What's Inside

1. AireSpring Receives Excellence in Customer Service Award 2019
2. New Product - AireSpring's Cisco^® Meraki^® SD-WAN with Integrated Firewall
3. New Product - Accession Meeting & Webinar for AirePBX Enterprise
4. Product Update - AT&T FREE Demarc Extension Offer!
5. Product Update - AT&T ABF Now with Lower Rates!
6. Product Update - New Look for QuoteSpring™ Online Quoting Tool
7. Product Update - Options for Agent-Selected Port NRC
8. AireSpring with Verizon - New York Datacenter Tour & Luncheon
9. June Promo - Double Dip on SD-WAN SPIFFs!
10. Partner Training - Cisco-Meraki vs. Fortinet vs. Palo Alto Networks vs. SonicWall 
11. Visit AireSpring at These Events
12. Partner Spotlight - Terri Stafford, VP/Managing Partner, Sybran Communications
13. Meet the AireSpring Team - Bruce Wolfowitz, Account Manager

Get a Double SPIFF on SD-WAN Orders!

Reach out to your AireSpring Channel Manager today or call us at 888.389.2899.

Network security is top of mind for all businesses in every industry today. Protecting your network from cyber threats starts with a good, next generation firewall. But with so many solutions to choose from, how do you advise your clients on making the best choice? When it comes to network security, are you confident that you have the data you need to advise clients on the best firewall to protect their data and critical applications?

Join AireSpring’s SVP of Solutions Engineering, Mike Chase, for an Ultimate Firewall Comparison of the four top-selling next generation firewall solutions from Cisco-Meraki, Fortinet, Palo Alto Networks and SonicWall. He’ll review the specifications with practical, detailed use cases and applications. We will:

• Compare and contrast the features of both products.
• Review the key differentiators between these top selling firewall solutions.
• Discuss the ideal target customer for each solution.
• Provide the qualifying questions that you need to ask.
• Present real-life use cases and applications.

Mike will provide the data that you need to make informed recommendations to your clients. He will also review the value of each vendor's solution and the depth of protection against cyber security attacks each provides. He’ll review the value of selling a fully managed security solution to SMBs and the competitive advantage it can provide both to you and your clients. Register today for this must-attend partner training!

Complete our brief survey at the end for a chance to win a $100 Amazon gift card!

Visit AireSpring at these Coming Events:

MICROCORP ONE-ON-ONE
PARTNER SUMMIT
Omni Atlanta Hotel at
CNN Center
Atlanta, GA
June 12-14, 2019
REGISTER HERE

TBI CLOUD COMMISSION
TopGolf
Columbus, OH
June 13, 2019
REGISTER HERE

TBI CLOUD COMMISSION
The Maven Hotel
Denver, CO
June 27, 2019
REGISTER HERE

TELARUS TECHNICAL INNOVATION CONFERENCE
Yankee Stadium
New York City, NY
June 18, 2019
REGISTER HERE

TELARUS TECHNICAL INNOVATION CONFERENCE-NEWPORT BEACH
Center Club of Orange County
Costa Mesa, CA
June 25, 2019
REGISTER HERE

INTERNATIONAL TELECOMS WEEK
Hyatt Regency and Marriott Marquis
Atlanta, GA
June 23-26, 2019
REGISTER HERE

Welcome to the latest edition in our series of profiles, shining the spotlight on AireSpring’s amazing partners. This month, we’re speaking with Terri Stafford, Vice President and Managing Partner of Operations, Sybran Communications, Inc.

Hello Terri, thank you for agreeing to speak with us. To begin, please tell us a little about yourself and your professional background.

I worked in the finance departments during most of my career prior to starting at Sprint, where I began my telecom career in 1997, processing commissions for direct agents. I moved on to working through the spin-off of Sprint local communications to Embarq. At Embarq I was promoted to Supervisor over the commissions team, supporting both the Partner Indirect Channel and Consumer Call Center agents, and that's where I had the good fortune to meet Jeff Powell, founder of Sybran Communications. In 2010 after the CenturyLink/Embarq merger, I finally completed my Bachelor’s Degree in Business Administration and joined Sybran Communications where I soon transitioned to becoming a 50% business owner with Jeff Powell.

We have about 75 agents and sub-contractors at Sybran now. We offer a full range of communication solutions for hosted voice and data, internet and telecom services, phone systems, wireless signal boosting and more. In the last few years we have entered the security field, reselling IC Realtime and Vivotech. That area has taken off to such an extent that we've added several vans and technicians to fulfill installations. It's an example of our commitment to staying proactively involved with customers and project manage the whole process. We share a building with an IT company that performs most of our installations, a process that is carefully implemented following a detailed site assessment in advance. We pride ourselves on delivering highly personalized, white glove customer service with every hosted product, including hand-holding customers all the way through installation. Our clients are mostly small-to-medium businesses in the IT world, who in turn provide us with lead referrals.  

What do you like about working with AireSpring?

We have been working with AireSpring since 2013. Whenever we have a deal for multiple locations, we come to AireSpring first. You have the capability to properly quote and install for those kinds of complex customer needs. Your extensive product offerings allow us to quote one supplier with a mesh of multiple carriers and bring it all together for the customer in one solution. Your quoting website, QuoteSpring, is easy to use for real-time, immediate pricing and availability of services.

We've been especially impressed with the personal service from the friendly staff at AireSpring, and the senior management who always make us feel we are a valued partner. If we have an issue along the way, we have always been able to pick up the phone and call Ron McNab, AireSpring SVP of Channel Sales, and he always helps us. At trade shows, we have met with top executives like Avi Lonstein, AireSpring CEO. He has sat with us, asked us what AireSpring can do to improve, and invited us to dinner or to a golf event. The AireSpring executives are very down-to-earth. Avi even talked about what TV shows he was watching, and we saw them flying coach on Southwest, just like the rest of us. Not many companies socialize and personally connect at that level. At Sybran, we follow a similar personal touch business model, so we appreciate being treated with the same level of care and interest.

What would you say is the secret to being a successful agent?

What is the "next big thing" you think agents should be aware of in 2019?

Hosted VoIP is taking the lead for 2019 and beyond, and it's our top focus now, as copper lines are being replaced daily with hosted solutions. A lot of people still need more education to understand the great benefits that come with hosted solutions, like getting an online portal and making changes on the fly, and the ability to monitor the number of daily calls coming in or which line gets the most calls. We need to be able to provide hosted solutions that seem simple but have the multiple features customers require.

What are some of your hobbies and interests outside of telecom?

I spend most of my down time with my family at our lake house in Lake of the Ozarks, boating, swimming & fishing. Our house is up on a hill overlooking the lake. We just finished remodeling the house in order to accommodate our large family, including six children and four grandsons, and the friends we enjoy having down. My hobby is traveling. My husband and I are leaving for Alaska in June for a couple of weeks. We're excited about seeing all the beautiful parts of the state, staying in bed and breakfasts, whale watching, and then cruising back to Vancouver. I've taken over 20 cruises and visited Europe several years ago. My husband's favorite hobby is hunting, which he does with help from our two wirehaired pointing griffon dogs.

Here are some views of our lake house and dock:

Terri, thank you for taking time to talk with us today.

At AireSpring, we know that it is our dedication to customer service that sets us apart, and customer service begins with great employees. Here is your chance to get to know another key member of the AireSpring team. This month we are talking with Bruce Wolfowitz, Account Manager.

Hello Bruce. To begin, please tell us about your professional background.

After getting my degree in Communications in my hometown of New York, I started a series of steps that built on the communications focus, gaining skills in TV ad sales and advertising research analysis. I transitioned into finance and investment, first in marketing for Smith Barney insurance products, where I got my Series 7 insurance license to expand my knowledge base. The focus on finance led me to Deutsche Bank, serving in marketing and business development for institutional trust and custody services and ultimately in corporate communications and public relations for their Americas region. During this time, New York was hit with the 9/11 attack, which had a severe impact on the financial industry, leading to massive layoffs at Deutsche Bank and others. My wife and I decided to seize the opportunity to move with our child (and one on the way) to her home city of London, where her family still lives. I soon found a position using my skills to sell data and mailing lists, interfacing with high-end brokers and serving as liaison among different departments for a data list rental agency.

By 2004, the door opened to a career direction that tapped into my personal passion for all things sports at the new FOX Sports International, based in London. I started as Sales Manager with responsibility for the sale of syndicated sports TV rights from the American produced FOX Sports International catalog of programming, including contract fulfillment. Just about the time my wife and I decided we wanted to move back to the Los Angeles area, FOX created a digital asset sales operation in L.A., and I was tapped as Director of Interactive Sales and Marketing for the Fox Soccer Channel. I was responsible for directing the complete interactive sales and sponsorship process. When the recession hit the TV ad industry hard in 2009, a lot of advertising dollars dried up. I began searching for an opportunity to apply my deep experience in high level account management and client sales interface, which led me to a consulting role with Reach Media Group. It proved to be a great opportunity to develop relationships with a range of agency and direct sales contacts in digital advertising. I was then drawn to an opportunity to pursue business development in other channel-based industries, including sales for digital home security with ADT. Finally in 2017, I had an opportunity to join the AireSpring Account Management team. I was excited about an entree into the telecom sector and joined AireSpring as an Account Manager, working under Yvonne Napoleon, Director of Account Management.

Tell us about your role at AireSpring.

As an AireSpring Account Manager, my role is to retain our customer base by renewing and maintaining customer voice, data and hosted IP solutions. The entrepreneurial environment within AireSpring facilitates those efforts in every way. By helping small to medium businesses communicate seamlessly and thoroughly understanding our customer's business model, we are able to design a network solution that facilitates their ease of communicating. We deliver an exceptional after-service-delivery experience that compels our customers to renew their contract at the end of their term and we are always looking for ways to help our agents reach greater levels of success. Our team approach fosters an atmosphere of “let’s get it done.” I’ve had lots to learn and it has been a great experience.

What do you enjoy most about working with AireSpring?

My team is what I enjoy the most about working with AireSpring. Specifically, Don Greenstein, VP of Account Management; Yvonne Napoleon, Director of Account Management, and Steven Chase, Account Management Supervisor, who all share their knowledge and foster an atmosphere of camaraderie and respect that has allowed me to be successful with the skill set I have.  I attribute any success I have had to the fact that the role takes advantage of some of the things I do best: attention to detail, a process with clearly defined procedures and rules of engagement, the need to establish rapport and build relationships with agents and their customers, and the comfort of routine and adherence to a defined schedule of customer touches.

What are some of your hobbies or interests outside of the office?

During my time at Deutsche Bank, I started running the softball and ice hockey teams, and now, I manage a highly competitive community fast-pitch team. Softball is my biggest hobby. I love watching and playing the sport. Ice hockey used to be right up there too, but unfortunately the wear and tear of the game, coupled with six marathons in three years, had taken its toll and while I found that I could still play well enough (albeit slower and with diminishing power on my slap shot) it was the mornings after the games that forced my (temporary) retirement. When not playing, I am a devout follower of the New York Yankees, Rangers, Giants, Knicks and New York Red Bulls soccer team, as well as English Premier League “football” team Arsenal and my newly adopted teams from UCLA (I get to about a half-dozen Bruins Baseball games a year).

Playing and watching sports is one prong of my “troika” of passions; music and movies are the others. I love all forms of music from the Canadian progressive rock trio Rush to other forms of classic rock (Pink Floyd, Dire Straits, The Grateful Dead, Billy Joel), classical music and Broadway show tunes (no judgements!). Through my kids I have become a fan of 21 Pilots, Panic! At The Disco, Post Malone and various Hip Hop acts that they curate for their Old Man.

The Star Wars and Marvel Cinematic Universes, as well as Game of Thrones (all coming to an end in 2019), have occupied more of my attention than they probably should. Great fun and something to share with my kids (well, the first two anyway).

Bruce, thank you for sharing your story with us!

AireSpring is an award-winning provider of Managed Connectivity and Cloud Communications solutions providing fully managed and connected end-to-end, next-generation solutions for multi-location enterprise customers, including:

• AireContact Cloud Contact Center
• AirePBX Cloud Phone System
• MPLS Mesh
• SD-WAN
• SIP Trunking
• Managed Connectivity
• Managed Failover
• Dedicated Internet Access
• Wholesale Long Distance

AireSpring's services are delivered over its revolutionary nationwide MPLS Mesh Network, providing customers a fully integrated, end-to-end solution from a single vendor.

sales@airespring.com | 888.389.2899 | www.airespring.com