we probably could have accelerated our growth sooner if we had taken money from outside investors. But I don't think we would be as happy with the outcome. That's been the most important thing to us."
Q: You started your partnership 15 years ago; what has made the relationship work?
Adam: "Jason and I have been business partners longer than I've been married. We still talk multiple times a day and strategize like we did when building MSDW 15 years ago.
I appreciate that neither of us has lost our entrepreneurial spirit. Our dynamic has always been good, partly because we have different personalities. I am the much more impulsive one of the duo, and Jason tends to calm me down. It’s a great balance.
We're constantly trying to come up with new ideas, be nimble, and pivot when needed. And we are not afraid to take calculated risks.
We have a small team, and everybody does a great job. We want our team to feel that we are lucky to have them work for us rather than the other way around."
Jason: "We both came to this business at the same point in our lives. We had been working as employees at larger companies, and we were ready to make a change in our professional lives. We have the same goals and values about how we want to be as business owners. That has worked well because we've always been going in the same direction.
One of our favorite things is discussing new ideas for the site or developing new programs. We still approach it with the same energy between us as we did in the beginning.
Our business is just a bit older than my oldest child and a few years older than Adam's children. I am sure there is a metaphor there about the business growing up and maturing, but I don't know exactly what it is. Ask me again in five years."
Q: Where do you think MSDynamicsWorld will be by your 20th anniversary?
Jason: "We are always trying to find ways to provide more data to our clients about leads they receive from MSDW so that they are as qualified as possible.
In 2023 we will be including account-based marketing capabilities with our programs. We want to give marketers more data, for example, the types of content their leads prefer to consume in terms of format and topic. We'd like to provide information identifying what stage of the buying cycle their leads are in when they hit our portal.
Our MSDW campaigns target specific roles, industries, business focus areas, and regions. We want to give our clients the tools for better targeting."
Adam: "We've always loved the idea of partnerships, but we found it difficult because our business model differed from everybody else's.
In the last two years, perhaps because of the increased digital focus of the market, we have formed strong partnerships and joint programs with PartnerTalks and ERP/CRM Software Blogs. The most recent is a joint membership offer with Dynamics User Group.
A priority going forward will be strengthening our existing partnerships and looking for new ones. We want to create a more extensive network. There are so many companies that have complementary offerings. When we all work together, it gives marketers in this channel a roadmap to find what they need."
No doubt our channel will continue to see innovations from MSDynamicsWorld.com
Adam concluded this interview by saying:
"I have a hard time recognizing our success. Call it paranoia, but I’m terrified of complacent thinking. If you work hard to get somewhere, that doesn't mean you should stop because you're there. You just have to keep on working hard. There is a lot more that Jason and I want to accomplish with this business."
Stay tuned.
By Anya Ciecierski, ERP/CRM Software Blog Editor, www.erpsoftwareblog.com