Having put its financial house in order, Qwest Communications is now polishing its image as a quality business services provider, and getting considerable help in that regard from recent customer surveys and studies.

For example, while the Denver-based company still lags behind AT&T and Verizon in the J.D. Power & Associates survey of business data users, it is no longer dead last among all major carriers, and its scores for the 2007 survey jumped significantly for both small to mid-sized businesses (from 624 to 670 on a 1000-point scale) and large enterprise businesses (from 672 to 714). In addition, Forrester recently gave Qwest its top score in overall customer satisfaction for business VoIP service and for overall VoIP market presence.

Most notably, however, Qwest was chosen, along with AT&T and Verizon, by the U.S. General Services Administration to be a primary contractor for the massive Networx product, which will replace the existing federal government telecommunications infrastructure.

This success is the result of a long period of focus and network improvement, said Stephanie Copeland, vice president of business marketing for Qwest.

“We have made progress over the last several years, and what we have done from a network and customer service perspective was intended to get us to the place we are right now, which is a place of steady growth and steady customer progress,” she said. “We have been focused over the last five to six years on continuing to improve our network services and core services.”

Qwest seeks to differentiate its service but offering a higher degree of customer interaction and service, Copeland said.

“We want to be the provider that is very marketing oriented – that is very nimble,” she said. “Nimble is our entire positioning – Qwest is large enough to meet the needs of its customers and to serve them in way that is scalable and flexible, but small enough to monologue with customers. We are trying to not only have the services they want but help them understand what they need by listening to them and understanding what their needs are.”

That doesn’t mean Qwest is doing a high degree of customization of services, however.

“I don’t want to confuse tailoring with customization,” Copeland said. “Customization is a very difficult thing to scale. We are talking about disciplined tailoring – putting the right pieces together to meet the customers’ needs versus having just pre-configured answers to their questions. Customers always want something slightly different from what you are offering, and we try to accommodate them.”

The service provider is also leveraging its early entry into VoIP five years ago to now package voice with other services that also hit the desktop.

“We’re ahead of the game with regard to understanding that voice doesn’t come alone, we are bundling that with other apps,” she said. “That includes Web hosting, Exchange voice mail and messaging apps. We believe we are ahead of the curve on that, and it is a differentiator for us.”

Next up for Qwest, beginning in May, is a new business wireless data service that recognizes how the work world is changing and leverages Qwest’s MVNO status, Copeland said.

“We will offer a wireless EVDO card that pops into your computer, so you can take your data services with you, regardless of where you are,” she said. “Our first launch of that card is on May 20 and we are going to be actively promoting mobility solutions around it as an introduction.”

Other mobility products will be rolled out over the next six months, Copeland said.