‘Telecom Brands Should Compete With Banks, Other Service Brands’

In this interview with O’Lekan Babatunde, Tuchar Maheshwari, chief commercial officer, Starcomms Plc, offers a recipe on how telecoms brands can keep a tab on consumers and ensure the long term vision of the brand is actualized especially in highly competitive markets. Excerpts:

Market

This business is very competitive. The reason is that apart from the GSM players, there are so many CDMA players and recently too licenses were given for wi-max to further compound the market. All in all, there are two sides to this whole thing; one, the market is very competitive with so many players. But we think this is good for the consumers because at this point they get a variety of choices and they can get what they want. This is the most important for us because we have to make sure that thrives. The reason of variety, choices and growing competition are the hallmarks of the Nigerian market and same goes for South Africa. These are the two biggest in the sub-Sahara Africa. When the customer has choice, he can get what he wants. The potentials is still there and huge especially in Nigeria.

The second is that what used to be the most prominent markets – Abuja, Lagos Port-Harcourt – are changing forms and the focus is to move to others areas so as to meet the needs of the consumers and that is important to us and we are going to focus on this.

Recession and Starcomms

Yes, we are satisfied because the paradigm has changed. If I go back to ten years back or six years back, I will probably be looking at numbers. Today, we are not looking at numbers alone but also and most importantly, the quality of our customers and our services to them. So there is a paradigm shift in this regard and the success of a brand should mostly be seen from these perspectives. In this wise, we are doing good while we are striving to be better.

On quality

I think we have always been there as far as Starcomms is concerned. Our plan has always been to provide a 360 degree experience to our customers, not only using the mobile phone as a means for a voice call. Today, you do not need to look at the mobile phone only an instrument to make a call but can also use it as your laptop, you use it as a radio, TV, calculator and so many other things. So many people put their alarm on their mobile phones. We are competing not only with mobile phones but all these mentioned segments.

Nowadays people use their phones as cameras. If you take a census on highest selling camera in India, you will be surprised that it is not Sony or Kodak or Canon but it is Nokia. So I think the entire structure has changed. The phone has become a means to take pictures among many other uses.

The other is the change that comes with the shift in paradigm – the services have to be good. We have always believed in offering quality service as far as our customers are concerned. One thing is that changes are coming fast in terms of services. Recently, we upgraded our call centre to what is called Internet Protocol Call Centre (IPCC). Through this, we are offering our customers the choice of five languages such as Yoruba, Hausa, Igbo, Pidgin and English. They can also do transactions such as checking their balance, recharging their cards and various other things. The aim is to make things as easy for our customers as possible. We also have retail stores spread across the country. The idea is that these stores are not only there to drive sales, they will also provide access to the list of services and value added services available to the customer. Starcomms has an account on facebook and we are making active use of social media to relay our messages, we get feedbacks and try to respond to them ASAP because we feel that this is the medium for the future. Really, some of these things are little things but collectively can make a lot of difference, they put us in the public domain. Whether what the customer says is good or bad, they need a response. You will be surprised, someone wrote to us in Spanish and we responded back in Spanish, This allows us to demonstrate our sign-off “we speak your language”.

One other thing we are doing in terms of getting nearer to the customer is creating what we call the CEO’s line. It guarantees direct access to the CEO to register complaints on ceo@starcomms.com and the mails are responded to within a short time. The entire team including senior management, at least once in a month, visit the customers. They also go to call centres, mix with the staff and receive customers complains and enquiries. These allow them to know what the customers are saying or how they feel about the brand.

Toyin Street Office

There are a lot of misconceptions about the reason behind the move or better still, I think it was not adequately communicated. When a customer comes to a shop, he or she needs to park their car; parking space has to be available but sometimes it is possible and sometimes it is not possible. The important thing is that we’ve got a better place which is just a few minutes away from the old office. We were not forced out neither did we constitute a nuisance to the area as insinuated.

The modem exchange promo

I don’t think that was the idea. Our philosophy is simple: either do things differently or do different things. This idea is not new and it is being done worldwide by electronics and auto companies among others. It has been there since time immemorial. Remember, there was a time people were asked to bring their black and white TV and trade it in for colour versions; also, you can trade in the conventional for the Plasma TV. As new developments take place, you want to make things easier for the consumer.

The philosophy behind that campaign was that we have a lot of customers on wimax. We aggregated customers’ complaints and realised that many people wanted to upgrade to the faster izap but the issue is always that they have to drop the older modem and cough out some good money to acquire the new hence we decided to make it easy for the consumers by telling them to trade in their old for a new and faster version. If some customers on other networks come to me or our customer centres obviously we are not going to deny them.

Superbrand awards

This has been a very pleasant surprise to all of us in this company because one day we just received a letter from them that we have won a Superbrand status so we are quite amazed. What happens in some other countries is that you put in your entry and they select among various companies. Here, what they did was an independent study which you don’t have to pay for. They do it on their own among various categories and their decision is based on what the customers say. It is the customer’s voice in terms of reach, service quality and so many other parameters. It is a finding grounded in research which is coordinated by Nielsen research. So it was pleasantly surprising to us when we received the letter informing of us of our new Superbrand status. It corroborates what we do and is an aggregation of consumers’ opinion and their perceptions about our brand.

Starcomms peak

I don’t know of any brand that can say it has reached its peak. In terms of quality, we will still like to set new standards. We can’t be complacent about quality. Competition is not only in terms of our product category. Our vision is to be the most preferred service brand, not a telecoms brand. When you compete as a service brand, it means Starcomms is competing with other service brands in industries such as banking, airlines, hospitality, etc. A brand has to up the ante in quality services and customer experience to give customers the best and there are various things you can pick up from other service industries.

Economy and your business

Yes, it has been a tough time not only for us alone but for everyone. It affects businesses in Africa, Europe and the Americas, it’s a global phenomenon but I think things are looking up. Though it has taken many months for things to work out, things are changing and the banks are coming up with stronger structures so these are all signs that things are picking up.

Perspective

We just believe in ourselves, believe in our people and believe in the country. If you can dream it, you can do it and that is how you have to look at it. Yes, there might be ups and downs but you have to look at ten years down the line not ten months down the line. As long as you have a long term perspective on what you are doing, you can survive but if the vision is not long term, you might crash out like some others have.

‘Telecom Brands Should Compete With Banks, Other Service Brands’In this interview with O’Lekan Babatunde, Tuchar Maheshwari, chief commercial officer, Starcomms Plc, offers a recipe on how telecoms brands can keep a tab on consumers and ensure the long term vision of the brand is actualized especially in highly competitive markets. Excerpts:MarketThis business is very competitive. The reason is that apart from the GSM players, there are so many CDMA players and recently too licenses were given for wi-max to further compound the market. All in all, there are two sides to this whole thing; one, the market is very competitive with so many players. But we think this is good for the consumers because at this point they get a variety of choices and they can get what they want. This is the most important for us because we have to make sure that thrives. The reason of variety, choices and growing competition are the hallmarks of the Nigerian market and same goes for South Africa. These are the two biggest in the sub-Sahara Africa. When the customer has choice, he can get what he wants. The potentials is still there and huge especially in Nigeria. The second is that what used to be the most prominent markets – Abuja, Lagos Port-Harcourt – are changing forms and the focus is to move to others areas so as to meet the needs of the consumers and that is important to us and we are going to focus on this.Recession and Starcomms Yes, we are satisfied because the paradigm has changed. If I go back to ten years back or six years back, I will probably be looking at numbers. Today, we are not looking at numbers alone but also and most importantly, the quality of our customers and our services to them. So there is a paradigm shift in this regard and the success of a brand should mostly be seen from these perspectives. In this wise, we are doing good while we are striving to be better. On qualityI think we have always been there as far as Starcomms is concerned. Our plan has always been to provide a 360 degree experience to our customers, not only using the mobile phone as a means for a voice call. Today, you do not need to look at the mobile phone only an instrument to make a call but can also use it as your laptop, you use it as a radio, TV, calculator and so many other things. So many people put their alarm on their mobile phones. We are competing not only with mobile phones but all these mentioned segments. Nowadays people use their phones as cameras. If you take a census on highest selling camera in India, you will be surprised that it is not Sony or Kodak or Canon but it is Nokia. So I think the entire structure has changed. The phone has become a means to take pictures among many other uses. The other is the change that comes with the shift in paradigm – the services have to be good. We have always believed in offering quality service as far as our customers are concerned. One thing is that changes are coming fast in terms of services. Recently, we upgraded our call centre to what is called Internet Protocol Call Centre (IPCC). Through this, we are offering our customers the choice of five languages such as Yoruba, Hausa, Igbo, Pidgin and English. They can also do transactions such as checking their balance, recharging their cards and various other things. The aim is to make things as easy for our customers as possible. We also have retail stores spread across the country. The idea is that these stores are not only there to drive sales, they will also provide access to the list of services and value added services available to the customer. Starcomms has an account on facebook and we are making active use of social media to relay our messages, we get feedbacks and try to respond to them ASAP because we feel that this is the medium for the future. Really, some of these things are little things but collectively can make a lot of difference, they put us in the public domain. Whether what the customer says is good or bad, they need a response. You will be surprised, someone wrote to us in Spanish and we responded back in Spanish, This allows us to demonstrate our sign-off “we speak your language”. One other thing we are doing in terms of getting nearer to the customer is creating what we call the CEO’s line. It guarantees direct access to the CEO to register complaints on ceo@starcomms.com and the mails are responded to within a short time. The entire team including senior management, at least once in a month, visit the customers. They also go to call centres, mix with the staff and receive customers complains and enquiries. These allow them to know what the customers are saying or how they feel about the brand.Toyin Street OfficeThere are a lot of misconceptions about the reason behind the move or better still, I think it was not adequately communicated. When a customer comes to a shop, he or she needs to park their car; parking space has to be available but sometimes it is possible and sometimes it is not possible. The important thing is that we’ve got a better place which is just a few minutes away from the old office. We were not forced out neither did we constitute a nuisance to the area as insinuated. The modem exchange promoI don’t think that was the idea. Our philosophy is simple: either do things differently or do different things. This idea is not new and it is being done worldwide by electronics and auto companies among others. It has been there since time immemorial. Remember, there was a time people were asked to bring their black and white TV and trade it in for colour versions; also, you can trade in the conventional for the Plasma TV. As new developments take place, you want to make things easier for the consumer. The philosophy behind that campaign was that we have a lot of customers on wimax. We aggregated customers’ complaints and realised that many people wanted to upgrade to the faster izap but the issue is always that they have to drop the older modem and cough out some good money to acquire the new hence we decided to make it easy for the consumers by telling them to trade in their old for a new and faster version. If some customers on other networks come to me or our customer centres obviously we are not going to deny them. Superbrand awardsThis has been a very pleasant surprise to all of us in this company because one day we just received a letter from them that we have won a Superbrand status so we are quite amazed. What happens in some other countries is that you put in your entry and they select among various companies. Here, what they did was an independent study which you don’t have to pay for. They do it on their own among various categories and their decision is based on what the customers say. It is the customer’s voice in terms of reach, service quality and so many other parameters. It is a finding grounded in research which is coordinated by Nielsen research. So it was pleasantly surprising to us when we received the letter informing of us of our new Superbrand status. It corroborates what we do and is an aggregation of consumers’ opinion and their perceptions about our brand. Starcomms peakI don’t know of any brand that can say it has reached its peak. In terms of quality, we will still like to set new standards. We can’t be complacent about quality. Competition is not only in terms of our product category. Our vision is to be the most preferred service brand, not a telecoms brand. When you compete as a service brand, it means Starcomms is competing with other service brands in industries such as banking, airlines, hospitality, etc. A brand has to up the ante in quality services and customer experience to give customers the best and there are various things you can pick up from other service industries.Economy and your businessYes, it has been a tough time not only for us alone but for everyone. It affects businesses in Africa, Europe and the Americas, it’s a global phenomenon but I think things are looking up. Though it has taken many months for things to work out, things are changing and the banks are coming up with stronger structures so these are all signs that things are picking up. PerspectiveWe just believe in ourselves, believe in our people and believe in the country. If you can dream it, you can do it and that is how you have to look at it. Yes, there might be ups and downs but you have to look at ten years down the line not ten months down the line. As long as you have a long term perspective on what you are doing, you can survive but if the vision is not long term, you might crash out like some others have.

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