CLV: The Ultimate Metric of Mobile Operator Performance and Customer Experience
By Colleen LeCount, Mobolize Senior Vice President, Global Sales and Marketing
Acquisition. Revenue. Churn. Another day, another key performance indicator (KPI) for mobile operators to chase. Operators are applauded for boosting subscribers and reducing churn but then dinged for lower margins, often the outcome of the actions taken to acquire and retain those customers.
Keeping all those balls in the air can feel like a juggling act. After all, if the focus is just on margins, there’s a of risk losing customers to a poor experience. Swing the pendulum the other way and profitability is quickly put at risk.
One of the key metrics is customer lifetime value (CLV), a performance indicator identifying the net profit attributed to the entire relationship with a customer. Many factors influence CLV, which is often considered to be and I’d argue is the best metric for measuring operator performance.
What many operators are finding is that adding attractive products and services to the mobile offer can help attract and retain customers. Products that customers want, like and need – provided by their trusted operator.
These come in lots of flavors. Some are unlimited or family plans that provide peace-of-mind. Others are more customized services such as telemedicine or access to special content such as sports or entertainment. Even special phone or SIM card offers can be an incentive.
But these are becoming the norm in the mobile space. They also can be costly, which affects margins and ultimately CLV. The smart operator looks for new ways to differentiate their service that delights the mobile user and can be provided at a low cost.
A popular new solution is Wi-Fi security. Mobile security needs are different than traditional computer security needs. With common use of public Wi-Fis (on average, more than 70% of data usage on a mobile phone) that are wide open to evil intruders, it is best to look for security that is designed for the mobile market. That means security that protects from the nanosecond the customer’s data leaves the device and travels to the router and beyond.
Traditional VPNs are required to always be on, and that drains batteries. They also encrypt all data, even data that is already encrypted. The result – popular video apps (Netflix and Hulu for example) won’t recognize the user and refuse to stream. Who gets the blame? The operator.
Another opportunity is optimization. Streaming video is the most popular way people consume data on their device. Helping the subscriber consumer more video and the operator save network traffic, all while maintaining the customer experience… that’s a win-win.
The key to cost-effectively delivering new, differentiated solutions with rapid time-to-market is to deploy on the device, not the network. Mobolize uniquely is able to do this as an SDK or standalone app, helping maximize the mobile data experience for both Wi-Fi and cellular networks.
Additionally once on the device, Mobolize’s software is low touch for the customer and the operator with no need for user interaction. Our contextual marketing capabilities essentially enable us to sell ourselves, and once subscribed we can provide regular, unobtrusive reminders of the value such as a notification that the subscriber is secure when joining a Wi-Fi network.
A good customer experience the helps acquire and retain customers at a low cost. Now, that’s the key to delivering high CLV.
