Alon Werber, VP, Marketing and Business Development at Pontis, offers advice to newtork operators on successfully cross-selling and up-selling to their customers

The battle to win the hearts and minds of the mobile user is bringing new challenges, but also huge opportunities for operators. In addition to rapid churn rates and high customer acquisition costs, marketers are faced with an economic downturn, therefore it is essential that marketers use the tools available to maintain customer loyalty and retention, whilst maximising ARPU.
The key to building relationships is to present consumers with services and offers, which meet their requirements, at the right time. Essentially the key is thinking Whats next? Instead of predicting users wants, operators must adopt a system which acknowledges a response, or lack of, and keeps the dialogue open, whilst executing offers in real-time. Gartner forecasts that within three to five years, up-sell, where you offer a higher priced version of the product; and cross-sell, where you offer a related product, will soar. So how can marketers implement these to ensure return on investment?

Analyse Everything
Get your facts straight. Whilst it is stating the obvious, operators often fail here because they dont have the right tools. Current and past behaviour are the best predictors of future action; to up-sell and cross-sell effectively operators must monitor usage in real-time to enable behavioural-based targeting. Some may think this approach is both difficult and costly to implement. Yet with the development of tools, like the Pontis Marketing Delivery Platform, which can harness data and execute offers in real-time, this can be addressed, enabling operators to launch personalised, perfectly timed offers, increasing the chances of uptake, whilst improving customer experience.

Know your customer
Many operators claim to understand the importance of personalisation; however they often fail to deliver. Users wont purchase or subscribe to a service if offers are irrelevant or delivered at the wrong time. Furthermore, if users are bombarded with irrelevant offers, theres a possibility it will be seen as spam. To prevent this, operators should follow online providers who have maximised the potential of personalisation, with Amazon-like recommendations, linked to users preferences and real-time behaviour.

Timing is everything
Timing is critical; opportunities can be missed if operators dont react in time meaning lost revenue and potentially alienating users. When a customer buys a ringtone, a cross-sell should be offered before the purchase is completed – not weeks later. Even if the customer isnt in the purchasing process, this doesnt mean they could not be tempted by an offer. For example, with pre-paid mobile customers, operators should offer a silent customer, with a low balance, a top-up benefit. This can improve response rates and ARPU.

Highlight products being left behind
An advantage with cross-selling is the ability to promote products which consumers would buy if they were correctly marketed. When products launch, they may be bestsellers, but over time, interest wanes; this surge of revenue is the Short Head. Yet the less popular products can deliver consistent revenue when offered alongside the latest content; this is the Long Tail and allows operators to cross-sell products left behind. When a customer is buying the latest remix of a song, it is the perfect opportunity to cross-sell the original version. The theory is that the Long Tail, over time, will equal the Short Head; that collectively, many products account for as many sales as the few bestsellers. By using these factors, operators can turn on-the-fly promotions into optimal marketing offers.

Conclusion
So, to be able to run marketing offers you need current statistics of all your products. By implementing effective marketing tactics, operators can analyse results in real-time and measure any reduction in consumption; giving ample time to rectify problems and turn them into a positive outcome.
Central to this is having full view of each customers profile; that is, visibility of preferences and behaviour in real time, so that offers are personalised; and the ability exists to tie analysis to execution capabilities. Knowing what a customer is doing is helpful, only if you can act upon this knowledge, by offering a benefit or service. This is the key to ensuring that cross-sell and up-sell activity delivers optimum results, driving revenue, improving customer loyalty and reducing churn.