When customers think of remote support, the first thing that comes to mind is often attended remote access. Specifically, they’re likely thinking of a time they had an urgent issue that required instant, on-demand assistance. With attended access, the customer can receive immediate support from a technician who gains remote access to their device and troubleshoots the issue with the customer on the line.
On the other hand, customers may be less likely to think about unattended access because it doesn’t require their presence. However, unattended access is extremely important for MSPs because it allows them to provide regular maintenance and support to customer devices on an ongoing basis—without supervision. To have to perform routine activities like software updates and IT infrastructure management with the customer present is not only a hindrance to your MSP’s operations, but also an inconvenience for your customers. For this reason, having unattended access capabilities is critical.
Unattended access means you don’t have to disrupt the customer’s operations by requiring them to grant control every time they need support. Instead, you’ll have remote access to customer devices at any time of the day, eliminating the need to walk them through the initial connection process for every routine task. Unattended access can save support technicians a significant amount of time and saves customers from the potential headache of helping facilitate a remote connection.
To utilize unattended remote access, you’ll need to install remote support software on all the devices that require support. Once you install the remote agent, your technicians will be able to connect to and work on these devices from anywhere as needed.
2. Support for high-resolution monitors and multi-monitor situations
Many remote support solutions are unable to handle high-resolution monitors or multi-monitor situations. If you want to offer customers a support solution built to handle modern business set-ups, then high-resolution remote support for today’s monitors is a crucial remote support software feature. If your remote support software can’t support high-resolution monitors or if the remote viewer has limited functionality, technicians won’t be able to maximize their productivity. As such, you should look for a tool that supports both modern monitors (4K+) and small-format mobile screens.
3. Session recording
The remote support software you choose should offer full session recording and search, so that activity is archived and can be easily accessed for historical and quality analysis purposes. Having the option to record and store sessions is also useful for training purposes when new technicians join your team.
4. Branding and customization
With cybercrime predicted to cost the world a whopping $6 trillion by 2021, bad actors are constantly finding more creative and sophisticated ways to exploit their victims. If your customers hope to avoid becoming another statistic, it‘s important they can distinguish between legitimate remote support services and those that are trying to compromise their data.
In this regard, branding and customization remote support software features can be very useful, as you can teach your customers to only trust the remote support platform with your specific branding details—and to keep an eye out for those that may be trying to falsely adopt your look for malicious purposes. Branding capabilities also help keep your business at the forefront of your customer’s mind when receiving support, which reinforces your value.
5. Enterprise-grade security
It’s critically important that your help desk remote access software prioritizes security and is safe for your customers to use. Key security features to look for include advanced encryption protocols, clipboard deletion capabilities, and support for multi-factor authentication and multi-level permissions.
6. Cross-platform support
Most MSPs will support a diverse customer base. For this reason, cross-platform support is a key remote support software feature. At a minimum, you should ensure the platform you choose supports Windows, Mac, and Linux devices. Ideally, the remote support tool should also support iOS and Android for mobile support.
7. A mobile application
While your technicians will often support customers remotely from their own computers, they might need to be able to access help desk details or establish a remote connection on-the-go. To enable your technicians to access and support customer devices from practically anywhere, look for a remote support tool that offers a mobile application available on iOS and Android devices.
8. Visibility into device details
Gaining in-depth insight into device details helps technicians accelerate problem solving—which means more resolved tickets and happier customers. Your remote support software should give you visibility into basic system info, health, drivers, and more.
Choosing the right remote support software
If you’re looking for a remote support tool that satisfies all of the above requirements, look no further than SolarWinds® Take Control. SolarWinds Take Control is built to help IT services providers support more customers through fast and intuitive remote support. Take Control gives you access to deep diagnostics from a single dashboard, centralizing your approach to remote support. It's designed to fit both your technicians’ workflows and your company’s budget, providing user-friendly support for both attended and unattended remote access.
This solution delivers all the key features listed in this guide—and many more. It provides rapid connection speeds to allow your technicians to connect, diagnose, and resolve issues in as little time as possible. Take Control also provides detailed insight into devices, giving you immediate insight into things like the device operating system, CPU, network information, and much more. To allow your MSP to support as many diverse customers as possible, Take Control supports Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, and Linux platforms. It features a mobile application as a native iOS or Android app, allowing technicians to access and support customer devices from anywhere with an internet connection.
With custom branding on support request methods, wait time alerts, emails, applets, the applet file name, post-session surveys, and more, you can drive home the value you provide for your customers. Take Control also enables seamless integration with SolarWinds Passportal™, which is a simple but highly secure password management solution. For MSPs interested in learning more, a 14-day free trial of Take Control is available.
If you’re looking for a more comprehensive solution, you may want to consider SolarWinds Remote Monitoring and Management or SolarWinds N-central® as an all-in-one alternative to Take Control. Both solutions include Take Control remote support software, but also provide a range of other remote monitoring features that allow MSPs to achieve a robust IT solution through a single tool.
