4 Steps to More Satisfied Subscribers: How We Harnessed the Power of Network Insights

At Garden Valley Technologies, we’ve been serving our membership in Northwest Minnesota for 119 years, building a reputation for service quality, value, and customer care. We take trouble tickets seriously—and if a subscriber has issues, we take action.
 

But we want to do more than address problems on a ticket-by-ticket basis. What if we could accurately correlate network performance to subscriber experiences and customer satisfaction metrics? Could we use this intelligence to optimize engineering resources, boost service quality, and increase customer satisfaction?
 

Moving From Reactive Trouble Tickets to Proactive Resolutions

That’s what we set out to do. In collaboration with the Calix Business Insights team, we undertook a project to analyze trouble tickets to identify patterns and trends that pointed to specific regions, equipment, and ports with higher concentrations of issues. This gave our engineering teams the insights they needed to proactively focus on areas requiring attention, whether due to equipment malfunctions, configuration errors, or external factors.
 

Here’s how we did it:

Step 1: Identify High-Trouble Regions

We identified areas with high concentrations of issues by mapping trouble tickets to specific geographic regions. This ranking of trouble spots allowed us to prioritize interventions and allocate resources more efficiently, ensuring we addressed the most critical areas first.

Step 2: Analyze Trouble Distribution by Optical Line Terminal (OLT)

After pinpointing high-trouble regions, we examined trouble distribution more deeply at the OLT level. Identifying which OLTs contributed most to the trouble ticket density enabled our network operations team to focus maintenance efforts on the most problematic OLTs—helping proactively identify service issues.

Step 3: Conduct Granular Analysis at the OLT Port Level

We drilled down to the individual OLT port to gain more precise insights. By analyzing trouble tickets at this granular level, we were able to pinpoint specific ports experiencing higher issue rates. This enabled our team to troubleshoot more accurately and implement faster, more effective resolutions.
 

Step 4: Take Actions Where Needed Most

Our analysis found that 20 percent of customers had more than one trouble ticket within 30 days, and 24 percent had repeat issues within a year. By identifying regions and network components with high rates of repeat troubles, our team conducted root cause analyses and implemented long-term solutions. These solutions—like equipment upgrades and proactive network optimizations—reduce recurring issues and improve service performance and reliability.
 

Delivering a Better Experience for Our Subscribers

Insights are invaluable for our network operations team, enabling us to prioritize maintenance, allocate resources efficiently, and take proactive measures to prevent future issues. Following this structured, data-driven approach has significantly improved network reliability, leading to fewer service disruptions and greater customer satisfaction.
 

Partnering with Calix Business Insights empowered us to turn network data into actionable intelligence, ensuring we continue providing the best possible experience for our subscribers.
 

Want to learn more about how Calix Business Insights can help you transform data into actionable strategies that improve the subscriber experience? Get in touch today.