Telecom Customer Experience: Stunning Insights Uncovered Through Customer Analytics

Customer Perception Analysis – Telecom
Mar 2019 – Sep 2019
Region – USA

The telecommunication services industry comprises of fixed-network services and mobile services. It has a reported value of about 1.40 trillion U.S. dollars in 2017. Research reports forecast the growth to approximately 1.46 trillion U.S. dollars in size by 2020. As more people are moving towards mobile phones, the telecommunication market is expected to grab more space. Mobile connections worldwide are expected to touch nine billion by 2020. This report offers an in-depth analysis of the telecom industry. Identity the investment opportunities using the customer perception drivers and customer beliefs.

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Methodology

The analysis is based on customer reviews and conversations online in the segment. The analysis results presented are completely unbiased and not based on any subjective judgment. The source data used for the analysis are user conversations available publicly online like public forums and social media.

Total number of customer conversations analyzed
2905

Telecom Customer Experience: Stunning Insights Uncovered Through Customer Analytics

 

Executive Summary: Key Takeaways

 Telecom Industry Overview 

Smart digital technologies are certainly ruling the telecom industry. Getting the right technology is the need of the hour to intensify competition thereby seizing opportunities. Telecom operators have come to agree that customer experience gathered using consumer analysis will open up huge opportunities. Only when you walk in the customer’s shoes will you understand the entire customer journey. Consumer analysis gives insights into the interactions between the customer and various parts of the business. Companies are focusing on mapping the customer journey across functions to eliminate customer pain points. 

Telecom Industry Growth Drivers

1. Take off of 5G

The biggest growth driver for the telecom industry is 5G.  Due to this telecom companies are banking on 5G faster data speed and better connectivity. Technologies such as Network functions virtualization (NFV) and Software-defined networking (SDN) is set to bring greater network efficiency. 

Ericsson puts global 5G smartphone subscriptions at 12 million by the end of this year and at 84 million by the end of 2020.

2. Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning

Social media and technology have evolved to such an extent that there is an enormous growth of consumer data. Artificial intelligence and machine learning have made it possible to get consumer data at our fingertips. Consumer data gives the ability to conduct consumer analysis. With the help of consumer analysis, it has become possible to identify patterns and trends to make informed decisions

3. India-Second largest Internet user base

Frost & Sullivan research says that the Indian market is set to grow to a whopping $16.7 billion by 2022.

 In India, digital transactions, online shopping, and social media have picked up speed like never before. This will become one of the biggest growth drivers for the global Telecom market.

Telecom Customer Experience: Stunning Insights Uncovered Through Customer Analytics

“Customer experience isn’t an expense. Managing customer experience bolsters your brand.” – Stan Phelps

Brand managers and marketers should look through the eyes of the customers to see how they experience brands in the real world. Marketers are no more limited to just nice words and advertising; it has evolved into knowing customer perceptions – how customers really feel about their brands and what are the drivers of brand loyalty in today’s world.

We, at Clootrack capture every experience that customers have with their brands. We analyzed thousands of customer experiences to capture what people feel about a brand. 

Through a detailed analysis of 2,905 customer conversations, Clootrack has created a list of the top four drivers of customer experience that customers associate with the best telecom provider:

1. Customer Service

Customer care touches customers every day – multiple times. For Today’s Telecom customers, customer service is just as important as download speed. We can visualize the ecstasy when a customer says, “I enjoyed that the people I contacted over this SIM card were quickly responsive, understanding, and helpful.”

However, many carriers are overlooking the most essential component: customer service

First of all, telecom operators should put digital technologies to use to improve the customer journey and add more customer-centric offerings to their product portfolio with product bundling. Customer service can be enhanced by deploying customer service chatbots, adding voice service that helps customers to buy using voice, predictive network maintenance, and many other self-healing and self-learning hardware that is powered by Artificial intelligence.

“We are implementing AI to help us to identify where these breakpoints are, and help to repair those in an automated way without human intervention. This goes for hardware failure, software failures.” Says Dr. Mazin Gilbert | AT&T

For example, Telco has set up a system to track and foresee customer problems. This allows customers to self-service and solves questions and difficulties on their own. This reduced the number of support calls by 90%.

Customers drive trends in the telecommunication industry – It is important to serve customers well! 

2. Call Quality

“Calls dropping all day, phone ringing and can’t answer, can’t make outgoing calls, and the calls that go through drop” says a frustrated customer who has a big list of complaints on the quality of the calls. 

For telecommunications, voice quality is one of the most visible and important aspects. Companies should prioritize monitoring and design of call quality. If customers hear no sound or unclear voice when making calls, it straight away leads to frustration among customers.

Telecommunication companies should plan to upgrade their technology and connectivity infrastructure. Likewise, they should focus on providing high-quality voice services that are reliable, and affordable.

3. Internet Connectivity

“Smart Cities Will Be Built Out” – Ian Watterson, Head of Americas and Asia-Pacific, CSG 

Customers wherever they are — across cities, towns, or across the globe — want to talk, download, text, upload, and stream seamlessly without interruption. 

The Internet has emerged as the single most reason for better-connected lives than ever before.  Therefore improving the speed of internet connectivity will offer telecommunication companies greater opportunities in the coming years. When companies can offer Machine to Machine (M2M) communication, it can open up unlimited streams of revenue for the Telecom companies. 

Finally, Telecoms need to deliver what actually internet means – connectivity that is meant to be secure, available, universal, and global. Telecoms should remove barriers thereby offering access to high-bandwidth communication while on the move.

4. Data Plans

The Telecom sector is witnessing a revolution in terms of subscription pricing and benefits. Despite many operators offering exciting offers with postpaid and prepaid data plans, customers are always on the lookout for better ones.

Customers want to choose from a range of cost-effective plans with varying benefits across various price ranges. Starting from moderate usage plans to a long-term plan, customers are relying on telecom operators to offer flexible and customized data plans that can suit their needs. Customers are expecting some special perks offered by Telecom operators to sweeten the deal as it could turn out to be beneficial for them.

Telecom operators should be battling it out to get an upper hand in the competition. They need to introduce new data plans and revise their existing data plans to retain and grow more consumers. 

Brand Equity

Brand equity is an indicator of the company’s strength and performance, specifically in the public markets. In simple terms, brand equity describes brand value.

Brand value is determined by consumer perception, which is a combination of knowledge and experience towards a brand and its products. The perception that a consumer segment holds towards a brand directly results in either positive or negative effects.  

Download the detailed report for free to get to know the brand names in the below chart. The detailed report also covers list of features that delight users and several other interesting insights.

Customer Beliefs 

When it comes to convincing consumers, the secret is to understand the consumer's beliefs and behavior. This will eventually lead you to know what a buyer wants from your business. The customer has a deep understanding of what they want from a product.

Here are some common customer beliefs: 

1. 5G is dangerous as it emits high-frequency radiation

With the advent of the 5G, which is the future of the telecommunication industry, there is a concern about the health risk. With a more powerful network packed with higher energy radiation, customers believe that it delivers potential damaging effects on human beings.

Dr. Steve Novella, an assistant professor of neurology at Yale says “There’s no known mechanism for most forms of non-ionizing radiation to even have a biological effect,”

2. Resolving billing issues takes time & the process is cumbersome

Billing errors consistently haunt customers of telecom carriers. The billing errors range from inaccurate bills, unexpected rate hikes, Charges for services you don’t receive at all to obscure third-party add-on fees.  

A billing solution is a fundamental part of running a successful telecom business but is often taken for granted.  In a world that gives the highest prominence to customer experience, robust and accurate billing will help telecoms to earn the respect of customers. 

3. Overcharging is common during the cancellation

Customers believe that as soon as they cancel their subscription with their telecom operator, they are overcharged. Telecom operators charge a fee in the name of cancellation fees, contract termination fees, or early cancellation charges, but customers know it as an early termination fee—ETF. 

A telecom provider gives customers a cell phone or internet service for a few years, and if the customer cancels earlier than the period, the customer believes that heavy cancellation charges are levied. 

4. Loyalty to the brand is not recognized by the company

Customers of Telecom companies believe that the brands are not recognizing customer loyalty. Customers expect that companies shower more care towards them.

79% of customers will only consider shopping with brands that show they understand and care about them – Wunderman loyalty study 

Telecom companies should focus on creating an emotional connection between customers and the brand to give them a feeling that their loyalty is valued. 

Conclusion

Innovative telecom companies are no doubt changing the way we connect to the world around us. Every day there is a new trend, and telecom companies are embracing the new technologies to stay ahead of the competition.

Yet, one cannot ignore the customer preferences that are voiced in the form of customer reviews, social media posts, online conversations, and updates on forums.

Telecom companies, by being aware of the top customer perception drivers, can align with the overall company strategy, systems, and vision for the future.

Detailed Report

There are interesting customer conversations, delight factors, brand equity information, and much more about the Telecom industry. To know more, you can download the PDF version of the report for free. Enter your email at the end of this report and we’ll send it to you for FREE.

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