Cable-TV, phones and internet make people talk

Telecommunication is the professional industry cutting out the largest share Danes’ e-commerce related activities. Not money-wise. But time-wise. Engagement-wise. What is it, the Telcos has done right? And who’s who among the Danish Telcos on the web? That’s what I’ve been looking into in my latest report “Danish Telcos on the web. A portrait of a digitalized industry”. Find reference below.

I’d say three structural factors explain the success of Telcos:
1. Existing products has turned digital: The move from fixed landlines to mobile phones, the digitalization of TV and the birth of the internet as such has drastically changed the nature of the telco-market, un-cabling the core products.

2. Sales process has turned digital: Telco’s has successfully shifted the sales channel online. Whether selling telephone- and/or TV-plans, enable you to speak and watch, selling access to the internet and for some selling a variety of devices used in the telecommunications-process, like mobile phones, TV-sets or routers, the Telcos has moved the buying experince online.

3. New digital products has been developed. Telco’s have developed new kind of pure internet-based products and services, which have hugely appealed to their customer-bases. Portal-sites, guiding the ISP-customers safely to the internet, bringing them quality-content, web-based email services, interactive programme guides and music download-services are among the premium examples of this.

As for the who’s who: TDC leads on i the digital communication space, (though the risk loosing out on the young ones, says the figures) Stofa (though their position in Copenhagen and Sealand regions are very weak) tries to bridge the gap. The rest – Telmore, Telenor og Telia, YouSee, CBB, 3, Callme, Getmore and M1 – follows far below. In time spend (= engagement) rankings, that is.

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“Danish Telco’s on the web. A portrait of a digitalized industry”. 10 pages, 1 illustration.

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TDC reduces churn by 50 percent by giving away music for free

A few days before the one year anniversary of the world first give-customers-free-access-to-all-music (2 mio tracks from all major record-labels), Danish telco TDC reveals the rationale behind the groundbreaking move labeled “Play”. Figures revealed today by TDC ceo Jesper Theill Eriksen at the Tele2009-conference shows that churn – that is customers quitting TDC – has been reduced by 50 % for broadbandcustomers.

I don’t know how much TDC paid for the rights to freely distribute the music, but it’s bound to have been a good deal.

From a how-to-make-money from the media & telco-landscape of today, it’s interesting as well: It seems an extremely successful move to focus on value-adding for their customers, differentiating TDC from their competitors, and therefore also not only keeping on to their customers but also potentially allowing TDC to raise prizes (or at least not be as vulnerable to sheer prize-competition from competitors).

On a similar note Theill Eriksen also noted that the new heavily valueadded triple-play product (telephony, broadband and television) had outsold TDCs own expectations, already reaching 50.000 customers as opposed to the benchmark of 12.000. In this product the free-music service Play is also included as well as customer service and care-free installation.