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By Eran Wagner
In the 1970s Burger King launched its memorable “Have it Your Way” campaign. Since then companies have based their growth strategies on the same idea – target the right customers with the right products at the right time. In today’s converging market, simply delivering new services is not enough. Providers must seamlessly integrate IP services and offer consumers what they want – a fully integrated bundle of services tailored to meet their needs. To successfully deliver the multi-play, service providers must adopt an integrated customer management approach with the ultimate goal of creating an intentional customer experience that forges stronger, more profitable customer relationships.
The Race for the Multi-Play:
In response to growing competitive pressures, many providers have deployed bundling strategies. The hope is that by bundling services together, consumers will perceive greater value resulting in decreased churn and increased customer lifetime value. Despite their committed efforts, traditional American wireline service providers are finding themselves behind in the race for the triple-play. In order to counter cable’s ‘triple-threat’, service providers must differentiate their offerings. Traditionally, the telecom bundle included fixed voice, wireless, and broadband services. Recognizing the gap, many providers are now looking to IP services to evolve their bundle and deliver a more compelling offering that will take them into the multi-play environment. The winners of this race are those that are prepared to take advantage of the opportunities created by their IP deployments. These include opportunities such as fixed-mobile convergence where a mobile call can be continued from a subscriber’s mobile phone to the fixed line in the home office, and feature interaction between networks including the ability to display an IPTV EPG on a mobile phone and set recording times for TV programs using the same mobile device.
Will IP be Enough?
Despite the promise of more innovative video services, the nagging question is whether or not simply adding IP services to the telecom bundle will be enough to gain competitive advantage and satisfy the growing expectations of consumers. To answer this question, bundling must be created using the views from a customer’s perspective.
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"This is a way of doing business in which all corporate resources are agile and aligned to deliver an intentional customer experience." |
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Although bundled services are perceived to deliver greater value, it is not enough to simply be able to put all services on one bill or even to achieve rapid time-to-market for new IP services within an existing bundle. For a bundling strategy to work and successfully deliver a multi-play, a service provider must be able to create the intentional customer experience. This means that the customer experience becomes the driver of all operations and business decisions. Creating an intentional customer experience requires a fundamentally different business approach – an integrated customer management approach. This is a way of doing business in which all corporate resources are agile and aligned to deliver an intentional customer experience. To achieve an integrated customer management approach implies a move away from the ‘stovepiped,’ legacy systems, organizational structures, and business processes that characterize most
service providers. This old concept of network-centricity applied to the new needs of convergence means that the customer experience across services, functional departments and interaction channels is a by-product of, rather than the focus of, the business. In order to achieve integrated customer management, service providers must place the customer at the center of their businesses.
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