Should we ask an MSP if they have experience in our line of business?

General IT skills transfer between industries, but the knowledge that makes support fast lives in the specifics: the practice-management or point-of-sale system your business runs on, the compliance rules that apply to you (HIPAA for medical and dental, PCI for card payments), and the rhythm of your work, like month-end close or a seasonal rush, when downtime costs triple. A provider that already supports your line-of-business application knows its vendor, its quirks, and its upgrade landmines before your first ticket.

A yes is easy to say, so verify it. Ask which of their current clients are in your industry, which of your specific applications they support today, and whether a same-industry client would take a reference call. For regulated fields, get concrete: will you sign a business associate agreement, and what role did you play in a client's last compliance review or insurance questionnaire? Named software and a willing reference are experience; an unspecific 'we work with everyone' is marketing.

The honest caveat: a strong MSP can absolutely learn a new vertical, and every provider once had a first client in every industry they now know well. The fundamentals (security, backup, documentation, response) transfer completely. Where you should not be the guinea pig is the compliance-heavy fields: if you are a medical or dental practice or you handle sensitive data at scale, prior experience stops being a preference and becomes a requirement. Dental and medical offices can read our practice-specific version of this question.