A few weeks prior to Christmas, Bryan Rader, President of MediaWorks, invited me to visit their offices Alpharetta, GA. "You can come see our operation and we'll send you out with some of our guys on an install," invited Rader. The thought of me installing anything of course inspired great humor at the Schofield household as my wife kindly pointed out that my reputation as a handy-man must not have reached the South yet.

Always eager to try new things and realizing that, hey if I break something Bryan has to deal with it not me, I signed on to spending the day with MediaWorks, learning about their operation and lending my severely under-appreciated handy-man skills to their field service techs.

Prelude
Before arriving at MediaWorks I had some simple goals in mind:

First, I hate writing profile pieces. You know the type, "Company X is awesome," and they are filled with quotes from the CEO saying how good his staff is and how they are working to benefit the entire industry, and so on and so on. I swear you can literally change the company names on some of these articles and re-run them and nobody would know the difference (Hmm...). Anyway, I want to be able to profile a company in a way that it is not all hugs and kisses yet still convey the important information: why they are successful.

Secondly, I wanted to be able to understand how a private cable/private broadband company works-beyond just explaining a business plan and to be able to convey this to our readers.

Lastly, (snicker, snicker) I wanted some dirt on Rader. Bryan and I have gotten to know each other pretty well over the last year and a half, we are the same age and have a similar sense of humor so I considered it my duty as a journalist to uncover something to bust his chops about for as long as I can until the joke grows old. After all, what else are friends for?

The arrival
After a healthy Southern breakfast of sausage gravy, biscuits, eggs and something called a grit I was ready for action and arrived at MediaWorks on January 26 promptly at 9:00 AM and ready for duty.

9:10 AM: The Tour
MediaWorks has a beautiful office. They are on the fourth floor of a new building in a modern office park and the offices themselves are very well decorated and are done in very good taste.

One thing that particularly struck me when touring MediaWorks office was the inordinate amount of letters, homemade posters and other tokens of gratitude adorning much of the wall and shelf space. Almost everywhere you turn you can find something from a child, teacher, parent or charity that is sending well wishes to the staff at MediaWorks for their aide with this project or that charitable event.

9:40: Marketing with Karla and Robin
MediaWorks approaches each property with the same goals in mind. Delivering cable service to residents that is priced below that of the incumbent and to provide exemplary customer service to both the residents and the property mangers.

"You have to be a people person to be successful in this business," said Karla Haser-Curtis, Vice President of MediaWorks. "One of the reasons we feel we have been successful is that we believe forming relationships with the property managers is the key to success-otherwise you will never last on a property.

"We realized very early on that the owner of the property is usually the last one to know what is going on onsite, so by the time they hear about a problem, it usually has grown into something that could have been easily rectified at a much earlier stage."

"One of the ways we measure ourselves is by how infrequently the owners phone rings with complaints," said Robin Benson, Marketing Coordinator.

"Many times when we launch on a new property experiencing 'change' bothers residents-especially elderly residents," said Haser-Curtis. "The result is a lot of complaints within the first 30 days-different channels, channels located on different stations, etc. "We try to prepare the property managers for this so that they already have this expectation in mind prior to launch. The last thing we want to have happen is a property manger calling an owner saying that people are up in arms when after 30 days, they usually find they like our service better."

"We even go personally visit upset residents," added Benson. "At the last property we launched, we received word from the onsite staff that this one resident, who they termed as a constant complainer, was furious that they switched to our service. So we went and visited with him, listened to his concerns and did what we could to address them. Now he is our biggest fan on that property. The onsite staff tells us he raves to everyone about our service."

From the very start of this meeting, you can begin to get a clear picture of how MediaWorks operates beyond the x's and o's. The company as a whole adopted a philosophy that relationships make the business successful and that they will go out of their way to enhance those relationships. This philosophy reoccurred in every aspect of their business that I was introduced to.

10:20: Customer Service with Heather and Laura
The call center houses approximately ten Customer Service Representative (CSRs) stations from which MediaWorks supports their multi-state operation. All cable television related inquiries are forwarded to this office and handled by an experienced staff utilizing CSG Subscriber Management Software. Technical support issues for MediaWorks broadband Internet service are outsourced to a specialized help desk.

"CSG performs all of our back office functions for customer care," said Rader. "It handles things like keeping a data base of current and former subscribers, payment history, customer contact information and a host of other important subscriber management tools."

The first thing I noticed when looking around the call center was a chart that tracked the number of calls, hold time, call abandonment rate and the time each CSR spent on the phone with a customer. I naturally assumed that the goal was to keep the person on the phone as long as possible ala retail-the longer they are in the store the more apt they are to buy something. However, the exact opposite is true for cable TV.

"We have all our CSRs trained to try to up-sell the customer, but we have a goal of keeping talk time below two and one half minutes per call," said Laura Larmon, Director of Customer Service. "Our research tells us that beyond that time, nothing constructive usually happens."

"Sometimes people call and just want to talk," said Heather Fox, Customer Service Supervisor. "We have to train our CSRs to answer their questions and move on to the next call as soon as possible. The longer a CSR is chatting with someone, the longer another customer is on hold and getting frustrated."

The next thing I noticed was another chart on the wall, this time bearing the likeness of turtles with names on them racing towards a finish line.

"We have contests each month where our CSRs can win prizes for up-selling our Works package to subscribers," said Larmon. "This month they can win a DVD player or gift certificates to local restaurants depending on how many Works packages they sell. The Works is a multi-premium package of services.

One thing I did know from past experience is that the CSRs usually have the best stories to tell from dealing with the public. MediaWorks was no different. "Well, we had this customer call once during the middle of a hurricane," said Larmon. "He wanted to know why his cable was out. We had to explain to him it was because he didn't have any power."

11:10: System design with Tom and Bobbie
Technically, MediaWorks considers themselves a very cautious company that places more emphasis on consistency and dependability. "We are not eager to be the first to deploy the latest and greatest technology," said Tom Davison, Director of System Maintenance. "Our goal is to deploy something that we are familiar with and can easily service."

"Every headend has a chart on the wall that depicts the technical scheme for the entire property," said Bobbie Brown Operation Coordinator. "We did this so that even if it is a techs first time on a particular property they have easy access to the knowledge of how the property is being served and can service it much more efficiently."

"Standardization and consistency is something we stress in all our buildouts," said Davison. "The headend you will see at the property is almost identical to one you would see at any of our other properties-from the design right on through to the equipment. This way our service technicians are never walking into unfamiliar territory and are trained to handle almost any problem that could occur-whether it is on this site or one as far away as Memphis."

11:45: On the road with Kenny
Sadly, nobody needed their cable installed today at the property we visited so I tagged along with Kenny Dunlop to do something that sounded even more enjoyable-a disconnect. Seems this Gentleman, who we will refer to as "Mr. No-Pay" from this point on, has been a little late covering his tab and it is Kenny's job to turn off the cable as a motivator.

Upon arriving at the Caswyck State Bridge Apartments, an upscale MDU community in Northern Altanta, we pulled up to the gate and went inside to the rental office. The onsite staff seemed very excited at the thought of Mr. No-Pay getting his cable cut-off. Seems Mr. No-Pay is a bit difficult and isn't too popular amongst the onsite staff. Kenny brought me over to the lounge area and showed me an interesting bit of technology MediaWorks deploys on the properties-an interactive kiosk.

The kiosk is self-standing and looks like somewhat like a video game and it houses a monitor with an interactive touch-screen. It was designed with the prospective resident in mind, to give the owner another technological leasing tool. The touch-screen monitor allows the resident to preview various floor plans, amenities of the property, a map of the area including neighborhood surroundings such as restaurants, shops, and other spots of interest. In addition, the kiosk also includes information about MediaWorks, such as its services, pricing, ordering information and contact information.

After exploring the kiosk, I made my way back to the office area where Kenny was being heavily encouraged by the staff to wait until about 15 minutes prior to the Super Bowl to cut-off Mr. No-Pay's cable, but Kenny remained strong and off through the gate we went to turn off the juice.

"We always make it a point to stop and talk to the onsite staff," said Kenny. "We want them to get to know us and we want to get to know them. We are on their property a lot and we like them to know us all at each property and be comfortable enough with us to let us know directly if there are any problems that need to be attended to."

My tour of the property began with a visit to its hybrid C-Band and digital transport headend located at the back of the property. MediaWorks philosophy is to build a headend on its properties rather than reselling a satellite service as some operators prefer.

"We did not like economics of reselling satellite," said Rader. "We felt we didn't have the flexibility or the return on investment we wanted, so we made the decision to build a customized headend for each property we served. At this point, we are happy with our results, but we are always monitoring new products like the WSNET satellite solution."

After Kenny concluded his inspection of the headend, we were off to complete our assignment by cutting off Mr. No-Pay's cable. We found the apartment quite easily and fortunately it was on the first floor, so Kenny boosted me up and I was able to reach through the open window and snatch the cable box right off the top of the TV. Mr. No-Pay screamed at us and tried to give chase but we were way too quick for him and were off in Kenny's truck before he could get out the door...

Sorry, imagination got the best of me there. A disconnect is actually nothing like I described above. It is an extremely anticlimactic process of unlocking the cable box on the outside of the building and disconnecting the cable feed from the headend to the apartment. It took all of ten seconds and we were back in the truck heading for the gate without so much as a peep from anyone.

Having to deal with getting a converter box back from a resident that moves out, or is disconnected for lack of payment is not an issue MediaWorks faces because the company does not use set-tops. MediaWorks instead relies on a negative trapping system at the outside security cable box.

"If you can offer an expanded basic package and tell the consumer they don't need a box, they are much happier," said Rader. "We also feel it helps our premium buy rates as over 15% of our subscribers take our 'Works' package. The only time we plan to put a box in one of our properties is when we provide digital service. Customers who order this particular service already expect to have a set-top device."

1:20 PM: Mmmmmm...grilled chicken and waffle fries.

2:00: Wrapping up with Bryan
Following lunch I said so long to Kenny and made my way back to Bryan's office to talk about their growth stradtegy. MediaWorks is in the process of selling off 20 systems that they have targeted as being outside their geographic footprint and launching an additional 30 systems in what they call their key markets.

"We made the strategic decision to focus more geographically on areas where we already have a solid footprint," explained Rader. "About five years ago we felt that being regional was the best approach, but over those last five years we found that while being regional is important, being local is more important. As the market changed and demands changed we found that being locally focused within our key markets allows us to be more responsive, more efficient and more successful.

General impressions
Consistency. Thoughtfulness. Friendliness. Customer oriented. Family. These are the impressions you get when you spend time with MediaWorks. I found it amazing that everyone from the receptionist that greets you when you come in right on up to Bryan Rader exhibited the same characteristics and the same attitudes towards the company and the way they do business.

Bobbie Brown said that she never worked anywhere longer than two months prior to joining MediaWorks two years ago, Karla Haser-Curtis has been there from the beginning and the majority of the management team has been promoted from within the ranks. This is indicative of the overall atmosphere and attitude of the entire operation.

The turtle figure that was on the CSR Sales board is the perfect analogy of MediaWorks. In an industry where operators come and go, leaving a trial of upset property owners in their wake, and at a time when companies who are over extended are being rapidly thinned from the heard, MediaWorks is quietly and efficiently moving forward-developing new relationships, adding new properties, rolling out data service and slowly, steadily walking toward the finish line.

Epilogue
I really enjoyed my day at MediaWorks. I like the way the article came out and I think we covered a lot of new ground that will separate it from a typical Company Profile. I had a great time and was able see and experience a lot of interesting stuff to relay to our readers.

However I can't consider this trip a complete success because I wasn't able to uncover anything to bust-on Rader about. His office is perfect, his business is great and the staff loves him. I couldn't coax anyone into relaying one single embarrassing story. Oh well. Win some, lose, some. I think next trip, though, I am going to have to go to a much higher source and request a little interview time with his wife...