With a focus on providing personalized service, Internet Technical Services offers technical support and network monitoring for small and medium-size ISPs.

by Jeff Goldman [August 21, 2003]

Internet Technical Services, or ITS, began life as an ISP in the mid-90s. Todd Simmons, ITS's CTO, says the company quickly realized that support systems for small ISPs were few and far between. "You just couldn't get any help with support," Simmons said. "So we decided to create a call center specifically for small to midsize ISPs that can't afford to pay a staff to man the phones."

The company switched its focus to the call-center services in April of 1998. To test the new business model, ITS first ran a small pilot program for one ISP. "Our employees ran 24/7 tech support on a shoestring," Simmons said. "We did a good job, and from that point on, people heard about us. Since then, all of our business has come from word of mouth."

Internet Technical Services Voice: (888) 288-9074 sales@isptechs.com

Simmons says the focus on small to medium-size ISPs made sense, considering the company's background. "We went after the smaller market because we understood that market," he said. "We knew exactly what small ISPs went through, and what they were going to have to do in order to become successful."

Particularly in the late '90s, Simmons adds, support was a key issue for many smaller ISPs. "A lot of small ISPs didn't have any support, and they were losing customers to larger companies mainly because of that," he said. "So we realized, if we could go in and offer this at a price that small ISPs could afford, it was something that they would want to do."

Human interaction
The company's call center is divided into blocks, allowing a smaller group of technicians to focus on each ISP. "At any time, we have from four to seven blocks running on our floor," Simmons said. "There are anywhere from three to seventeen people in a block, and each ISP is assigned to one block. So when a customer calls in, they're going to talk to the same people on a regular basis."

For the same reason, customers aren't placed in a queue when they call in to ITS's call center. "We answer every single incoming call with a screener," Simmons said. "The phone will never ring more than six to seven times before someone actually picks it up and says, 'Thank you for calling [the ISP's name]. This is [the screener's name]: how may I help you?'"

Before ITS began serving ISP customers, the company ran a study regarding customers' experiences with call centers. "We determined that the most annoying thing for customers about call centers was the automated attendant saying, 'push one,' 'push two,' 'push three,'" Simmons said. "So we decided we would never use an automated attendant."

The lack of a queue does have a downside: Because calls aren't logged into a queue when they come in, ITS's reporting can't be as thorough as it might otherwise be. "We can tell you the number of calls that came in, how long the calls were, what the average call time was, that type of information," Simmons said. "But we don't do any more reporting than those basic items."

Additional services
All ISPs do, however, receive real-time network monitoring for no additional fee. "We do this because we understand that we've partnered with this ISP, and we're their front line," Simmons said. "If the ISP has a problem, we should be the first people to know. Since we're 24/7 anyway, we monitor all the major equipment for that ISP, using TCP/IP ports, every 60 seconds."

If a router goes down, a technician will contact the ISP's owner or an assigned representative within six minutes. Doing so, Simmons says, helps both ITS and the ISP customer. "If something is not working, it will increase the amount of calls we get," he said. "If we can take care of it before the calls come in, we have a jump on it and the customers will see that. It works for everybody."

ITS has also recently begun offering security auditing. "We have a security expert on staff now, and we're offering an audit to our customers at a discount price," Simmons said. "Identity theft and credit card theft are hot topics, and we can actually show an ISP how to protect themselves from such an attack. We don't guarantee that they'll never be attacked, but we can fix 95 percent of it."

The initial setup process comes down to signing three key documents: a service level agreement, a non-disclosure agreement, and a checklist of basic information about the ISP's system. Simmons says ITS usually requests five to seven business days to do the full setup, but they've begun taking calls in as little as four hours when necessary.

No contracts, no minimums
One aspect of ITS's service that makes the company particularly attractive to smaller ISPs is the fact that it doesn't require a long term commitment. "Our theory is that your customers are 30 day customers-90 percent of all ISP customers are 30 day at a time customers—and so we're not going to lock you into a six- or twelve-month contract," Simmons said. "It's a 30-day pay as you go."

There's also no minimum number of users, and no minimum fee. All pricing, which is based on the number of customers, can be viewed on ITS's website. Different pricing levels are available depending on whether the ISP wants 24/7 support, 7AM-11PM support, or weekend-only support.

Michael Koonce is the owner of Mt. Carmel Online, a small ISP based in Mount Carmel, Illinois. Koonce began working with ITS in April of 2002. He says the lack of a contract made it easy to try the service without risk, and he soon found it extremely worthwhile. "I'd been missing calls because I was doing it all myself," he said. "So after I signed up with them, I felt very relieved."

Despite his initial caution in signing up, Koonce says outsourcing makes a lot of sense for small ISPs like Mt. Carmel Online. "It's amazing how much time you have freed up, especially compared to the price of hiring somebody," he said. "And they make people feel good: I actually get compliments on the way they talk to people. It's really a benefit for a small ISP."

— End

Related articles:
	[Dec. 27, 2002]	We Need Cheap Overnight Tech Support
	[Sept. 15, 2000]	Outsourcing Your Affiliate Program
	[Sept. 22, 1999]	Startup Concerns

Online resources:
	Outsourced Customer Support Directory
	Quick Reference Chart