In a survey released by Park Associates last year, nearly one-third of households in the United States that access the Internet with a dial-up connection were interested in switching to broadband connectivity in the coming year. A report from Cahers In-Stat/MDR in June noted that telecommuters and remote offices are effectively forcing business customers in the United States to adopt broadband; 40% of current broadband users are business subscribers.
The combination of consumer and business need-for-speed shows promise for further broadband adoption in the United States. And as we've seen in the Spotlight, providers who can deliver intelligently bundled services as well will likely be one step ahead of their competition.
In New England, AT&T Broadband not only offers broadband, but cable television and digital phone service as well. At the start of this year, as part of a multi-million dollar integrated online and offline marketing campaign to promote these services, AT&T Broadband tapped Carat Interactive to more effectively communicate the offers online and evolve the e-mail marketing efforts.
AT&T Broadband New England already had an online presence, but it was essentially brochure-ware and could not communicate the expanded service offerings that AT&T had put in place over that time. Depending on where a potential customer lived, he or she could have dozens of options to choose from, by combining various cable television packages, broadband service, and digital telephone variations. The site did not encourage optimum user behavior, as many questions that could have been answered online instead flooded the call centers.
Thus a redesign came about, with two primary goals: Meet the expectations of site visitors who wanted to sign up for services, and relieve pressure on the company's call centers. Working hand-in-hand with the AT&T Broadband e-sales and marketing manager, Heather Bell, the Carat team ensured that the look and feel was consistent with offline advertising that ran locally, and refined the complicated browse-and-order process. "We were trying to mirror the best practices of the call-center reps and the scripting of the call-center reps to bring people from page to page as they navigated the site," says Bell. "We looked at the typical questions and answers that were happening in the call center and pushed that content to the forefront."
Special consideration was given to the complex ordering process that supports bundling services. Depending on the path in the order-entry process, potential customers were now able to buy a bundle for TV-digital cable service, phone service, and high-speed Internet access. They weren't just tied to one, and were given special pricing and promotion packages if purchasing a bundle.
To drive traffic to the new site, AT&T Broadband promoted activity through special offers (e.g. a U.S. Savings Bond for signing up), a variety of co-marketing activities with local radio stations and companies, and seasonal offers for certain holidays.
E-mail marketing was another important driver of qualified traffic. Carat developed a comprehensive e-mail marketing plan, including opt-in list targeting, and multiple creative executions for testing. As Alan Osetek, managing director of Carat in Boston, says, "The marketing of the site evolved from a siloed marketing approach to an integrated approach."
With the new site up and running now for eight months, offline advertising and targeted e-mail and banner ad marketing continue to drive qualified leads. Some of the current communications target those people on the cusp who are debating whether or not they need the service. "We have been doing a number of e-marketing programs to promote each of the AT&T Broadband products, and we cross-sell potential customers to 'own the bundle' through incentives and offers," says Bell. Furthermore, the site itself offers many more opportunities to up-sell and cross-sell bundled services to interested prospects. And recently, multi-lingual pages have been added to the site to cater to Chinese, Spanish, and Russian prospects.
Special online programs with dedicated Web pages have also contributed to the business need to reduce call center call volumes while supplying a convenient online resource for customers and business partners in the area. Together these additions have provided a great boost in traffic.
The combination of the redesigned site with smart traditional and non-traditional marketing support has led to double the online conversion rates and an increase of sales to this site by over 331%. These key metrics were achieved while significantly reducing the cost to acquire and process each new account.
