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Mobile Consumers Demand High-Value Deals from Operators, Shun Third-Party Ads: Survey

April 06, 2011

A recent study from Upstream, a provider of mobile marketing solutions, finds that mobile consumers demand high-value personalized deals from operators. The study says the deals via SMS offer mobile operators a great opportunity to boost revenue than that gained by third-party advertisements.


The 2011 Upstream Mobile Marketing Consumer Attitudes Report is based on independent research conducted by YouGov, which polled 2,198 consumers online.

According to Alex Vratskides, CEO of Upstream, the survey indicated that a great opportunity exists for operators to cross and upsell their own products and services at minimal expense.

Fifty nine percent of the survey participants said they would like to receive offers from their operator via text message, such as plan and handset upgrades or discounts. Customers prefer personalized offers such as suggestions for plan upgrades (15 percent), general discounts (13 percent), proposals for a handset upgrade (8 percent) and personalized notifications of new service launches (4 percent).

Most of the respondents (61 percent) said they would like to be contacted via text messages. However, 51 percent also said that they would like to be informed within pre-existing service messages such as top-up confirmations (9 percent), missed call and voice mail alerts (8 percent each) and balance updates and roaming notifications (7 percent each).

According to Vratskides, personalized messages, which are contextual and feature utility and transactional driven rewards, can have a significant impact on an operator’s average revenue per user – particularly when these offers are included in messages the operator is already sending to the customer.

However, consumers also want that these messages do not become a nuisance. Thirty eight percent of the survey participants said they do not want more than one message per month and 31 percent said they want less than that, whilst 14 percent were prepared to receive offers up to twice a month.

More than half (52 percent) of consumers said they would trust their mobile phone company over a third-party retailer when redeeming a deal via SMS, compared to just eight percent of consumers who would trust a third-party retailer more.

Of the survey participants, 56 percent said they would opt-in to receive third party advertising if offered discount incentives, but 88 percent said that they did not think it was acceptable for mobile operators to feature third-party advertising. As many as 72 percent said they would be more likely to consider leaving their operator if they started featuring third-party ads, with 21 percent saying they would do so immediately.

Vratskides added, “Looking at the number of customers who say they would switch operator as a result of receiving third-party advertising, it seems fair to say that opt-in databases are a false economy. Operators are the guardians of marketing contact with their customers; if they abuse their position, it can only lead to customer churn.”

Earlier this year, a ContactCenterSolutions report said relevance will be the key revenue driver for new mobile-based services in 2011 and beyond, quoting Flytxt, a provider of mobile marketing and advertising technology to operators around the world. Read the full report here.


Rajani Baburajan is a contributing editor for ContactCenterSolutions. To read more of Rajani's articles, please visit her columnist page.

Edited by Janice McDuffee



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