Editor’s Note: Welcome to our weekly Reality Check column where we let C-level executives and advisory firms from across the mobile industry to provide their unique insights into the marketplace.
When it comes to mobile customers, communications service providers are facing a new frontier. Highly-connected consumers are eager to use their mobile devices to pay for goods and services, watch videos and operate intelligent homes. In fact, they’re beginning to care more about access to a wide range of services rather than who is delivering the services. This creates a challenge and an opportunity for CSPs.
How can CSP attract and retain the customer of the future? The outcome will be determined by how well CSPs meet demand for services like mobile payments, personal clouds, location-based promotions and augmented reality; how well they price services in relationship to market demand; and how well they prevent their customers from considering switching carriers.
Accenture recently delved into these topics in a survey of nearly 31,000 consumers in 26 countries and uncovered some surprising insights. One of the most confounding survey takeaways is that nearly one-third of mobile Internet users express no preference for what type of provider meets their needs as long as they are met. In fact, 31% of consumers surveyed – and 42% in emerging markets – would prefer device makers over their mobile provider for packaged communications bundles, encompassing audio and video calls, messaging, e-mails and access to apps. For mobile payments, consumers’ top choices for providers would be banks, payment card providers, and mobile providers, in that order.
The need for speed
As mobile phone usage broadens, and convergence enables consumers to make payments, watch videos, and more, their thirst for data-hungry services is being matched by a thirst for speed. In fact, according to the Accenture survey, speed is of primary importance to mobile customers, and they’re willing to pay more for faster Internet connections. Sixty-three percent of respondents said they were willing to pay additional monthly fees for “4G” mobile Internet, and in emerging markets 76% said they would pay more. These responses are a strong sign that investments in high-speed data networks could reap economic benefits.
Other factors influencing carrier preference included the availability of mobile payment and cloud services. More than half of those surveyed said they would switch to a CSP that offered mobile payments if their current carrier did not. In addition, almost half of respondents indicated they would want their mobile provider to offer cloud-based capabilities, including location-based services such as information on nearby shops or facilities or discounts or coupons from retailers in their local area.
Opportunities for CSPs
Despite some of the challenges, there are compelling opportunities in front of CSPs, especially given consumers’ willingness to open their wallets wider for faster network speeds, digital services and mobile payment capabilities. The research also confirms consumers would be more inclined to pay for cloud-based storage, online backup, sharing and collaboration services. And the good news is that customers’ prefer their mobile service provider when it comes to cloud services.
While attitudes were similar across the regions, the Accenture research shows that China and India show the most aggressive adoption. For instance, in China 81% of consumers using a smartphone to access the Internet either use mobile payments now or plan to use them in the next 12 months. In India more than three-fourths do so.
These days, every business is a digital business, and it requires a different mindset to meet the kind of personal customer relationships that were typical years ago, between shoppers and their neighborhood store. As CSPs cope with the tectonic shifts taking place in the mobile landscape, they must deliver the variety of services consumers and businesses want – on fast, reliable and secure networks. Yet, with the right capabilities, CSPs can blaze a trail on the new frontier, including winning consumer loyalty.
Montgomery (Monte) Hong is managing director – Global Communications Industry and Asia Pacific Communications Industry lead, Accenture.
