sound branding- out with the old, in with the new, v3
TRANSCRIPT
Audio Presence & Corporate Voice Mail Systems:
Out With The Old, In With The New
A White Paper
Written by:
Andres Jordan, CMO, HiproCall, Inc.
August 2013
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One of the documented challenges for telecom operators in the age of accelerating digital disruption is how to best harness the power of the internet and software to create innovative Web based products that empower product portfolios in the search for new customers and the retention of old ones.
The internet and software technologies now clashing with mobile broadband and shifting consumer expectations, has created a perfect storm that is giving new meaning to fast moving markets but that also provide opportunities to those operators that can act fast and seize the new white spaces. The software as a service (Saas) solutions are products and services that are benefitting greatly from this perfect storm and in many ways are driving the creation of entirely new Web based offerings for enterprise.
It is here – at the front-‐end of a mobile app, a portal, an e-‐commerce site – where businesses are increasingly finding value and where they can fuel their growth via flexible, low cost solutions. If nothing else the digital revolution has disrupted old business models and created new ones via lower cost structures.
The new imperative for telecom operators and integrators should be to capture this trend by experimenting and adopting new cloud-‐based solutions that can be iterated and deployed quickly. By doing so, they will be able to accelerate revenue capture and focus on serving their customer bases with innovations and optimized ROIs.
Audio Presence
Let us take audio and sound (music, voice, movie tracks, radio, VIP voices, jingles, etc.) and the ability to use these different types of media to create customizable voice mail greetings, ring-‐back tones, ring tones, music on hold.
For the astute CMO, audio and sound is viewed as ready assets to be leveraged in the pursuit of marketing, differentiation and engagement. Many brands have caught on to this wave such as Volvo, Adidas and Audi, which have all deployed a harmonized and consistent audio presence via voice mail greetings and other outlets. All have recognized the multiplier effect of this technology to brand their telecom assets and grow their brands with their own audio compositions composed of corporate sound derived from their sound logos or advertising campaigns, or jingles or even official corporate voice talent. Now we know, after going through the first generation of the technology, that audio and sound branding is here to stay.
But it was not always so.
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The Early Years
Audio branding was misunderstood and unappreciated in the deployment of audio branding solutions in part because there was no easy way for an enterprise to create and manage customizable voice mail greeting for deployment in an enterprise’s telecom assets composed of fixed and mobile voice mail boxes, music on hold and others.
In the early days, operators experimented with the technology by launching operator branded sound studio portals that customers would go to and would engage in the single transaction of customizing their individual mobile phones with a limited set of greetings, voices, and music. Basically the build-‐it-‐and-‐they-‐will-‐come approach that was a characteristic of the early days of the Internet.
Many telecom operators did exactly this including, O2, Deutsche Telekom and Vodafone in Europe. These operators need to be commended for taking the lead and experimenting with the technology and distribution channels given its great promise. Unfortunately the model proved to have limited success for the following reasons:
• Non scalable • Non customizable • Unable to combine and have multiple greetings • Unable to use at will • Expensive • Awkward navigation • Limited features • Clunky look and feel • No porting of audio assets • Limited transaction-‐based revenue model • No white labeling possible
Exhibit 1 below shows the old way of offering the service by Deutsche Telekom in Germany.
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After some exploration, these operators discovered that customers were interested in the technology but in order for it to gain stronger adoption it would require a more dynamic approach of delivery to end-‐users.
Next Generation Solution
Enter the next generation version of audio and sound branding. By adopting software as a service methodologies (Saas), now enterprises can have their own portal to manage their audio presence via highly scalable software architectures that run on one platform but that can reach both mobile and fixed telecom infrastructures.
The success of Salesforce CRM, SAP ERP and other enterprise type services, demonstrates that Saas is here to stay, that adoption is strong and that it will continue to grow as these solutions proliferate via the Internet and cloud based delivery methods.
A Saas based model offers a completely new paradigm by providing the service in a fully branded and self-‐managed portal with a full feature-‐set that allows customers to manage and scale their audio and sound greetings any time they want with the content of their choice and ‘audio art’ of their choice.
Exhibit #2 below shows the front-‐end for Volvo’s solution:
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With a self-‐managed portal enterprise customers can now maximize the value of their audio presence and make full use of their audio assets and audio branding via easy to navigate drop down menus. With a few clicks of a mouse users can now quickly change their voice mail greetings at any time and for any reason making full use of audio assets that have been chosen by corporate marketing/ branding.
Exhibits # 3,4,5 shows navigation for new solution:
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Conclusion -‐ Results
Since the introduction of the next generation solution adoption has been strong and growing stronger with new use cases being generated and imagined every day.
Operators that tried the old approach have now abandoned those efforts in favor of the new Saas solution and have implemented them via technology partnerships and revenue sharing models resulting in strong adoption by MNEs, SMBs and VSEs (very small enterprise) alike.
MNE’s like Coca-‐Cola, BMW, Volkswagen, Adidas, are just a few of the multinational brands that have adopted the solution through operators and are actively using it to extend their brand power. The SMB solution has had strong adoption as well, ranging from companies with as few as 30 employees to as many as 300 adopting the technology. Most importantly, however, the VSE solution has allowed carriers to address a market that has been poorly served and that has the greatest projections for growth and the subsequent sale of additional telecom services.
The benefits of deploying the solution for operators and enterprise are:
ENTERPRISE:
ü CUSTOMER BRANDED PORTAL ü SAAS BASED, SELF-‐ADMINISTERED PORTAL ü INTUITIVE & EASY NAVIGATION ü ABILITY TO POPULATE CONTENT WITH OWN AUDIO ‘ART’
(CORPORATE SOUND AND VOICE TALENT) ü FLEXIBLE, ALLOWING CHANGES AT WILL ü ENHANCED PRESENCE AND IDENTITY ü ENHANCED MESSAGING IN SERVICE ORIENTED
BUSINESSES ü INNOVATIVE MARKETING TOOL
OPERATOR:
ü WHITE LABEL BRANDING POTENTIAL ü DOOR OPENER INTO COMPETITOR’S CUSTOMERS ü DOOR OPENER FOR UPSELLING OTHER PRODUCTS ü LOW COMPLEXITY BUSINESS MODEL ü COOLNESS FACTOR ENHANCES BRAND ü ZERO CHURN ü MULTIPLE LANGUAGE SUPPORT ü STRONG RETENTION ü STABLE RECURRING REVENUE