Building on Velocity West's experience in the ISP space, Call Resource offers ISPs outsourced helpdesk services with a solid technical background and straightforward pricing.

by Jeff Goldman [November 5, 2003]

Call Resource was created in August of this year (2003) by the founders of Velocity West, with the initial aim of serving Velocity West's customers. "We needed a call center to support our clientele at a higher level than we could get from outsourcing, and we had enough volume to justify bringing it in house," says Jeff Laster, the company's Chief Operating Officer.

Most established helpdesk providers, Laster says, fall into two different categories. "Typically, you have call centers who understand ISP needs on the technical side of things, but they don't have the tools in place to give you the type of reporting you need to manage the business," he says. "They gather a portion of the information, and you're able to get bits and pieces of it, but it's not kept all in one spot."

The second category consists of larger providers who don't understand the specific needs of ISPs. "There are some good high-end call centers out there, such as eTelecare," Laster says. "But it's a general call center. They might be taking care of banks, or retail, or ISPs, or CLECs, so the information that they're gathering is strictly marketing-related. They know very little about the specific industry needs."

Call Resource was founded to combine the strengths of both categories. "We have the flexibility to take care of very sophisticated clientele, and we also have services that go all the way down to just general tech support, as in 'Here's an 800 number, put it up, and we'll take care of all your tech calls for you,'" Laster says.

Solid technology
One of Call Resource's greatest strengths lies with the proprietary software that the company has developed both for Velocity West and for the new call center. "In our back office, if you need information, we can gather that information," Laster says. "You're able to manage your customers, look at call volumes, and get reports to manage your business."

The fact that the software was developed in-house also gives Call Resource a great deal of flexibility in terms of the kind of reporting a customer can receive. "If they need to monitor calls for training or for quality assurance, we can do that," Laster says. "We can manage based upon SLA: if the SLA calls for recording of 100 percent of all calls, then we can put a program in place to do that."

The call center supervisors for Call Resource came straight from Velocity West's NOC, giving them a solid understanding of the needs of most ISPs. "They're very knowledgeable on how to support Internet services, they're very knowledgeable on the type of customers they'll be dealing with, and they're very familiar with multiple back office systems-not only our own, but Rodopi and OptiGold and so forth," Laster says.

Unlike many helpdesk providers, Call Resource is extremely straightforward about its pricing. "We're pretty aggressive coming out of the gate, to gather new business and to get as much momentum as possible," Laster says. The company's pricing is structured as follows:

Subscribers	0-500	501-2k	2k-10k	10k+
Non Branded 12 hr	$0.95	$0.85	$0.75	$0.65
Non Branded 24 hr	$1.45	$1.25	$1.15	$1.00
Branded 12hr	$1.00	$0.90	$0.80	$0.70
Branded 24 hr	$1.50	$1.30	$1.20	$1.05
Reporting	$100	$100	$100	$100

Industry experience
While the call center was initially developed to support Velocity West's own ISP clients, Laster says the company is focusing increasingly on marketing its services to other ISP customers. About 80 percent of Call Resource's clients are currently customers of Velocity West: Laster says he expects that number to balance out soon to 50 percent or so.

Being located in Abilene, Texas gives Call Resource access to students and graduates from four nearby universities, as well as a number of skilled workers living in the immediate area. "There aren't a lot of booming tech jobs in Abilene, so this gives some bright people an opportunity to find employment," Laster says.

The fact that Call Resource lists pricing options for ISPs with 0-500 customers makes it attractive to smaller ISPs—but Laster says the company is targeting ISPs of all sizes. And it's good to have Velocity West's full range of services as an additional offering: a number of companies, Laster says, have come to Call Resource for helpdesk services and have decided to make use of Velocity West's back office as well.

Ultimately, Laster says, Call Resource was designed to give ISPs a chance to work with a tech support company that fully understands their industry. "Our techs are keyed right into the wholesale side of the industry, the way that the networks and vendors sell to VISPs and other wholesalers," he says. "They really understand what's going on."

— End

Related articles:
	[May 7, 2003]	Wholesale Dialup Directory: Velocity West
	[Sept. 9, 2002]	It's Not Easy Being Cheap
	[Dec. 13, 2001]	Qwest to Increase Internet2's Speed

Online resources:
	Outsourced Customer Support Directory
	Quick Reference Chart