What SLAs Should I Demand from an AI Sales Automation Provider?

I've built and scaled service businesses. Dentists, medspas, home services—pick your poison. The common thread? Most operators chase leads like addicts but leak revenue through sloppy systems. AI sales automation promises to fix that. But without ironclad SLAs, you're just swapping one headache for another.

Providers peddle "AI chatbots" and "magic automations." Bullshit. You need a revenue machine with guarantees. Tykon.io's Revenue Acquisition Flywheel plugs into your leads, captures after-hours inquiries, books appointments, collects reviews, and compounds referrals—24/7, no staff dependency.

Demand SLAs on response times, uptime, conversions, errors, and penalties. Anything less, and you're gambling your ad spend. Let's break it down. Math first, feelings last.

What Response Time SLAs Are Non-Negotiable for AI Lead Handling?

Speed to lead isn't a buzzword. It's math. Harvard Business Review data: conversion rates drop 391% if you respond after 5 minutes. After an hour? Forget it—90% gone.

Your ads cost $50-200 per lead. A 2-minute delay costs you $1,000s monthly. AI sales automation must respond instantly. No excuses.

Should I expect under-5-second or under-60-second first responses?

Demand under-5-second first responses. 60 seconds? That's human-tier slop. Real AI lead response systems like Tykon hit sub-5 seconds every time.

Why? Leads ghost slow responders. Test it: text a plumber at 9 PM. No reply by 9:05? You're calling the next guy.

| Response Time | Conversion Lift | Monthly Revenue Impact (50 leads @ $100 avg ticket) |

|---------------|----------------|-----------------------------------------------------|

| Under 5 sec | Baseline +20% | +$1,000 |

| 30-60 sec | Baseline | Baseline |

| Over 1 min | -50% | -$2,500 |

Tykon.io guarantees sub-5-second engagement across SMS, web, Facebook—unified inbox, no fragmentation. Peak hours or not, it fires.

How do SLAs handle peak-hour and after-hours performance?

After-hours leads are 30-50% of inbound for service businesses. Ignore them, and you're torching 1/3 of your pipeline.

SLA must specify: no degradation during peaks (e.g., 9 AM-5 PM) or after-hours (5 PM-9 AM). Define peaks as 150% average traffic. Tykon scales infinitely—no throttling.

Penalty: credit 2x lost leads' value per breach. Track via logs. Vague "best effort" clauses? Walk away.

What Uptime and Availability Guarantees Should AI Provide?

Downtime kills revenue. One hour offline during dinner rush? That's 10-20 missed calls for a dentist. At $500/appointment, you're out $5,000+.

Demand 99.9% uptime (43 minutes/month max downtime). Track via third-party monitors like UptimeRobot.

Is 99.9% uptime realistic for 24/7 coverage?

Yes. Cloud infra makes it table stakes. Tykon.io hits 99.95%—multi-region redundancy, auto-failover.

"Chatbots" flake at 98%. Unacceptable. Your revenue acquisition flywheel runs 24/7, or it's worthless.

What happens during system maintenance or failures?

Zero unplanned downtime. Scheduled maintenance: 48-hour notice, off-peak only (2 AM-5 AM), under 15 minutes.

Failures: auto-rollback, alerts within 60 seconds. Compensation: 10x hourly revenue per minute down. Calculate your hourly: (annual revenue / 8760 hours). Tykon eats the cost—we guarantee it.

What Conversion and Revenue Recovery SLAs Make Sense?

Funnels leak. Flywheels compound. SLAs must benchmark conversions, not vague "improvements."

Can providers guarantee appointment booking rates or ROI?

Yes. Demand 15-25% booking rates on qualified leads (based on your historicals). Tykon baselines your data in week 1, guarantees +20% lift or refund.

ROI math: $10k/month ad spend at 5% baseline conversion = $50k revenue. Tykon hits 20%? $200k. We recover the delta via credits.

No provider guarantees raw ROI (variables like offer quality). But tie to controllables: response speed, follow-up consistency.

How are review and referral velocity metrics benchmarked?

Reviews compound referrals 3-5x. SLA: 80% review collection rate within 24 hours post-job. Tykon automates: AI texts post-appointment, funnels to Google/Yelp.

Referrals: 10% of reviews trigger 1 referral request. Velocity: 5x/month per 100 appointments. Track compounding: Month 1: +10 leads. Month 3: +50.

| Metric | Baseline (Manual) | Tykon SLA Guarantee |

|---------------------|-------------------|---------------------|

| Review Rate | 20-30% | 80% |

| Referral Velocity | 2-5/month | 10+/month |

| Compounding Lift | None | 3x in 90 days |

How Do SLAs Address AI Errors, Hallucinations, and Security?

AI hallucinations? Early days plague. Demand <0.5% error rate—wrong info, failed handoffs.

What error rates and compliance standards are required?

Error rate <0.5%, audited monthly. Human oversight on escalations. Compliance: HIPAA for medspas/dentists, SOC2, GDPR. Tykon: zero hallucinations via domain-specific tuning—no generic GPT slop.

Test: 1,000 interactions, flag anomalies. Penalty: $100 per error over threshold.

What data privacy and customer trust protections are included?

Zero data retention post-conversation. Encrypt transit/rest. No training on your data. Audit rights.

Trust: Transparent logs, branded responses. Tykon mimics your voice—patients think it's your team.

What Penalty and Compensation Structures Protect My Business?

SLAs without teeth are paper. Structure cascading penalties.

How do providers compensate for SLA breaches?

Tiered:

• Minor (e.g., 5-10 sec response): 50% monthly fee credit.

• Major (downtime >5 min): 100% credit + 2x revenue impact.

• Chronic (3+ breaches/quarter): Full refund, contract exit.

Escrow 1 month's fee. Tykon: 30-day money-back, unlimited credits. We've never breached—math proves it.

Stop Gambling on AI Hype—Tykon Delivers the SLAs That Matter

Operators don't need more leads. Fix the leaks: after-hours, reviews, referrals. Tykon.io's plug-and-play Revenue Acquisition Flywheel installs in 7 days. Instant AI engagement, unified inbox, guaranteed appointments, review/referral engines.

We hit every SLA above. Recovered $1.2M for clients last quarter. Your math: 50 leads/month x $150 ticket x 20% lift = $15k/month risk-free.

Book a 15-minute ROI calc at tykon.io. No sales call. Just numbers.

Written by Jerrod Anthraper, Founder of Tykon.io