Convergent BSS required to drive CEM benefits

Fierce competition, ever-increasing customer expectation, and system complexity continues to challenge the communications industry. Customer Experience Management (CEM) has been hailed as the industry saviour, often favourably described as – ‘boosting profitability’, ‘key differentiator’, and ‘driving loyalty’. So if CEM is helping combat customer expectation and competition, what about system complexity? And does CEM affect the complexity of Business Support Systems (BSS)?

In TM Forum’s research on customer experience the challenges cited by CSPs for effective CEM were legacy systems integration and end-to-end control. CSPs have grown through acquisitions and many still have very disparate systems, with operators continuing to augment rather than replace BSS. Without removing the complexity, CEM initiatives add further pressure on the BSS stack.

So, why hasn’t more been done by operators to resolve the obstacles created by legacy systems? Whether due to lack of foresight or concerns regarding cost, risk, or lack of return-on-investment, CSPs will not be able to meet the consumer and business’ CEM demands with their current IT setups.

Why do legacy systems not serve our needs today?

The main issue leads us back to ‘complexity’. With so many devices, packages, and channels many legacy systems still work in silos, causing inaccuracies. This increases the time and cost to serve, impacting customer satisfaction.

The 2014 Telecoms.com industry survey stated that 42.5% of operators are planning to upgrade their customer management systems in the next 12 months. IT environments need to be redesigned to fit in with CEM strategy, in order to realise the customer loyalty and profitability benefits of CEM.

Optimise CEM with convergent BSS

With convergent BSS, CSPs can optimise their operations. Ensuring all data is centrally accessed and updated, keeping accurate customer profiles. This enables operators to create personalised packages, to enhance customer loyalty, and boost revenues. 

To get the most out of CEM, the operator must examine their current BSS environment and invest to break down the barriers of silos. Convergent BSS enables a transparent and cohesive CRM solution. Resulting in service delivery, billing, and customer care operations all working in harmony and opening the pathway up for innovative CEM initiatives.

Written by Natasha Geldard - Marketing Consultant for CoralTree Systems Ltd.

Real Time Convergent Charging and Policy Management are a necessity!

Real Time Convergent Charging (RTCC) and Policy Management go hand in hand, with 95% of the CSP’s that responded to TM Forum’s recent Insights Research paper ‘RTCC and Policy Management’ [Link] saying that they cannot remain competitive without implementing it in some form.

The benefits of introducing RTCC can be great for the CSPs for a whole number of reasons such as improving customer experience, minimising or negate bill shock and providing a means to monetise the OTT market.

As customer experience quickly becomes the critical focus for operators, RTCC and policy management will allow operators to be much more creative and agile in how they interact with the customer and a lot quicker in the introducing new services and products

Bad Profits

Currently the two largest uses for RTCC and Policy Management are bill shock management and threshold management, which are great, but - even now - there are companies who use them in rather blunt ways. Capping or throttling customers who reach data caps, or charging ‘premium’ prices for going over limits. This creates ‘bad profits’ and does nothing to enhance the customer experience.

However some CSP’s have the idea, using these tools to build a bond with the customer and ultimately using it to drive revenue growth. When customers get close to limits they are warned they're close, and offered ‘extensions’ to their data or broadband usage for a set price, repeat ‘offenders’ can be marked for upsell opportunities offering them a better package at a higher price, but one that would be cheaper than the charges they would otherwise incur.

In the short term, this doesn't drive as much revenue as the charges, but, as should be obvious, a loyal customer is more profitable than a customer who leaves because they feel they've been ripped off.

As the marriage between RTCC and Policy Management becomes more complete (94% will implemented a RTCC & PM strategy within two years and 64% within the next year) operators and CSP’s will be able to produce more innovative offerings to their customers.

This will enable them to increase revenue through USPs – introducing flexible services that the customer can control such as Holiday mode, sharing data, moving portions of broadband download limits onto mobiles – especially as networks move towards 4G LTE. And on the topic of LTE, Policy management and RTCC will be necessary for the introduction of VoLTE to ensure bandwidth is properly managed.

Over The Top

Lots has been made of the need to monetize the OTT trend, and with a RTCC and Policy Management, CSP’s and operators can. 

A good number of them are offering free data when using apps like WhatsApp and Facebook, others are offering Netflix or sports services when they sign up (Virgin Media, Vodafone) whilst others are competing directly with their own offering (Sky’s NowTV, UPC’s Horizon) Policy management and RTCC is vital in letting operators omit these services from customer’s data use. 

The nature of the relationship with OTT players is only really beginning to be explored, but it can be as simple as free data, it could be as one Indian MSO does, offering bundles of access to YouTube, Facebook and other OTT services instead of, or in line with data allowances.

Or CSP’s could really be involved with developing the relationship, making it a truly two way relationship that benefits both, working with Google’s Project Loon or Facebook's Internet.org to bring internet (and telecoms) to remote places with the knowledge, infrastructure and software they already have in abundance. OTT’s get more customers, CSP’s get more customers.

However the future unfolds, one thing appears to be a common theme throughout it all, the need for Real Time Convergent Charging and Policy Management, preferably together, to drive new revenue growth. 


This article was written by Craig Maxwell-Brown. Business Development Associate for CoralTree Systems Limited. Views are not necessarily the companies views.

Do we understand the meaning of convergence?

The communications industry is rife with vendors promoting their convergent systems. Technology aligned, all working smoothly, hand in hand. But is this so commonly used word, convergent, merely a buzzword?

Converge is defined as to ‘come together from different directions so as eventually meet.’ So do the systems that are implement into communications providers operations really converge with the existing systems in place? Or is the truth that they simply run in parallel?

I don’t think we should trivialise the importance of convergence here. Creating the competitive differentiation that a converged system allows is in every operator’s best interest. Convergence enables a joined up approach to customer service, more efficient call handling, and minimising billing and order errors.

But very few operators’ systems are really convergent. Many are ‘window dressed’. New systems on top of old, trying to disguise the disorganisation underneath. But the systems only work in parallel and are not often integrated. This can be beneficial in the short-term and helps speed up processes, but as more technologies and services are added complications will become apparent.

The long-term objective should be to converge all BSS systems. This will limit the support needs and issues faced by IT teams, as well as providing a wealth of knowledge to marketing and customer support teams, so service can be enhanced.

Systems must ‘come together from different directions so as eventually meet’ in order to stay competitive in this dynamic communications industry.

To read more about operator convergent strategy, read CoralTree’s latest Insight report: “Convergent strategy or conflicting goals?” by visiting our website: www.coraltreesystems.com/insights-papers

This blog was written by Natasha Geldard, Head of Marketing, CoralTree

CTO vs. CFO – focusing on company prosperity

The goals of the communications providers’ CTO and CFO are driving further apart. Both are committed to do what’s best for long-term business prosperity, but their strategies are far from converged.

In this face-paced sector communications operators have to innovate, to offer the latest services and packages to customers, in order to stay competitive. The CTO is under constant pressure from the business to ensure that the systems are in place for dynamic packages to be marketed, fulfilled, and billed. With many BSS systems dated, this requires investment to upgrade to next generation support systems.

In contrast, the CFO focuses on ensuring profitability and demands in fiscal year returns for any large investments made. The CFO role is to demonstrate to owners, shareholders, or the market, that the business is doing well. In simple terms, growing and making more money than it is spending.

Yet some CFOs are acknowledging this strategic problem. Industry news title, Global Telecoms Business published in an article that interviewed top global telecommunications CFOs in February 2014. Tom Fitzpatrick, CFO of satellite operator Iridium, was quoted saying: “The short-term earnings bias of Wall Street in the evaluation of results proves difficult in that many compelling long-term initiatives are not undertaken in the face of this short-term bias.”.

Many BSS out-of-date

The issue is that many BSS systems in place are so dated that they are unable to cope with next generation technologies and services. Quick fixes will not last for long and will not be able to keep up with the fast pace of change. In the long run, this will cost the operator more money than upfront investment in a long-term solution.

To stay competitive, it is crucial for the CTO and CFO strategies to be converged. Alignment must be made to support the business with advanced IT, creating long-term efficiency and cost-savings.

To read more about operator convergent strategy, read CoralTree’s latest Insight report: “Convergent strategy or conflicting goals?” by visiting our website: www.coraltreesystems.com/insights-papers

This blog was written by Natasha Geldard, Head of Marketing, CoralTree