Editor’s Note: Welcome to our weekly Reader Forum section. In an attempt to broaden our interaction with our readers we have created this forum for those with something meaningful to say to the wireless industry. We want to keep this as open as possible, but we maintain some editorial control to keep it free of commercials or attacks. Please send along submissions for this section to our editors at: dmeyer@rcrwireless.com.
The wireless industry is one of the richest sources of news – technology breakthroughs, key appointments and disappointments, patent disputes, network developments, thinner/lighter/smarter/smaller devices, multiplying apps. It is undeniably the flagship market of the 21st century.
And yet. In this noisy market, operators are fighting for revenue. Although the global adoption of smartphones continues, with entire new markets opened up by the introduction of low cost devices, operators in developed markets in particular are seeing voice and messaging revenues steadily decline.
The focus is now on data, and operators are being threatened by “over-the-top” applications such as WhatsApp, iMessage and FaceTime – all innovative, all free, all providing no additional revenue whatsoever to the host mobile network. But this explosion in the use of mobile applications is a huge opportunity for revenue generation for operators smart enough to exploit the marketing potential.
The key lies in the ability of the network to monitor each customer’s behavior in real-time, enabling the operator to utilize that knowledge to deliver greater personalization for the individual user, and greater value for OTT partners. This is real-time monetization, the real-time marketing concept that enables operators to see customers in a broader context. Faster processing and greater sophistication within the network gives operators the ability to boost revenues, create new business models and, most importantly, improve the customer experience by enabling true personalization.
The advent of real-time charging is critical to the effective management of the customer experience, which is now seen as essential to operators’ ability to differentiate. Real-time network capabilities are transforming billing mechanisms into valuable marketing tools. The operator’s BSS is no longer a business support system – it has become a business enablement platform, with features that combine to deliver the components for powerful, targeted marketing based on knowledge of real-time customer context.
Today’s operators are increasingly aware of the capability of the BSS to enable RTM services. With the ability to “instantly” process data, operators can proactively push suggestions, offers, discounts and alerts to individual customers, in real-time, tailored to their specific preferences. These marketing campaigns can be designed to deliver added value to the customer, and generate additional revenue for the operator.
Another innovation delivering true personalization is real-time self service. Operators can leverage network advances to focus on the customer experience, specifically enabling customers to choose and price their individual data usage. With RTSS, operators replace today’s classic service resources (minutes, messages, megabytes) with different forms of data (Skype, Spotify, Netflix, YouTube, etc.), applying appropriate quality of service for different applications and charging for usage on an appropriate basis (e.g. minutes on Spotify or Skype, movies for Netflix, etc.).
Subscribers can trade resources with friends, increase the priority for specific applications when required, and create personalized budget controls for shared plans – all taking effect in real-time. The benefits of offering RTSS are proven – industry analyst Analysys Mason explicitly links self-service to an increase of up to 18% in average revenue per user.
RTSS can open up a variety of new options to suit both the consumer and the operator, and is already in use in Asia. It serves millions of customers, who no longer simply passively view their account details and amend their price plan every year or so. RTSS puts the customer in control. It’s a bit like the app store concept, but this time it’s the operator’s services and packages which can be purchased simply from the phone. Not only that, but these offerings can be customized by end users to suit their individual needs.
Delivering access to this control and convenience unlocks new sources of revenue for the operator (e.g. transaction charges for trading resources and upgrading QoS on the fly), and the enhanced customer experience provides competitive advantage and improves customer loyalty. An example would be a customer on the train who wants to watch a football match on his phone. With RTSS, they can increase the bandwidth of the TV on-demand application for the duration of the match – a value-add service for which the operator can charge. The customer gets a better experience, and the operator can monetize the service.
As LTE networks roll out around the world and users become used to a sustained higher QoS, even more customers will move to access online media and social networking applications via their mobile devices. This means that the speed and reliability of the network data connection will play a critical part in the perception of an operator’s brand and reputation.
Real-time monetization, real-time marketing, real-time self service: new phrases that promise a new phase of revenue generation for operators. The capability of networks to deliver mass personalization to suit individual customer behaviors in real-time is already creating a true win-win situation for operators in Asia. Not only does their infrastructure enable new revenue streams, but by upgrading to modern BSS operators are benefiting from powerful data management without increased network complexity or operational expenditure.
With the global uptake of smartphones, operators need to monetize data usage or they will not survive. Networks must have the flexibility to target micro-segments, the sophistication to enable real time customer management, and the power to deliver mass customization. These capabilities are all available now. Overlay the marketing expertise to capitalize on this wealth of real-time information to which operators have access, and the resulting differentiation is proven to deliver enhanced revenue.
