Nokia reveals reasons why mobile users dump telecoms

Mobile users
Telecom network major Nokia has revealed five major reasons for mobile customers for shifting to a new service provider.

Churn is the one of the main challenges faced by telecom operators.

Nokia cited the following reasons for mobile users to shift from operator to another.

Global mobile subscribers, particularly in mature markets, want more transparency when it comes to contract terms, rate structures and data fees.

While price is still the most important factor when it comes to customer acquisition and retention, the study shows calling plans and rate structures are 14 percent more important to respondents than they were in 2014. Customers, confused by different packages, will often choose easy-to-understand terms and conditions over price.

Customer care has 60 percent more impact on their loyalty than it did in 2014. This is the biggest change in the Nokia study. Respondents say better general services, self-service capabilities and effective complaint handling are increasingly important to them. Customer care is now basically on par with network quality as a deciding factor to stay with a mobile provider.

Networks are getting better in mature markets, but there is work to do in transition markets. Consumers in mature markets report a 13 percentage-point improvement in their satisfaction with Internet connection quality vs 2014, while transition markets report a slight decline.

Mobile security is a growing issue: 90 percent of customers in mature markets and 94 percent in transition markets worry about mobile security. Globally, 47 percent of respondents would change operators if they suffered a security breach – that’s a 7-percentage-point increase from 2014.

Consumer expectations about IoT are growing. 56 percent of respondents in mature markets and 82 percent in transition markets would like to control at least one device via their mobile phone or tablet.

Bhaskar Gorti, Applications & Analytics president at Nokia, said: “We can see the marketing battles to acquire mobile subscribers are fierce. What we don’t see as well is the work operators do every day to retain customers.”

The importance of a mobile provider’s service and device portfolio has a 10 percent impact on customer acquisition, up from 6 percent in 2014.

4G services could play a bigger role in customer acquisition and retention. Respondents using 4G are 38 percent more likely to be satisfied with their data speed and 24 percent more likely to be satisfied with data consistency than earlier-generation technology. In the past year, 38 percent of respondents signed up for 4G. Almost a third of the respondents do not know if their operator offers the technology.

The study reports different uses of applications in mature and transition markets: 87 percent of consumers in transition markets use messaging applications compared to 46 percent in mature markets.

38 percent of respondents say they would be willing to receive advertisements on their mobile devices in exchange for rewards.

68 percent of respondents say they would leave an operator over network quality issues. In particular, the speed and consistency of Internet connection matters more for keeping customers loyal than either voice quality or network coverage.