How can Analytics solve specific business problems?

How can Analytics solve specific business problems?

Ever wondered what made Uninor, Aircell, enter into Indian market when there already were 12 mobile operators in India, including two government-owned companies?

It is expected that the Indian mobile market will double in the next three to four years and there is nothing called one-size-fits-all for a 1.2 billion India. Uninor, Aircell followed customer segmentation strategy and are targeting only those customers who will benefit from its services.

Now it’s a bigger challenge for other leading GSM telecom operators in India namely Airtel, Vodafone, Reliance Communications, Tata DoCoMo, and Loop Mobile to retain existing customers and grow their customer base amidst stiff price war posed by the new entrants in the market.

Let’s take a critical business decision of retaining high-value customers. If we knew which customers of ours were likely to quit to a competitor, and which of these are really worth keeping, we could intervene in a timely manner and take steps to retain them. This will ensure ongoing revenue from them, reducing costs of replacing them with the new customers and maintaining market share.

So what has analytics to do here? Analytics will help build predictive models to identify high value customers at every point of interaction. Once the high value customers and potential quitters are identified, one can devise strategies to retain them.

Telecommunications companies hold rich data on their customers. Personal information, demographic information is gathered while subscribing to a new connection. Call detail records like Call volume, Usage, Calling Patterns, Roaming Behavior can be used to study customer behavior.

A statistical model can be built that evaluates customer and classifies as loyal or a potential quitter and a likely time period in which the connection can be withdrawn. Quitters can be identified based on the complaints raised and demands posed and subsequently strategies devised to make them loyal.

Telecom operators operate in highly dynamic markets; customer preferences change quickly based on fashions, trends, competitors’ actions and the products, services and packages the provider offers hence ongoing market research and analytics becomes paramount to the success.



Mukta Phadnis-Joshi