Relationship Marketing at Vodafone?

August 18, 2009 12:22 pm Denise Fay Customer Care, Relationship Marketing, Retail

There are times when I think I should go back to my customer care training days. From my early days at college, I consumed everything about relationship marketing - books, magazines, Harvard Business Review supplements etc. Susan Fournier was my favourite writer on the topic back then.

I did my thesis for my MBS on Relationship Marketing for the airline industry. I loved relationship marketing - the arguments for and against, the technicalities of it, the operational display of it and the theorys around it.

I still do a customer care training for previous clients and think now that I should go back into it after a phone call from a Vodafone rep. This is a paraphrase of it, from the customers perspective:

Vodafone rep: is that Denise Fay?

DF: Yes

Vodafone: Are you an 02 customer or still with ourselves?

DF: Surely you should know that - you’re calling from Vodafone (Friction No. 1)

Vodafone: Well we’re calling from the landline service

DF: Okay - I’m still with vodafone but am still thinking of changing

Vodafone: Do you want me to get someone to call you?

DF: About what? The mobile or the landline?

Vodafone: The landline.

DF: It’s okay - I’m with BT, I changed some time ago. You guys don’t have broadband.

Vodafone: Oh we do.

DF: Oh really. I didn’t realise that. But I’ve bundled my service - landline and internet with them.

Vodafone: You’re probably in regular contact

DF: With BT? (Friction No. 2)

Vodafone: Yes.

DF: no..like yourselves, I pay my bill.

Vodafone: Oh okay.

DF: So are you giving me information on the landline here?

Vodafone: No. I’m just seeing if you’re interested and someone will call you back

DF: Let me get this straight. You’re calling me to see if I’m interested in talking to someone else about landline services but not you. The purpose of this call is to get someone else to call me back. (Friction No. 3)

Vodafone: That’s right

I got off the phone incredulously - why does it take two people to find out if I’m interested in finding out about landline services and then giving me information? Surely one person would be enough?

I’m all for people keeping their jobs in an economy that lets say, isn’t great, - but lets face it - three frictions in one phonecall is not good customer service.

Where is their relationship marketing?

1. They should have access to a database which shows I’ve been a Vodafone customer for in excess of five years

2. Am I in contact with Vodafone regularly? No. So why would I be in contact with BT? They provide a service, I pay for it. That’s the level of contact with most telecom providers

3. Why two calls? No wonder the cost of telecoms is expensive. We’re paying for a cost of sale that makes no sense in proper financial terms.

On a final note, the rep was lovely. She was friendly and was doing her job well. It’s the idea of not appreciating my business from the get-go that finished that conversation before it could even start. Relationship marketing would appear to be missing within the multiple divisions of Vodafone.

Perhaps, I should send them a copy of my thesis - It covers multiple divisions within an airline but can easily be applied to a telecoms company.