Westwind Digital Communications

What a great week! The Super Bowl was amazing and good for the city of New Orleans. Not much is more American than Super Bowl Sunday. Here at Westwind Digital we have been putting a lot of time in going over new features that will be out and available for the public to help them be more efficient in their communication efforts. One such feature, although not completely new, is the Oaisys backed Talkument™ voice recording system. This system is ideal for high call traffic volumes and really gives the management personnel a valuable training and service tool. Making sure that customer service reps are providing an excellent level of service is critical in these days of economic uncertainty. The retention of business and revenue depends on your ability to oversee these calls and the Talkument™ and Tracer™ software offer several advantages to help you ensure this. From call monitoring to on the fly supervisory assistance these tools take the guess work out of call center effectiveness.
Talkument™ has a myriad of reporting tools that will help management review call volume, procedure compliance and overall service levels through documented voice recordings of any calls. Management can use this tool to store, organize, playback and share calls with team members for training, evaluation and other administrative purposes. This software works directly with a number of leading telephone systems such as Toshiba, Mitel and Avaya just to name a few. The Talkument™ is intuitively designed to help users quickly locate recordings by conducting searches over a wide range of parameters. This tool is a great investment into your organization and training on the product is extremely user friendly.
Tracer™ is another tool that is becoming more and more popular. It is a desk top agent that adds advanced quality assurance, development and reporting tools that are bundled into one comprehensive system. With Tracer Live Call™ supervisors can monitor a call and give feedback to the agent through instant messages. This tool can really help in managing dissatisfied customers as well be a helpful tool in situational training. From a sales standpoint Tracer gives management the ability to monitor calls and verify up sell opportunities as well as resolve sales related disputes. Both of these tools are designed to assist the business owner, management and team members in the handling of calls and have been successfully installed in everything from doctor’s offices to dispatch centers. Please give one of our sales engineers a call and let us explain in more detail how Westwind Digital, Talkument™ and Tracer™ can help your business in this ultra competitive age we are in.

“What’s up with That?”
Rick Mulroney/Westwind Digital
I am sure you have all noticed it. Every where you go there is some of it to be on display for all to see. Sure, during the holidays it can be expected to some degree but it’s been going on for a while. Rudeness! Now it seems every day tasks are being met with rude responses with everything from shopping to pumping gas. I began to notice this trend a while back while in line at a convenience store. The poor girl working the counter was merely the first person this aggravated customer would lash into over the gas pump she parked at being out of order. The counter attendant did everything she could to apologize, offer a solution and get a supervisor to help her none of which appeased the woman. I am not sure how the situation ended as I merely moved along on my own way but I thought about it a lot and made sure to inform my children of the incident and how that must of made that girl feel. This was not the last case where rudeness raised its ugly head and sure wouldn’t be the last time I would ask myself why people feel it is ok to be that way.
Here in Oklahoma we recently had what was called the “Blizzard of 09” by the local media. It came on Christmas Eve and all but shut down our beautiful city on what could arguably be the most important shopping day of the year for some of us procrastinators. As many people scurried around as quick as possible to get the supplies we would need for the next several days as warned by the weather man and brave souls out doing live remotes much like you would see for a hurricane more and more disrespect for each other was being unearthed. I witnessed two ladies almost come to blows over a shopping cart! Yes, a shopping cart, an empty shopping cart. It could be said that under those circumstances it is understandable but I don’t think that is the case at all. I feel like many are just waiting for the opportunity to be rude to someone for several of personal reasons. We see it in traffic all the time, some one accidentally pulls in front of someone else and the devil comes out cursing, throwing things and even in some cases bearing arms.
That leads me to the moral of the story for the dawn of 2010; being rude to people is just plain rude. None more important than in the service industry where even if you are perceived as being rude you are! What can we do to help keep our customer service skills upbeat, positive and effective? Lead by example as leaders is the first thing, show your sales associates, service technicians and office staff what proper service is and be sure to offer them a compliment whenever you can. Sometimes it can be quite the challenge when someone is being rude to you. You probably just want to let them have it but we all know that doesn’t accomplish much if anything at all. It is better to just smile and bear it knowing that you’re doing the right thing; you’ll feel better about yourself and maybe, just maybe, the person across the counter from will learn a lesson from you. As we move forward in this new decade let’s try to be good to each other 365 days at a time.

“Tis the Season”
Rick Mulroney/Westwind Digital
Well here we are again, another holiday season is on us and I may not be alone when I say, “Man that was fast”. Seems like just a few days ago the smell of fireworks was still in the air. Anyway, with the holiday season comes a few challenges for business owners and operators. For one, making sure your business stays productive and efficient when the natural tendency is to relax a little bit and enjoy the times. That’s all well and good but your customers may not have the same mentality. One of the things that happens at our office is the phone rings in a different way this time of year. It rings with a sense of urgency, like that call you know about before you answer it knowing the party on the other end is in need of some help.
Being in the service industry it is important for us to take each one of those calls and treat it like it was our only concern of the day even though it’s not. For your business it may be something else that gets your phone ringing but make sure your aware of how well your phone is being answered; if you use an automated greet maybe change the greeting to inform your callers of special events or promotions going on in your business during the holidays. Also, let callers know about your hours and when you will be closed over the holidays. If you have a live voice answering your phones encourage them to be friendly and understanding how anxious people can get this time of year.
Next, a little year end maintenance for your phone and video system is also a good idea. Get out your old trust can of compressed air, or you can get a new one at your local office supply store and get all the dust blown away from the fans, cables and connections. Take a minute and go through all those voice mails and delete the ones you don’t need anymore. Get some wet naps and clean the handsets and button pads and if your speed dial and other soft key buttons are worn out, go ahead and make some new ones and update any numbers you may need to. On your video system, once again with the air can blow out the fans and connections, clean the lens on your cameras with a wet nap and tighten all your connectors. All of these tedious yet simple tasks will ensure that when you walk into the office on January 4th, 2010 you’ll be ready for a great New Year.
Happy Holidays from Westwind Digital.

If you read our blog often you see a theme (aside from the random movie quotes) that usually starts, “We were talking to a customer . . . “

Being in business for 20 years you get to see and hear a lot of things. Fortunately this time it was not a situation Westwind Digital or the customer created, but it was a headache we both had to deal with. The topic today is the importance of structured cabling and maintaining the integrity of your investment.

A small business had made the investment when moving into a new office of going with structured cabling. One reason is they went with a VoIP telephone system.

There are many reasons compelling to go with a structured cabling system. Instead of rehashing them, here is a good article citing a few of them.

http://www.technology-toolkit.com/computers-and-technology/what-is-a-structured-cabling-system

What we ran into was an electrical subcontractor that came in behind us. As you can see below, they ran the electrical lines literally on top of ours.

An example of what not to do.

What is the big deal you ask? Great question! Electric lines put out a lot of “noise” and interfere with the signal going through a CAT 5 line even if the cables are shielded. This interference will make any phone sound like you are talking in a tin can and could even knock a computer off the network. Here is an example of what a good structured cable should look like:

What a good run should look like.

Not that we are telling you how to run a business. If you paid for structured cabling, you might as well reap the benefits of having it.

In conversating (I once had a manager with an MBA use that word three times in a short conversation) with a customer recently, I thought it might be necessary to revisit telephone interconnect basics.

There is a line between having the features found on a home phone and ones found in a business setting and it is not fine. If you want nothing more than to pick up a phone when it rings, then an off the rack telephone from Office Depot is all you need. If there are certain features you desire, then it unfortunately goes beyond just plugging it into the wall. These are a few of the features you can get with a business phone system:

• Automated Attendant
• Caller ID
• Call Logging
• Direct Inward Line
• Door Box
• Door Striker
• Group Rings
• Music on Hold
• Names for Extensions and Trunks
• Night Service
• Off Premise Extension
• T1 Interface
• Voice Mail Capability

Just as there’s a Chiltons Guide for working on my Acura, there are guides out there to installing a phone system to your PBX. It goes something like this:

Cable One Color Code
White-Blue
Blue-White
White-Orange
Orange-White
White-Green
Green-White
White-Brown
Brown-White

Cable Two Color Code
White-Slate
Slate-White
Red-Blue
Blue-Red
Red-Orange
Orange-Red
Red-Green
Green-Red

Repeat four more times! And that is just steps four and five. It does not even get into the programming of the system.

No thanks. In the end it’ll cost more to un-mess up my boo boo (I am using nice words) than it would to hire a technician that knows what they are doing to install it. I know, I know there are people out there that eat this kind of thing up, but for one thing, they are not reading this blog. Another, is business people know their strengths and weaknesses and how much their time is worth. That’s why there is AutoZone and a Firestone; a website and Westwind Digital Communications.

It has been particularly wet this month in Oklahoma. It seems a little early for all the rain, but I’ll never complain about an early fall. Weather like this reminds me of the fall days as an undergrad on the best campus in the nation, but I digress. I know this will sound a little weird for a company to give advice as to how to keep our company from prematurely visiting your phone closet, but think of us as your telephone doctors. Medical doctors are paid for fixing your ailments, but would rather see you healthy. Right?

The past few weeks have been busy here at Westwind Digital Communications. The thunderstorms have been strong this fall and I’ve been told when you hear thunder there is lighting. Or is it when you see lighting there is thunder. Can you have one without the other? Hmmmm. Where was I?

Ah yes, busy weeks. The lightning monster has been feasting on unsuspecting and, worse yet, unprotected telephone systems. The key word in that sentence is “unprotected.” A simple $100 UPS battery backup and surge protector will save hundreds if not thousands of dollars. Hundreds if we can replace a few parts. Thousands if the whole telephone system gets fried.

It’s as easy as this. A good salesperson should do a good needs analysis. Based on what they find they should come up with a full package to fulfill all your needs. When looking at the proposal, if there are items that do not make sense to you, simply ask. A good salesperson can justify their proposal and not add fluff. Loooooong story short is do not skimp. There may be ways to cut costs, but just like my dad says, “You get what you pay for son.” In the end, ask yourself, “What will it cost us to go without phones for a few days?”

Most of the time we get your run-of-the-mill telephone system request. That does not mean we take short cuts when it comes to finding out about a customer’s operations. For one thing, as a trust I.T. provider we do not want to over look any aspect as it may come back to haunt us down the road. Secondly, asking the right questions allows us to sometimes find a way we can make a customer more efficient and save money at the same time. That‘s when we become a trusted partner in their business.

I have stated this before, we are lucky to have some of the best technicians in the entire state of Oklahoma. Combined they account for over 100 years of technical expertise. That does not mean they are miracle workers and when its time for a phone system to be put to rest, it’s time. We had a customer who was seeing more and more of our techs at a regular interval.

Chad and I went to see them and after doing some digging, we discovered a way to save them over $6,600 a year on their phone bill. The main office was in Oklahoma City and had two satellite offices in Edmond and Wilson Oklahoma. They also had an employee that worked out of her home in Albuquerque, NM. The office in South OKC had been connected point-to-point to Edmond with a dedicated T1 line and all four locations were incurring considerable long distance charges as they all interacted with one another on a daily basis.

What did we come up with for a solution? Well, we installed a new Toshiba CIX 670 phone system, ordered a PRI from AT&T, and killed the dedicated T1 line between the two offices. On the phone system was a new MAS (Media Application Server) with unified messaging and fax to desktop. This centralized the voicemail for all four locations. We then set up a VPN (Virtual Private Network) and tied all four offices together using Cisco routers. This way we were able to utilize VoIP and eliminate the long distance charges from the telephone carrier. Another great benefit is we did NOT need to travel to New Mexico to set up the home office. Our technician simply programmed the phone and mailed it to the young lady’s home in Albuquerque. All she had to do was plug her phone in and she was off and calling! Now any call comes to the receptionist in OKC and she is able to rout it to the proper office with the caller not knowing where they called in the first place.

In the end, the customer really did not care what we had done. They got a new phone system, it works, and he saves money every month. Simple as that.

Although I have never personally done a remodel, I know people who have had to endure that grueling chore. I’ve been told that a remodel is slightly better than building a new house, to which I have heard that fun task called a divorce maker. In other words, it’s no fun. The other aspect to both that I have heard is the budget is a starting point, and not what you are going to spend on the project.

Recently we were called out to replace the phone system at a hotel that was going through a remodel and name change. Not that he was very excited to spend the extra money on a new Toshiba phone system near the end of an 18-month remodel; although he was lucky we got the 24-year-old Mitel to work as long as it did. Our techs are the best in Oklahoma, but they stopped making parts for the beast in the late 80’s. There comes to a point when you get past bubble gum, duct tape, and prayers to keep an electronic device working. The boys had gotten there about seven service calls before, and I’m not joking about the size either. Imagine a square version of R2D2 that’s less mobile.

Before the Mitel system finally died, he had asked us to come out and evaluate where to put video surveillance cameras. Morton’s Salt and Murphy were running the gambit on our poor customer and I do not fault him one bit for dropping the camera job to replace the phone system. He was ready to get the whole remodel behind him.

The only problem was part of the remodel was installing nice new Panasonic 42” plasma flat screen televisions. I say it was a problem because those TVs started to walk out of the hotel. Unfortunately, it was not hard. This is a huge hotel and it has multiple exits spread out all over several buildings. Had he decided to go ahead when he first called to have us put in the video surveillance system, he would have actually saved money by not replacing the televisions. I guess this way it makes for a better “lessons learned” story.

I bet you are assuming since we are a telecom I would be writing about pre-paid calling cards, but I’m not. Wait, do they even still sell those? Anyway, being a telephone interconnect we have a certain skill set that non-profits can rarely utilize.

The YWCA in Oklahoma City has a 24-hour crisis center hotline was in need of an overhaul. Josh Beasley, the CDO for the Oklahoma City YWCA, came to Westwind Digital and asked for our opinion as to what needed to be done. Westwind Digital Communications was able to help facilitate some of the change when the owner and president of the Company, Chad NesSmith, donated a Panasonic phone system with voicemail, the man-hours, and all new wiring to get it installed. Chad said, “The YWCA came to us because they had a telecom need, and we were happy to be able to help.”

Another location in Oklahoma City, the McFarland Branch, has been through several months of repair, change, and growth recently. “The McFarland Branch donation was well over $8,000” Chad said, “but the more exciting news was saving the YWCA Gaylord Service complex over $600 a month with the phone system upgrade we provided.” Mr. NesSmith went on to say, “We did not want the YWCA to sacrifice services to the woman and children who needed the hotline or shelter because of reoccurring monthly costs. Switching from 16 separate phone lines to a T1 PRI will save the YWCA over $7,300 a year.”

Americans and especially Oklahomans are known for their generosity. When all you hear in the press is bad news, this warms the heart a little knowing I work for a company that cares.

The last blog got me thinking about how it is we convey what it is we do here at Westwind Digital. That seems to be an easy answer, but when talk about technical issues to non-technical people you can see the fog in their brains begin to form. Mind you we all have certain levels of technical talk we can be comfortable with. If you want to see a haze form in my eyes start talking about HTML code or TCP/IP. Zzzzzzzzzz, What? I’m sorry I just woke up.

My 30-second commercial sums it up best when I tell people we help business owners sleep at night. With Westwind Digital they do not need to worry about whether or not their phones are working. They do not need to worry about customer or employee shrinkage because of their video surveillance, and they do not need to worry if their accounts receivable department is able to send out invoices due to I.T. issues. It is a bit simplistic, but it lets the listener know about our three areas of business VOICE, DATA, and VIDEO in terms a business owner can understand and appreciate. Features like unified messaging, voice over IP, and structured cabling are just that, features. People who run small businesses have a hard enough job. Their #1 job is in to make money and if we can help save them money, then that is what will keep us in business.