A global study of thousands of smartphone users has revealed that loyalty towards mobile operators can’t be taken for granted, with network performance increasingly playing a crucial role in driving user loyalty.
The study by Ericsson found that mobile broadband experience has emerged as the principal driver of smartphone user loyalty towards operators but, ironically, it’s also a source of dissatisfaction among 73% of users globally.
And, Ericsson says loyalty is a “notoriously difficult metric to measure” within the telecommunications industry, “yet it is essential in understanding consumers’ reasons for choosing – or staying with – a particular operator”.
The two-part qualitative and quantitative research (and on-device measurements) involved 30 smartphone users from South Korea, the US and the UK participating in in-depth, face-to-face interviews, and 1,000 users in 14 markets responding to an online survey (except India, in which 2,000 users participated).
{loadposition peter}A total of 15,000 iPhone and Android smartphone users aged between 18 and 69 took part in the survey across Brazil, China, Germany, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Oman, Poland,Russia, Sweden, South Korea, Ukraine, the US and the UK.
Ericsson highlights the fact that there has been no reduction in smartphone issues since 2013 and, while cellular networks have “improved over time”, smartphone users are still facing issues as frequently as they did in 2013.
Among smartphone users globally, 2 in 5 face more than 11 issues at least weekly and smartphone users who face a high number of issues (i.e.11+ per week) are approximately twice as likely to contemplate switching operators compared with those who don’t face issues.
The study also reveals that new emerging video app usage is causing smart phone issues and impacting customer loyalty, while video streaming glitches are more common.
Ericsson also says that Net Promoter Scores are no longer enough to gauge smartphone user loyalty, and one fifth of smartphone users who are “promoters of their current operators”, despite being satisfied and willing to recommend them, do not necessarily prefer them over other operators.
“They are also twice as likely to switch compared to those who prefer their operator,” Ericsson says.
The research found that consumers have a mental criteria list to assess network performance, with 86% using at least one of the new indices to judge connectivity, such as:
• Web page loading time - top measure 46% of those surveyed
• Content upload time - Picture upload speeds (33%)
• Email attachments to download (30%)
• Video buffering (30%)
• Time taken to transfer files (27%)
According to Selina O’Connor, Head of Communications Ericsson Australia & New Zealand, the results of Ericsson’s research on consumer views on network performance are compelling, showing that globally video streaming is growing and issues with video are “now more common” and, further, “those who are most likely to switch operators face twice as many issues with video streaming”.
“This is an early warning, as new streaming behaviours grow globally,” O’Connor says.
“Consumers have devised their own mental index to judge connectivity; time to content on video apps, sessions without interruptions, and time to share content on social media apps are the top mental indices that consumers use when assessing connectivity experience.
”Millennial users are most demanding and expect operators to communicate around app experience, the report shows that operators not only need to offer superior performance but also communicate how this relates to customer’s app experience.”
As well as emerging video app usage causing smartphone issues and impacting customer loyalty, and consumer criteria for assessing network performance, the Ericsson survey reveals that:
• New evolving apps and video streaming behaviour is placing different demands on a network’s expected performance.
Over the past two years many new mobile video apps have been launched (eg. Periscope) and existing apps have been enriched with new features, such as live video streaming – increasing video streaming behaviour. Additionally, the possibility to watch live broadcasts of user generated content as well as professional content on apps like Facebook has increased the appeal of live streaming
1/3 Korean smartphone users watch both live stream videos and 14% of US smartphone owners use live streaming apps. Globally 30% are interested to watch video on mobile devices, and
• Net Promoter scores need to be complemented to better understand customer loyalty.
- Net Promoter scores are no longer enough to gauge smartphone user loyalty as they don’t take account for changing expectations of network performance
- The report identifies 6 new Loyalty profiles which could be a useful guide to better understand smartphone users’ different degrees of loyalty and to build stronger customer loyalty.