Awesome. I have never been called a marketing droid before. I will add this to my "cabal of insiders running ICANN" description on the list of "things I thought I would never be called". ;-)
Seriously, this touches on something that drives me a bit crazy and something that, IMHO, significantly limits the potential for some resellers in building their businesses. It is amazing to me how some people view customer service as a bunch of people answering a phone and "marketing organization" as a bunch of people (in a dank room with no windows) dialling a phone. The reality of great customer service and great customer acquisition for a service provider could not, IMHO, be further from the truth. I cannot comment on your service directly "domainwhiz" as you have always chosen to maintain a high degree of anonymity, but I can tell you that relatively few service providers (<10%) offer an email solution with webmail, anti-virus, good anti-spam, IMAP, etc.. Those that do better be maintaining a large base of mailboxes that they are selling (not bundling) for which they are getting paid or they are expending resources inefficiently. Great customer service is equal parts tools and love (caring about your customers). Both are necessary for it to be great. If I had to choose I would choose love, but love only gets you to "good" and tools get you to great. There has been much too much inattention to great customer service tools at the edge (where you guys are). There is also a ton of automation and imagination that can/should go into customer acquisition. Making it easier for your customers to buy stuff is equal parts art and science. Most of you are scientists yet you view this as all art. Also, to think that running sendmail (or qmail or....) is somehow differentiation is, IMHO, naive. It may have been differentiation in 1995, but (as I noted in my earlier post) so were dialler scripts and init strings. With Internet services todays innovation is tomorrows commodity. When started offering domain forwarding in 1997 it was cool. By 1999 it was canned. At the end of the day I think that we (us and you all) have failed to innovate sufficiently where it is needed (customer service, customer acquisition) and have spent too much time navel gazing. Just my thoughts. Regards Elliot Noss Tucows inc. 416-538-5494 > -----Original Message----- > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Sent: Tuesday, February 18, 2003 1:26 AM > To: 'Discuss List' > Subject: Re: Tucows E-mail Service > > > > No offense, but this sounds like marketing droid thinking to me.... > > IMO the only resellers who will likely be interested in this are those > who are already basically little more than marketing organizations, > providing little or no actual services themselves. > > > On Mon, 2003-02-17 at 19:22, elliot noss wrote: > > I think I will take this one and leave Bruce to do the real work. > > > > First, it is important to note that we have always been absolutely > > aware that this service would not appeal to everyone. That being said > > the market for outsourced email is huge. Most resellers we presented > > this to were extremely positive about offering the service. The more > > they heard, the more positive they responded. Don't forget, many more > > people need email than domain names. > > > > Next, for us a critical part of the thinking is that the needs of email > > users have become more complex. Users need anti-virus protection and > > constantly evolving spam blocking (which stands to change numerous > > times in the next 12-24 months). Users want today, and will want more > > often tomorrow, not just webmail, but also SMS and IM bridges. Storage > > and archiving (which are completely different services to me) will also > > become increasingly complex. > > > > Users will pay for this increased complexity, but service providers all > > too often still see email as a cost center (and therefore in terms of > > how cheaply can I provide it) rather than as a potential source of > > significant revenue. This shift in mindset will be key. > > > > Remember, a shocking number of people rely for a significant portion of > > their email needs upon hotmail/yahoo/other free mail provider, all of > > home are curtailing their offerings. > > > > All in, "running a mail server" will soon no longer suffice. Many of > > you have or will evolve to more complex services. Many others won't. > > And I think the really smart ones are those that can, but choose to put > > the resources into something that can truly differentiate them. > > Remember, in 1995 Trumpet Winsock dialler scripts and modem init > > strings were differentiators. > > > > The provisioning of email services has become complex and will only > > become more so tomorrow. It is interesting that the larger the service > > provider the more likely they are to outsource email. We have had > > first-hand experience providing customer service to outsourced email > > and have found that is like most Internet services in that you can have > > GREAT customer satisfaction with an outsourced service as long as the > > underlying service is well-provisioned and like any Internet service > > horrible when it isn't. > > > > The rest is execution. > > > > Regards > > > > On Monday, February 17, 2003, at 09:34 PM, Jim McAtee wrote: > > > > > ----- Original Message ----- > > > From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > > To: "'Discuss List'" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > > Sent: Monday, February 17, 2003 5:25 PM > > > Subject: RE: Tucows E-mail Service > > > > > > > > >> Someone who does not currently offer e-mail services and does not > > >> have the > > >> technical aptitude to offer e-mail services on their own would > > >> probably > > >> never consider these things as being requirements. We do. > > > > > > > > > I'd be curious to know who this product is meant to appeal to. Like > > > SSL > > > certificates, it's likely not something we'd be interested in, but no > > > doubt > > > Tucows has done some research into the marketplace and felt it was > > > viable. > > > > > > Generally speaking, you outsource a service when it's either cheaper > > > than > > > providing the service yourself, or you don't have the in-house > > > resources to > > > provide it. The only businesses that I can think of that fit that > > > bill (and who > > > would be selling email services) are virtual ISP's. Many of them, > > > however, > > > still run their own radius, dns, and mail servers, even if they > > > outsource their > > > dialup ports and customer service. > > > > > > Jim > > > > -- > [EMAIL PROTECTED] <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >
