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Customers want smart phones – and service providers want to maximize potential smart phone revenue. But operators are quickly discovering that simply sitting back and hoping for smart phone users to consume loads of data is not a winning strategy.
A recent worldwide survey of 55 service providers conducted by analyst firm Heavy Reading and sponsored by Amdocs, revealed some eye-opening trends. Increased device complexity has led to greater confusion among users on how to tap into new smart phone services. This confusion has led to an under-utilization of data services by consumers, higher support costs for operators, lower revenue per user and an increase in “no-fault” device returns.
In a first step to capturing the higher revenues that smartphones can generate and boosting their margins, service providers need to improve their customer support.
Complex phones, straightforward problems
More than 60% of the respondents in Heavy Reading’s survey said the cost to support smart phones is anywhere from 10% to 50% higher than feature phone support. More specifically, the growing complexity of smart phone customers’ support questions was listed as the primary challenge for service providers’ call center operations, quickly followed by the increased time needed to resolve smart phone users’ problems.
Smart phone support calls usually take longer, with consumers asking how to use an advanced device feature or seeking troubleshooting for a malfunction. The survey found that the majority of these calls are transferred to a more senior agent for resolution, due to their complexity. The problem is that these transfers raise costs, because service providers either pay a fixed fee to the device manufacturer per call, or a higher hourly rate for technical support.
When asked to rate the problems that prevent service providers from maximizing smart phone revenues, customers’ inability to correctly use advanced features was cited as the primary obstacle. The research also shows that when customers’ support inquiries are not promptly resolved, they often return their smart phones even though there’s nothing actually wrong with the device – a costly resolution in which nobody wins.
Leaving money on the table
“Our survey of service providers confirms that smart phone support calls are increasing rapidly, caused by the dramatic increase in number of devices, features, and services,” says Ari Banerjee, senior analyst at Heavy Reading, who supervised the survey design. “These calls take longer to resolve, are more expensive and are more likely to be transferred to a technical support agent.”
Fully three-quarters of the surveyed service providers stated that they are counting on advanced services and increased data usage to deliver additional sources of revenue from smart phone customers. Yet over two-thirds of customers do not use their smart phone’s advanced services – either because they don’t know about them or don’t understand how to use them. And many of the customers who do use them are tying up the support lines with time-consuming “How do I do this?” questions.
“Service providers are discovering that the expected increase in revenue for a smart phone customer is not keeping up with actual revenue, with support call volume cutting into their margins,” said Banerjee.
A smarter way to support smart phone services
Interestingly, more than half of the service providers surveyed said they did not intend to expand their technical support staff by more than 10%, far below the projected increase in call volume. Instead, 40% of surveyed carriers plan to use more efficient support tools and technologies to increase efficiencies and empower level-one call center agents (those who take incoming calls) to resolve support inquiries.
Forward-looking service providers have already begun introducing tools and approaches to help users resolve their problems more quickly. Sixty percent of survey respondents stated that they direct their customers to a self-service portal that pulls information from both internal and external sources to help users learn how to use and troubleshoot their smart phone devices. Additionally, over half of the respondents direct customers to specific websites to search for answers to their customer support queries. And using advanced call-center technologies – such as systems that give call center agents direct visibility into a customer’s smart phone to diagnose and troubleshoot problems – boost the productivity of each agent.
Don’t miss the train(ing)
But prevention is always better than cure. Operators must educate their customers on these new devices – ideally at the point-of-purchase. Early education will provide savings later in the form of fewer, and shorter, support calls. It will also ensure that customers know about all of their devices’ services and how to use them, resulting in greater data usage. Service providers must make it easy, across all customer touchpoints, for consumers to research their devices and quickly learn both the basic, and advanced, functions.
Helping customers get smarter is the smart move for service providers.
Scott Kolman (scott.kolman@amdocs.com) is Managing Director of Customer Management Product Marketing at Amdocs. With more than 20 years of high-tech marketing experience, Kolman is responsible for defining the market strategy and direction, creating awareness, positioning, and bringing to market Amdocs’ customer management products and solutions
