At the end of 2022, Talkmobile, a UK-based mobile operator, had a Trustpilot score of 2.2 out of 5.
Just two years later, it was the highest ranked mobile operator on Trustpilot with a score 4.7 out of 5. Its NPS value had also leaped by 22% and customer retention climbed by 6%.
Revenue up 46%
Happy customers powered a 46% revenue surge and the margin grew by more than 50%.
At the recent International Customer Experience Awards, Talkmobile picked up gold awards for Best CX Strategy and Best Contact Centre.
What’s more impressive is that the operator’s CX transformation has been achieved by 13 people, operating on a shoestring budget.
Research from Context Consulting in 2022 illustrated what Talkmobile’s audience of ‘tech neutrals’ wanted from their mobile service provider. The bottom line was disarmingly simple — they just wanted stuff to work really well and they wanted to feel valued.
The insights from the report formed the guiding principles of Project He-Man — a CX strategy to eliminate pain points and provide ‘tech neutral’ punters with exactly what they wanted.
“Our customers want the nuts and bolts to work really well,” Stuart Wilson, head of sales & marketing, Talkmobile, told CXM.
“At that time, it was about doubling down on getting the basics right. Not just right, but doing them really well,” he added.
Customer experience as a differentiator
There was also a realisation that Talkmobile’s customer experience would be a competitive differentiator in the budget mobile telecoms market. “CX is about what keeps people in the long term,” said Wilson.
“Whatever reason you join the network, you’ll leave because you’re annoyed. If you appreciate the service, you’ll stay forever,” he added.
Project He-Man wouldn’t have delivered the results if it wasn’t for a renewed CX commitment from the whole team. A small team makes it relatively easy to ensure everybody buys into the company mission.
“We’re a super accountable group of people and effectively we win together and we lose together,” said Wilson. “There was a moment in time when we put a strategy together and said ‘we want to be famous for doing [customer experience]’,” he added.
“Whatever reason you join the network, you’ll leave because you’re annoyed. If you appreciate the service, you’ll stay forever.”
Stuart Wilson head of sales & marketing, Talkmobile
Being a small operator might make it easier to agree on a strategic direction, but it also meant that to scale-up its CX, it needed key partners along for the ride.
“Part of the story of Talkmobile is how you take generic services from other people, [and] bring it together [as] a coherent whole,” commented Wilson.
Talkmobile invested time, money and energy laying out its CX strategy in microscopic detail and getting key partners to buy-in.
“We need to really invest in [the top five suppliers] because they impact the customer experience,” said Wilson.
Meanwhile in 2,300 miles away in Egypt…
A huge amount of focus fell on the contact centre, operated by a third party, 2,300 miles away in Egypt. Talkmobile wanted to empower customer service agents to ‘do the right thing’ for customers, unencumbered by policies and processes.
Talkmobile wanted calls answered promptly, to be rid of unnecessary call scripts and to reduce the number of times calls would be transferred within the contact centre.
The initiatives had to be discussed, planned, communicated, implemented and managed remotely from Talkmobile’s head office in Newbury.
A contact centre that delights the customer
Getting the contact centre to a point where it ‘delights customers’ has meant exploring processes and customer journeys in forensic detail.
Talkmobile hosts weekly Purple Spirit sessions online with its partner to explore how it can continually improve service and make life easier for agents. Delivering improvements suggested by the customer service agents builds trust.
The VMO also regularly conducts ‘Trustpilot roundups’ where it links great reviews to customer agents and gives them a ‘shout out’. By calling out positive behaviour, it encourages agents to do it more.
The contact centre work, which has been a cornerstone of Project He-Man, has delivered great results. Cross-functional training within the centre has meant agents are capable of resolving more calls, driving call transfers down to below 1%.
First call resolution also improved by over 2%, and 93% of calls are now answered within 20 seconds.
Operating on a shoestring budget
Another aspect of Project He-Man has been the acute attention to costs. Being a budget brand, the operator has to keep costs low. “If you’re going to charge less, you need to keep your costs low to make a margin,” said Wilson.
Every aspect of the CX strategy has had a clear cost-impact attached. Some CX initiatives have saved money, for instance shifting some letter communications to email. By “working out the processes that drive cost, you can make a saving. [That] gives you breathing space to reinvest in CX”, explained Wilson.
“We invest in CX because it’s the right thing for the business. It’s the right thing to grow the top line and the bottom line.”
Stuart Wilson head of sales & marketing, Talkmobile
Other initiatives have required more capital investment, but offer long term operational savings. Last year the budget operator built its My Account platform, so customers can log in and discover their usage and billing. A lot of thought was put into the ‘CX’ of the platform, in terms of design, useability and functionality.
The online platform was designed with the rollout of further app-based, CX enhancements in mind. For instance, as of last year customers that log in via the app can speak to a web chat agent, and the agent will already have all the relevant details to hand. The revised, shorter, process provides a better experience , and “the business has saved a bit of money”, said Wilson.
Investing in CX because it is the right thing to do for business
As part of its programme of continuous improvement, Talkmobile also introduced asynchronous web chat. The service allows customers who start and leave a web chat, to return to the conversation, rather than having to start over again.
“It is a better customer experience — you never get cut off on your web chat with Talkmobile,” explained Wilson.
The expansion of online services has reduced the propensity for customers to call by nearly a quarter and there has been a 73% drop in the number of calls about account access.
Aside from the online platform project, the majority of Talkmobile’s CX work has focused on delivering continuous incremental improvements to its services, while staying within its budgetary constraints.
Despite the revenue and margin growth in the business there are no plans to change the model. “We invest in CX because it’s the right thing for the business. It’s the right thing to grow the top line and the bottom line,” said Wilson.