Carriers need to leverage network data to keep customers

Wireless operators need to start leveraging the data they have on customers to give end users a meaningful experience, and thus drive the lifetime value of the customer instead of focusing on short-term promotions, said Glenn Pingul, VP of Products & Mobile Strategies at Globys, which provides contextual marketing, billing and analytics to telecom operators worldwide.
As penetration levels get near or past 100%, Pingul said operators have to end their dependency on gross additions because there aren’t going to be that many more. Instead, operators need to find out the best ways to treat their $30 average revenue per user customers and their $100 ARPU customers. Providing flexibility to end users is “The days of trying to outpace churn with new gross adds is over.”
Operators need to stimulate data usage and sell their customers the right data plans. For example, providing billing estimates to customers is an easy to way to connect with customers and help them to manage their experience so they appreciate the operator instead of feeling betrayed by an operator after an unexpected high monthly bill. Customers are still getting used to using data and could go over their allotted monthly usage. Warning customers that they are nearing limits, and then offering them contextual marketing to switch plans helps the customers. Learning what each customer wants and then responding to it is a way to leverage the network to compete against over-the-top providers. Some customers like self service; others prefer talking to a customer service representative. “Don’t use brute force” to manage customers, Pingul noted.
“Analytics are great, but translating them to effective marketing campaigns is hard to do,” he said. “Carriers haven’t leveraged data in the past because they have so much data they don’t know what to do with it.”
Going forward, though, that level of customer service will continue to drive the relationship between the operator and the end user.