Personal marketing is the core of our approach at VodafoneZiggo. We no longer target general audiences or assumptions, but personal preferences on an individual customer level. We base our offer (sales and service) on what we know about the customer. In that way, we can approach him at the right time, through the right channel with the right message. And for the sake of clarity, customers always decide themselves which data they want to share with us.
Real time relevance
We are much more in touch with our customers, through more and more communication channels, from app to website, e-mail to telephone, shop to helpdesk. All the more important is the alignment between all these channels. Only then can we service a customer individually, personalised, real time and relevantly. GURU, the dedicated system we are currently building, collects relevant data and acts as the brain that is the linchpin between all channels. Over time, all the messages we send to a customer, will be fully aligned with regard to design and content, offline as well as online. As a result, irrelevant communication, duplicate or conflicting messages will become past history.
Eventually, we will be able to closely monitor customer behaviour. The system learns from every interaction customers have with us. Their choices result in personal profiles that help us provide them with the right products and services. As a next step, we compare these one-to-one profiles to behaviour of other customers. Where we see clear similarities, we can make a comparable offer and see whether the interests match as predicted.
Have you looked at a product on our website a couple of times, contacted our call centre, watched certain sports or talked to one of our shop assistants? Based on that kind of data you will receive a message in which we suggest products and services that match your interests. This data-driven approach leads to well-balanced sales. One that perfectly suits the needs of the customer. It’s for good reason that GURU’s slogan says, 'Make sense, add value'.
I regularly share the GURU story with an audience. Recently, our software supplier even invited me to speak to an audience of 6,000 people in the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, the venue where the Grammy awards are presented. What strikes me each time I deliver a speech, is that people in the audience often come up to me afterwards because of the well-chosen example I use. The example of the fictitious customer Tim.
Formula 1 fan passes by
Tim is a Vodafone customer but is also interested in other providers. Which is why he visits the Ziggo website. As a Formula 1 adept, Ziggo Sport with free Formula 1 coverage immediately appeals to him. He clicks on the banner to learn more about the offer. When he passes by one of our Vodafone or Ziggo stores, he receives a WhatsApp message: can he spare the time to enter and try out the F1 race simulator? (With him already being a Vodafone customer, we know exactly which channels we can use to contact him. Moreover, due to the settings of location services on his phone, he has registered himself upon entering the store, so we know that this is indeed ‘our’ Tim.)
Once inside and happy with his performance on the track, Tim has a nice talk with one of the shop assistants. Based on that, he receives an email with a suitable offer for Ziggo All-in-One with superfast and reliable internet ánd with the Ziggo Sport Totaal package for free. From now on, he never has to miss one single Grand Prix race anymore. This is just an example of how we can wait on customers hand and foot, as long as we have the appropriate data at our disposal.
Learn from rejections
Call centre agents play a key part in the data collection. They can check what the customer wants ánd what he doesn’t want. Both are of value to us. We also learn from an offer which is rejected by a customer. Someone who is not interested in Ziggo Sport Totaal for example, will not receive that same offer again – and quite likely is not very interested in other sports-related products either.
This shows that every bit of information we know about a customer, can lead to better products or services. But no matter which technology, computer systems or marketing methods we use, we always stick to one golden rule: the customer is King. We are only relevant, if the customer experiences us as such.
Nicole Verburg, Customer Value Management Director
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