Telefonica faces the future

With innovative service ideas and a dedication to customer satisfaction, Telefonica Moviles Mexico is set to continue as a big name in the Mexican mobile market. We interview Miguel Calderon, Director of Strategy at Telefonica Moviles Mexico, to find out more.

What challenges does Telefonica face?

Increasing the number of users and increasing the use of value added services, several of these services are not only a differentiator, but also the main loyalty factor and therefore reduce churn.

Making the user experience simpler is another challenge. It is still very difficult to access financial services – for example, five or six SMSs with large codes need to be sent. We also need to give our customers greater certainty about the total amount they will pay and continue with our 3G network expansion.

How does Telefonica segment its data-service customers?

We have increased the segmentation of our user-base, which is 94 percent prepaid. There are several factors that help us determine the users’ profiles: whether they use more data or voice, calls to particular communities of interest, where do the calls originate, and so on. This information gives us a more detailed, more refined segmentation.

Through segmentation we seek to retain users, make sure that they have the right price structure, deliver the right promotions and personalize services.

I do not believe that, in the short term, we will offer an “all-you-can-eat” plan. Today we offer a package whereby the user can download a certain amount of information. However, if the consumer reaches that point, additional modules of the same size can be purchased, otherwise, other people’s service could be affected.

What are the key services you focus on?

Location services are an important focus for us. We believe there will be a boom for these services, but we need to manage them properly to protect customers’ information.

“We are striving to offer excellence in customer service, to solve customers’ problems and to continue giving them what they ask for.”
Mobile advertising is something that we are also driving at Telefonica in Mexico, through partnerships with agencies, important customers and platform suppliers. We are evaluating several types of advertising – advertising via SMS both ways, receiving and sending messages, advertisements found navigating the Internet and sponsored calls or SMS.

We also see a large opportunity for offering financial services and health care services. In Mexico, approximately 25 percent of the population has both banking services and a mobile phone. We would like to offer these people m-banking services, where the user is the bank’s customer and we are the carrier. But here is a greater opportunity for the 50 percent of the population that has a mobile phone but do not have a bank account, I think it is here where we can deliver a much greater value.

In m-health, for instance, a mobile survey can determine pretty accurately how many people are sick, how the disease is distributed, where out-breaks occur, and more.

Telefonica has grown a lot. We see ourselves as enthusiastic, and have to keep focusing on the mobile business. We are growing to become more efficient and to be able to offer better services to our customers.

Currently we have the highest customer satisfaction rating among our customers in Mexico. We are striving to offer excellence in customer service, to solve customers’ problems and to continue giving them what they ask for.

Thank you Mr Calderon.