ConnectWise PSA Helps Axcell Technologies Grow 50% in One Year

Sept. 30, 2011 - PRLog -- Axcell Technologies is a respected provider of outsourced IT services in the Chicago area. Axcell serves a variety of industries including manufacturing, real estate, healthcare, transportation, and finance. As the company grew, President Rick Vines began looking for an integrated Professional Services Automation (PSA) solution to help better manage the dispatch and scheduling aspects of the service ticket process. During the evaluation process, Vines was impressed with the functionality that ConnectWise had to offer and how it tied in to all areas of the business. “ConnectWise is at the center of what we do. We use it for just about everything on the operations side.” said Vines.

Documenting and proving value to clients
ConnectWise has given Axcell a way to keep track of everything that happens—which has helped them demonstrate the value they provide to clients. Through audit trails and response time measurements, Vines has all the information he needs in one system to evaluate the issue resolution process. Vines explains, “We no longer have to search through emails and try to piece together information from different systems. When a client brings up an issue with our service and we need to look back at what happened, I have all the data I need. For example, if a client says that we were slow to respond, I can present the facts including how long it took us to resolve the particular issue, as well as our average response and resolution times. For us, that is huge. We want to stop any negative client perception as soon as we can.”  

With ConnectWise, Axcell can effectively demonstrate to clients that they are meeting service level agreements (SLAs). “Before ConnectWise, we could not measure our response times. We always thought we were good, but we had no way to prove it. With ConnectWise, we can report on SLA metrics and know we average a 12 minute response time and, very often, we go for days and days with a 3 minute response time. With those numbers in hand, we can tell clients that we can manage those SLA metrics very closely and report on them.”

Vines is also impressed with how easily he can provide detailed business reviews to his clients. “Because we gather a huge amount of information, we can provide great detail to our clients in our quarterly business reviews. We can show activity and trends based on all of the data we gather on a minute-by-minute basis in ConnectWise.” Through detailed reports of metrics and all the behind the scenes work, Vines can prove Axcell’s value to clients which helps increase customer satisfaction.

ConnectWise gives us the ability to scale up more quickly without having to necessarily add more staff.

Better time management helps foster 50% growth
Since implementing a dispatch strategy, Vines has gained more accountability from his team. Through ConnectWise, each engineer can view the goals and objectives set for them, and they can see whether they are meeting those measurements in real time. Vines says, “ConnectWise gives us the ability to track issues and move a ticket through the system to completion. We can see if we have technicians to schedule. From the technician’s point of view, ConnectWise allows them to better manage their time and complete assignments.”
The workflow rules and alerts in ConnectWise also help Axcell process a large number of tickets without adding additional staff. “As a business owner, the last thing you want is to grow and then, in the process, have your ability to provide quality service to your clients go down,” remarks Vines. “ConnectWise gives us the ability to scale up more quickly without having to necessarily add more staff. We can also keep a close eye on our ability to deliver quality service. In 2010, we experienced over 50% growth. We can attribute part of that to our ability to more easily manage new business as well as existing clients.”

Axcell uses a number of the ConnectWise modules to save even more time across their business. Vines shares the time savings Axcell enjoys from configurations, the ability to integrate with schedules, projects and invoicing. “Invoicing is really easy. We can rate our agreement invoices once a month. It takes us about a half hour to do and then we email them out.” When asked how that compares with Axcell’s old process, Vines laughs. “We used to have to go through and gather remote control logs to see what we worked on and calculate all that time and import it into Excel. There were also additional steps to take before we could finally print and mail them. It was a very lengthy process.”

Vines points out another powerful time saving feature in ConnectWise, “I can assign custom rates per technician per work type. Whatever my agreement is with the client, I can say a junior tech on site is $80 per hour. For another client, that same technician might be $90. I can put whatever we negotiate with the client in the system and I don’t have to worry about it. ConnectWise automatically applies all those rules. It’s a huge timesaver.”

The ConnectWise Community: A powerful business coach
Axcell has also taken advantage of the many benefits the ConnectWise Community has to offer. By becoming a business coach to IT service providers, ConnectWise disseminates best practices and other resources that will help partners grow their businesses more quickly. Vines states, “Our participation in the ConnectWise community has had a powerful impact on our business. It’s been a huge part of what has made ConnectWise successful for us. We have thousands of peers that can help us answer questions and provide best practices, as well as hundreds of vendors that integrate with ConnectWise.”  Axcell uses a couple of the add-ons, including ConnectSmart which has given them the ability to see real time metrics for their business. “The willingness of our peers to share their hard work with everyone is really unique. I’ve been in this business a long time, and it’s hard to find a user community who is more passionate about a product.”

Vines is impressed with the strong relationship that ConnectWise strives to maintain with the user community. He describes the commitment ConnectWise has made to the Enhancements Forum and the effort at making it a user-driven product. “ConnectWise has demonstrated that they are not just developing products in isolation. They are really out there to try and see how products work in real life. The community makes people feel comfortable, and see they are part of the process.”

Managing future business opportunities with ConnectWise
ConnectWise has enabled Axcell to manage their entire business in one application. With ConnectWise, Vines reports that his company is saving time, eliminating errors, invoicing for all billable hours, and providing greater detail to clients. “ConnectWise has made a dramatic impact on our business. We are growing. We completed an acquisition three years ago and are planning more.. ConnectWise made the acquisition simpler and if a company is already running ConnectWise, it makes the integration that much easier.”

To Vines, ConnectWise has demonstrated a solid commitment to adding and expanding functionality, developing comprehensive reference materials and training, supporting an active user community, and providing top notch technical support. As Axcell continues its growth, Vines knows he can rely on ConnectWise to take his business to the next level.

“We no longer have to search through emails and try to piece together information from different systems. When aclient brings up an issue with our service and we need to look back at what happened, I have all the data I need…For us, that is huge.”  -Rick Vines, President, Axcell Technologies

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Axcell Technologies provides it's client with "I.T. without the Drama" by delivering a customized suite of technical services and support. Axcell provides services to clients throughout the Chicago Metro area and is proud to be celebrating it's 13th year in business.

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