Ecommerce Company Dramatically Improves Sales After Switching to Zultys
Because of the number of calls not answered or improperly routed by our old phone system, we’ve determined that over a 2-year period by us not switching to Zultys sooner, it has cost Quality Logo Products an estimated $1,250,000.00. I attribute this to the fact that the Zultys system does a WAY better job of handling analog lines and effectively routing our calls to our representatives than our prior system. I also won’t miss the many sleepless nights where I used to have to worry about whether or not the phone system would be working when I arrived in the office the next day.
Profile
- National distributor of promotional products and marketing giveaways
- Their existing system was unreliable and resulted in a large number of missed business opportunities
- In need of a scalable phone system that would allow for future expansion
The Customer
Quality Logo Products is a national distributor of promotional products and marketing giveaways based in Aurora, IL. Established in 2003, Quality Logo Products maintains a call center staffed with 70+ experts in the field of corporate advertising. Consistently ranked by the Inc. 500 as one the fastest growing companies in the Chicago metro area; Quality Logo Products estimates 2013 ad specialty revenue of $25,000,000.00 — a 25% increase YOY compared to 2012.
The Challenge
As Quality Logo Products expanded their sales force, the company realized they were outgrowing their current phone system. They agreed that they needed to look for a more modern solution to invest in that could scale over time.
Because of their office location in an under developed area, analog lines are more reliable and less expensive to maintain than SIP Trunking. This meant that while Quality Logo Products’ business needs required their phone system to have highly sophisticated call routing and call statistics as well as unified communications (UC), analog line support was also a must.
In 2011, Quality Logo Products purchased an Asterisk-based phone system, but it soon became apparent that rather than solve problems, the new phone system just caused more of them resulting in a large number of missed business opportunities. Quality Logo Products was spending 15-20 man hours a week on maintenance; there were complaints of dropped calls, incoming calls were often routed incorrectly or even unanswered by the phone system.
The Solution
Our previous system required constant hand holding and troubleshooting,” said Bret Bonnet, president of Quality Logo Products. “There wasn’t a day that we wouldn’t have 5 or more trouble tickets. When you’re an e-commerce company, customers expect you to be open and available 24/7 – no exceptions. Rain or shine — we’re open for business. Our weakest link has always been our phone system.
With the help of Aavex Technology, a certified Zultys channel partner, Quality Logo Products implemented an MX250 redundant IP PBX for high reliability.
Users constitute a mix of operators, sales agents, and customer service agents as part of multiple call groups utilizing Zultys’ Integrated Contact Center solution. As their sales agents are paid on commission, Zultys’ reliable call routing options help ensure that all calls are distributed fairly among the agents. An acceptable response time is also maintained for all calls. Quality Logo Products uses the Call Center edition of MXreport software to provide daily scheduled Call Center reports that are automatically emailed to management after each shift.
Since a number of full-time employees work remotely on a regular basis, Quality Product Logo utilizes Zultys Mobile Communicator for iPhone. This alongside MXIE UC client for the desktop has rendered a lengthy drive to the office virtually unnecessary.
As Quality Logo Products already purchased IP phones from another vendor to use with their previous phone system, the Zultys MX open SIP standards platform allowed them to repurpose these 3rd party IP phones their employees were used to, instead of having to acquire new sets.
“After we completed the migration (on a Thursday night because Fridays tend to be slightly slower than average), our call volume doubled!” said Bonnet. “It was as if someone flipped a switch, which in a sense, we did. The power switched to our MX250, and the calls just started coming in.”
The Impact
With the implementation of Zultys’ MX250, Quality Logo Products achieved these benefits:
- Eliminated dropped and improperly-routed calls while gaining record setting sales numbers;
- Garnered huge savings on the phone system maintenance costs; and
- Simplified office operations and allow for reliable remote worker support with the MXIE UC client.
The company also discovered just how many calls they’d been missing in the last two years with their old system.
According to Bonnet, “We’ve determined that over a 2 year period, because of the number of calls not answered or improperly routed by our old phone system, by not switching to Zultys sooner cost Quality Logo Products an estimated $1,250,000.00. I attribute this to the fact that the Zultys system does a WAY better job of handling analog lines and effectively routing our calls to our representatives than our prior system.”
He continued, “I’ll tell you one thing though — I won’t miss the many sleepless nights where I used to have to worry about whether or not the phone system would be working when I arrived in the office the next day. I trust Zultys as it never has — nor has it given me any reason to think it will — let me down.”
