Want To Delight Your Subscribers and Show You Care? Start by Asking What They Think

Gone are the days when a broadband service provider (BSP) could win by offering fast connections at the lowest price. Today, many subscribers know they can choose their provider. In some markets, subscribers can pick from six or more BSPs—all of them fighting for their business. So how will you stand out from the competition?  

Level the Playing Field by Delivering an Exceptional Subscriber Experience

Delivering an exceptional subscriber experience may sound complicated, especially for smaller BSPs. Thankfully, you no longer need huge marketing teams or budgets to compete with the Tier 1 players. Even more importantly, because speed alone no longer sells, smaller BSPs can win by focusing on their subscribers’ overall experience.  

Ready to deliver an exceptional subscriber experience? Here are best practices that will help you stand out from the competition and gain market share.

1. Align your entire company with subscriber experience. Subscriber experience needs company-wide commitment to succeed, starting from the top down. As BSP marketers, you can be champions for change, aligning your entire organization behind experience. Ontario & Trumansburg Telephone Companies (OTTC) ensures all employees are fully trained on their offerings and can communicate the value to subscribers. This alignment lets OTTC deliver an exceptional experience, gaining them a Net Promoter Score (NPS) of +76 and a 5 percent reduction in subscriber churn.

2. Show your subscribers how much you love them. Each step along the subscriber journey is an opportunity to gauge—and increase—subscriber happiness. Welcome subscribers to your family with a post-installation survey. Get their feedback after your support team closes a trouble ticket. Make sure subscribers are aware of new services. Use every interaction to reinforce your commitment to subscriber satisfaction. ALLO Communications sends satisfaction surveys on subscribers’ service anniversaries. The Nebraska service provider’s commitment to providing superior service has netted them an NPS of +74.

3. Make it easy for subscribers to share feedback. To encourage subscriber feedback on experience, keep the process simple. Keep satisfaction surveys short. Use the channels subscribers are most likely to respond to—web, email, phone, printed surveys, even video. In their decade-long NPS program, Horry Telephone Cooperative (HTC) has evolved the channels they use to solicit feedback to make it easier for members to respond. This member-first mindset is one reason HTC enjoys an NPS of +73.

4. Analyze the data and create actionable recommendations. Once you’ve measured experience, analyze the data to find strengths you want to amplify and areas that need work. Develop actionable recommendations for improving the subscriber experience, such as adding new services to your portfolio or expanding channels for customer service. HTC reviews their survey results quarterly and uses the insights to develop “deep dive” training sessions. This way, they can ensure all member-facing staff are up to speed on new technologies and services and can better serve members.

5. Ensure every subscriber becomes an advocate. All subscribers are important. But it’s particularly critical to convert your NPS “detractors” into “passives” or, better, “promoters.” Unhappy subscribers are more likely to share negative opinions that can impact your brand. Further, it costs more to acquire new subscribers than it does to keep your current base. ALLO makes it a practice to always close the feedback loop and “make it right” with any dissatisfied subscribers. 

Increase ARPU and Exceed Industry Standards With NPS of 70 or More

By implementing these (and other) best practices, you can create an exceptional subscriber experience that will yield higher satisfaction and lower subscriber churn, as well as higher ARPU and customer lifetime value. As the examples above demonstrate, focusing on the customer experience yields amazing results, including NPS well above the industry standard of 33.

Innovative BSPs—like ALLO, HTC, OTTC, and many others—are setting an example for what subscriber experience should be. We’ve taken that one step further to establish an industry standard for the ideal subscriber experience. Working together with BSP marketing leaders, we ran workshops and interviews, and researched best practices for experience in other sectors. The result is The Definitive Guide to Subscriber Experience, which provides a roadmap for all BSPs to elevate experience and bring greater value to subscribers and their communities. This initiative underscores our commitment to giving BSP marketers the resources they need to win in their markets.

Subscriber experience is an ongoing journey. We’re always looking for new ways to help BSPs “wow” subscribers; so, if you have a best practice you’d like to share, send it my way at todd.graden@calix.com.

Gain insights from your fellow BSP marketers today, check out our recently published report, The Marketer and the Broadband Service Provider.