3G Marketing: Communities and Strategic Partnerships

About the Authors xvii

Foreword xix

Acknowledgements xxi

1 Introduction 1

1.1 A look back 2

1.1.1 Enter I-Mode 5

1.1.2 The flap about WAP being a failure 6

1.1.3 Growth rate 7

1.2 What have we learned? 8

1.2.1 Telecoms operators and 3G marketing 9

1.3 Lets touch upon definitions of 3G 10

1.3.1 So what is 4G 12

1.3.2 W-LAN or Wi-Fi is definitely not 4G 12

1.3.3 4G will arrive ten years from now 13

1.4 To sum up 13

2 Market Intelligence 15

2.1 What is market intelligence 16

2.1.1 Evolution of market intelligence 16

2.1.2 Information, analysis, knowledge and intelligence 16

2.1.3 Knowledge or Intelligence 17

2.2 Systematic market intelligence 17

2.2.1 Market intelligence and business intelligence 18

2.2.2 Legal and regulatory intelligence 18

2.2.3 Customer intelligence 19

2.2.4 Competitor intelligence 20

2.2.5 Technical environment intelligence 21

2.2.6 Telecoms is not used to rapid innovation 22

2.2.7 The computer industry thrives on rapid innovation 23

2.3 ‘Environment scanning’ intelligence 25

2.3.1 Resource market intelligence 26

2.3.2 Reference market studies 27

2.3.3 Partnership intelligence/networking 27

2.4 Towards a higher intelligence 29

3 Segmentation 31

3.1 What is segmentation? 32

3.1.1 Test of current telecoms segmentation 33

3.2 Segmentation criteria 35

3.2.1 Segmentation from the academics 35

3.2.2 Segmentation by geographical pattern 36

3.2.3 Segment by demographics 36

3.2.4 Industry type 36

3.2.5 Segmentation by using various distribution channels 38

3.2.6 Personal data 38

3.2.7 Segmentation by psychological patterns 38

3.3 ERP, CRM and segmentation 38

3.3.1 From hard to soft facts 39

3.3.2 Users broken down — segmenting situations 40

3.4 From theory to practice: building a segmentation model 41

3.4.1 Characteristics of a useful segmentation model 41

3.4.2 Segmentation by user behaviour 41

3.4.3 How many segments? 43

3.4.4 Comparison with the car industry 46

3.4.5 Beyond a segment of one 47

3.4.6 From business to individual 48

3.4.7 Self-organizing maps 48

3.4.8 From alphas to omegas 49

3.5 Developing the segmentation model 51

3.6 To sum up segmentation 54

4 Service Development and Management 55

4.1 Product development — the Five Ms 56

4.1.1 Power of personalization 57

4.1.2 Money brings content 58

4.1.3 Talking machines 59

4.2 Service management (product management) 61

4.2.1 Knowing the market 62

4.2.2 New service ideas 62

4.2.3 Brainstorming 63

4.2.4 From idea to opportunity 64

4.2.5 Let there be light 64

4.2.6 It is your own sales who knows your customer best 65

4.2.7 Caught in the middle of the triangle 66

4.3 The launch 67

4.3.1 Tariffing, cost and profit 67

4.4 Killing a service 68

4.5 To finish with service creation 68

5 Partnership Management 71

5.1 What is partnering? 72

5.1.1 Flavours of partnering 73

5.1.2 Who are the prospective partners? 74

5.2 Operators are new to this game 75

5.2.1 Culture shock 76

5.3 Revenue sharing 78

5.3.1 What kind of revenue (and/or cost) sharing options? 79

5.3.2 What level of revenue sharing 80

5.4 Main factors influencing split in revenue share 81

5.4.1 Exclusivity 82

5.4.2 Value chain 82

5.2.3 On-screen location 83

5.2.4 Brand strength 83

5.2.5 Location information 84

5.2.6 Charging/billing information 84

5.3 Rules of thumb 84

5.4 Contract management 86

5.4.1 Keys to success 87

5.4.2 Partnering for profit 88

5.5 Parting with partnering 89

6 Terminals 91

6.1 How our gadgets evolve 92

6.1.1 Convergence 93

6.2 The Swiss knife or all-in-one device 95

6.3 Custom-use devices 96

6.3.1 The PDA 97

6.3.2 Digital camera 99

6.3.3 Gaming devices 101

6.3.4 The credit card 102

6.3.5 GPS devices 103

6.3.6 3G modems 103

6.3.7 Custom devices 103

6.4 Automobiles 104

6.4.1 Servicing and maintaining the car 104

6.4.2 Navigation 105

6.4.3 Car security and anti-theft 105

6.4.4 Multitasking and the car 106

6.4.5 Games in the car 106

6.5 More devices that seem like science fiction 106

6.6 Handset subsidies 108

6.6.1 Device needs 109

6.6.2 Connectivity 109

6.6.3 Synchronization 110

6.7 Handing off on handsets 110

7 Distribution 113

7.1 Sales channels 114

7.1.1 Operator’s own stores 114

7.1.2 Independent stores 115

7.1.3 Departments and sales desks of other stores 116

7.1.4 IT integrators 116

7.1.5 The Internet as a sales channel 117

7.1.6 The mobile portal as a sales channel 118

7.1.7 MVNOs 118

7.2 Managing channel conflicts 118

7.3 Selling new mobile services 119

7.3.1 Bundling an m-component 119

7.3.2 Soul of the store sales rep 120

7.4 Information flow 121

7.5 Warehousing, shipping, inventory 122

7.6 Distribution as an end 123

8 Portals 125

8.1 Defining portals 126

8.2 3G portal categorization 126

8.2.1 Different types of mobile portal 126

8.2.2 Categorization 127

8.3 The 3D rule for mobile portals 127

8.3.1 What is murfing 128

8.4 Personalization 129

8.4.1 Authentication (‘intelligent’ portal) 129

8.4.2 Timing (‘instant’ portal) 130

8.4.3 Positioning (portal ‘to go’) 130

8.4.4 Pull versus push (portal ‘on demand’) 130

8.5 Open content policy – a decisive battle over 3G’s success 131

8.5.1 The more services, the more money for everybody 131

8.5.2 Price strategies: skimming versus penetration 132

8.6 Revenues and advertising 133

8.7 Collect customer data (registration) 133

8.7.1 Advertising 134

8.7.2 Buy your ad on the top of search engines 135

8.7.3 Cross selling (own products) 136

8.7.4 Customer loyalty programmes/clubs 136

8.7.5 m-Commerce (partner marketing) 136

8.7.6 Multi-access portal 136

8.8 Closing the portal 137

9 Promotion 139

9.1 Is the classic marketing mix all mixed up in 3G? 140

9.1.1 The AIDA rule 140

9.2 Crossing the 3G chasm 141

9.3 Public relations and press relations 143

9.4 Advertising mobile services 144

9.5 Publicity 147

9.6 Sponsorship and product placement 148

9.6.1 Viral marketing and communities 149

9.7 Conclusion 149

10 Branding 151

10.1 What is a brand? 152

10.2 Why brand? 152

10.2.1 Brands aid in decision 153

10.2.2 Brands and teenagers 154

10.2.3 Brands and price 154

10.2.4 Brand and loyalty 155

10.3 Needs to be comprehensive 155

10.3.1 Brands in mobile telecoms 156

10.4 How to build a brand 157

10.4.1 Where do I begin? 157

10.4.2 Employee buy-in 158

10.4.3 Damaging the brand 158

10.5 Multiple brand messages 158

10.5.1 Cross branding 159

10.5.2 Sub-branding (overall company branding versus product trademarks) 159

10.5.3 Co-branding 160

10.5.4 On-line branding 161

10.6 Action plan for branding 162

10.6.1 Branding ‘do’s’ 163

10.6.2 Branding ‘don’ts’ 164

10.6.3 Brand development plan outline 165

10.6.4 Brands grow too 166

10.6.5 After the brand, what is left? 166

11 Service Adoption 167

11.1 S-curves 168

11.2 Where is the saturation level? 169

11.2.1 TV set analogy 170

11.2.2 But can you use two phones at the same time? 171

11.2.3 Subscriptions and subscribers 171

11.2.4 So where is the ceiling? 172

11.2.5 ‘Near saturation’ myth 173

11.2.6 An American consideration 173

11.2.7 How high is high? 174

11.3 Business or Residential 174

11.3.1 The case for business customers 174

11.3.2 The case for the residential customer 176

11.3.3 Exceptional issues with 3G 177

11.4 Early adopters 179

11.5 Mass market 181

11.6 The early eight 182

11.7 Beyond the adoption 186

12 Reachability 189

12.1 Wireless carriages and voice telegraphs 190

12.2 Enter reachability 191

12.2.1 Calling the person, not the place 192

12.2.2 Change plans 193

12.2.3 Indispensible 194

12.3 Reachability and mobile services 194

12.3.1 SMS text messages and reachability 195

12.3.2 Respecting privacy 196

12.3.3 Knowing who calls 197

12.4 Cellular is a distorted case of Metcalfe’s law 197

12.4.1 Hockey stick is not Metcalfe’s law 198

12.4.2 Inflection points for the hockey stick curve 200

12.5 Most personal device 200

12.6 Reach out and touch 201

13 Selling Mobile Services 203

13.1 What do you sell in 3G? 204

13.2 Selling through distributors 204

13.3 Selling to consumers 206

13.3.1 Event related sales 206

13.3.2 Bundling services with the subscription 207

13.3.3 Billing inserts 207

13.3.4 Portal placement 207

13.3.5 Selling to businesses 208

13.3.6 Corporate customers 208

13.3.7 Large corporate customers 209

13.3.8 SME or medium sized companies 209

13.3.9 SOHO or small businesses 210

13.4 Selling to partners 211

13.5 Motivating the sales representative 212

13.6 Handset subsidies 214

13.7 Non-traditional sales 216

13.7.1 Cross-selling 216

13.7.2 Bonus point programmes 217

13.7.3 Network effect/viral selling 217

13.8 Sales out 218

14 Tariffing 219

14.1 But isn’t tariffing simple? 220

14.1.1 Cost-plus tariffing 220

14.2 Some customers are willing to spend more 221

14.2.1 Airline analogy 221

14.2.2 Applying the example to telecoms 225

14.3 Profit and pricing 226

14.3.1 Prices and usage 228

14.3.2 The variety in acceptable price 229

14.3.3 Prices for service introduction 230

14.3.4 Penny for your thoughts 231

14.3.5 Pricing of bundles (‘service packages’) 232

14.4 Preparedness for tariffing 232

14.4.1 Marketing research 232

14.4.2 Tariff modelling 233

14.4.3 Tariff trials 234

14.4.4 Tariff adaptation 234

14.5 How about one price for all? 234

14.5.1 Pricing by data traffic 235

14.5.2 Home zones and hot spots 236

14.6 3G licences and the price 237

14.6.1 Price 3G for mass market adoption 237

14.6.2 Not a free for all 238

15 Billing 239

15.1 Charging, billing, reporting 240

15.1.1 Charging collects the data 240

15.1.2 Billing creates the invoice 241

15.1.3 Reporting gives information to the caller 241

15.2 Micropayments 241

15.2.1 Credit risk 242

15.2.2 To bank or not to bank? 243

15.2.3 Tracking advertising and promotion revenues 243

15.2.4 Tracking digital rights 244

15.2.5 Billing can also be an added value service 245

15.3 From billing to product management and marketing 245

15.4 The call for one bill 246

15.5 Revenue assurance 247

15.5.1 Revenue leakage and profit 248

15.5.2 Revenue assurance and 3G 248

15.5.3 Billing complaints 249

15.6 End to billing 250

16 Other Revenue Streams 251

16.1 Redefining the operator position 252

16.2 Business models 253

16.2.1 Case Jippii Group 253

16.2.2 Case Sonera Zed 255

16.2.3 Case I-Mode 256

16.3 Operator revenue strategies 257

16.3.1 Selling location data 259

16.3.2 Location based push services 259

16.3.3 m-Commerce 261

16.3.4 mAd (mobile advertising) 261

16.4 Revenue sharing 263

16.4.1 Revenue sharing levels 264

16.4.2 More money? 266

17 Combatting Churn 267

17.1 Basics of churn 268

17.1.1 Who is a churner? 268

17.1.2 Why customers churn – three general reasons 269

17.1.3 The joiner 269

17.1.4 The leaver 270

17.1.5 The changer 271

17.1.6 Selecting customers to target 271

17.1.7 Stayers 272

17.2 Churn is good — targeting competitors’ customers 272

17.3 Churn is bad — don’t let valuable customers churn 273

17.4 Combatting churn 274

17.4.1 Price as the weapon 274

17.4.2 Technical barriers and churn 275

17.5 Number portability 276

17.5.1 Changing numbers 276

17.6 Loyalty programmes 277

17.7 Handset subsidies 277

17.7.1 What makes subsidies so damaging? 279

17.8 From techniques of authentification to identity 280

17.9 Back to the brand 281

17.10 Community think 282

17.10.1 Customer intelligence and churn 284

17.10.2 Keeping customers happy 285

17.11 An end to churn 286

18 Marketing Plan 287

18.1 Business, marketing, advertising plans 288

18.1.1 Business plans 288

18.1.2 Marketing plans 288

18.1.3 Hierarchical nature of plans 289

18.1.4 Segment marketing plans 290

18.2 Marketing plan outline 291

18.2.1 Plan ahead 293

19 Postscript 295

Being Part of the 3G Revolution 301

Abbreviations 303

Bibliography 307

Useful Websites 309

Index 313