Over the past few years, Altnet providers have been delivering an invaluable service to homes around the UK, installing full fibre infrastructure all across the country as part of the UK Government’s rollout of gigabit connectivity. It’s proven to be an effective way to accelerate the improvement of internet infrastructure around the UK.
Yet while it’s made the market for full fibre broadband appear far more competitive than it used to be, the reality is that the big four providers still have a distinct advantage over altnets in one key area – customer acquisition.
The problem is that altnets are so busy building next gen infrastructure for customers that their sales infrastructure still isn’t as mature as that of their biggest competitors.
Add to that the decades of brand equity and massive customer management resources available to these industry leaders, and the odds of converting and retaining customers are clearly stacked in favour of the incumbents.
The result is that even though most altnets have proven they’re adept at laying fibre infrastructure, they’re struggling to acquire enough customers to stay competitive, and even alive.
Why most altnets lag behind where it matters most
The critical issue with inadequate sales and customer management infrastructure is that the problems quickly compound.
Because so many altnet providers are going to market with ad-hoc, spray and pray outreach tactics, they struggle to acquire the revenue that would help them make those processes more mature. That in turn makes it harder for them to adapt to the multivariant customer demands of a fast-growing, chaotic environment.
Engineer visits aren’t scheduled fast enough, technical installation problems start to creep in and soon management teams find themselves overstretched dealing with the multitude of issues stemming from a higher and higher dropout rate.
This can make it harder to hire and retain good salespeople as they do all of the work to acquire a customer, but then don’t get the commission when the customers cancel pre-install.
All of which contributes to tight cashflow constraints and exhaustive funding challenges while the biggest providers offer triple and quad play propositions with a proven track record and the resources to meet customer demands.
So what can altnets do to turn the tide?
A level playing field for altnets
In terms of the infrastructure needed to acquire, engage and retain customers, altnets today lack two three critical elements: the data needed for effective sales processes, experienced sales expertise to serve customers all along their purchase journeys and efficient omni-channel sales processes that can be data and tech-enabled.
Realistically, no single altnet provider can expect to match the scale and resources available to the big four. But what if all altnets could benefit from the same economies of scale?
For years, Firstsource has provided some of the UK’s biggest telco operators with the data, technology, process excellence and skills to reach, acquire and retain customers. Now, Firstsource is launching a new modular customer service designed specifically for altnets.
It’s called Growth Engine for Altnets and it includes everything altnets need to go to market with a customer experience that can reliably lead to sales and retention.
- Data-driven, multichannel marketing driven by personalized, proactive customer outreach at scale, including door-drops, email marketing, voice call outreach, door-to-door calls and on-street stands.
- Scalable sales processes that capture data to inform sales teams and close the loop between outreach and retention using AI, ML, automation and proven technologies for effective customer processing and management.
- Cost-effective contact centre operations that deliver frictionless customer experiences which hold the customer’s hand all the way through to retention, even managing collections.
It serves multiple alt-nets from a single delivery operation with dedicated sales and service advisors assigned to individual fibre broadband providers ensuring there’s no conflict of interest in terms of sales and marketing.
In effect, it gives every altnet provider the benefits of economies of scale for a fraction of the cost. All while improving the customer experience and giving busy management teams the predictability of improved revenue and cashflow.
For any altnet provider to stand a reasonable chance of competing against the scale and reputation of its biggest competitors, you need to be able to convert customers just as well as they do. Growth Engine for Altnets has been designed to help altnets become just as good at acquiring customers as they are at laying cable.
Visit Growth Engine for Altnets to learn more about whether it’s right for your business, or click here to get in touch.