This paper covers material presented at the 15th Annual Off-Campus conference (formerly known as the Off Campus Library Services Conference) in Memphis, Tennessee. During the course of this presentation, participants learned how both chat and instant messaging reference are being conducted and evaluated at a major online learning university. This information enabled participants to understand and take into consideration quality of service issues when implementing or refining their own virtual reference services in order to best target their own user community. This study also has implications for proper training, staffing, and marketing of the services. (Contains 4 figures.)