If you always e-mail jake@telco.com instead of noc@telco.com for your issues, you may end of in a situation where Jake is gone, on vacation, or simply moved on to accounting.
Plus, Jake hates this. He might pretend to be your friend but he's getting paid to do that. Nothing more annoying than having a customer demand to work with Jake when Jake has 20 other things going on and literally anyone else on the team can help you.
Once you're known within the right team, it should be easy to get prompt responses.
Exactly. Show the team that you know what you're talking about and that you're not belligerent and people will be more than happy to work with you.