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Customers, marketing and distribution

Vodafone endeavours to ensure that customers’ needs are at the core of all products and services. Understanding these needs and continuing to serve them is key to Vodafone’s customer strategy.


72.9

Customer delight index

(2008: 73.1, 2007: 70.6)















9th

in global BrandZ ranking

Up from 11th in 2008

Customers

Vodafone has 302.6 million proportionate mobile customers across the globe. The Group seeks to use its understanding of customers to deliver relevance and value and communicate on an individual, household, community or business level. In delivering solutions that meet customers’ changing needs in a manner that is easy to access and is available when required, Vodafone aims to build a longer and deeper customer relationship.

Vodafone continues to use a customer measurement system called “customer delight” to monitor and drive customer satisfaction in the Group’s controlled markets at a local and global level. This is a proprietary diagnostic system which tracks customer satisfaction across all points of interaction with Vodafone and identifies the drivers of customer delight and their relative impact. This information is used to identify any areas for improvement and focus.

Customer segmentation

Customer segments are targeted through many different tariffs and propositions, which are adapted for any localised customer preferences and needs. These often bundle together voice, messaging, data and, increasingly, fixed line services.

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Consumer

Customers are typically classified as prepaid or contract customers. Prepaid customers pay in advance and are generally not bound to minimum contractual commitments, while contract customers usually sign up for a predetermined length of time and are invoiced for their services, typically on a monthly basis. Increasingly, Vodafone offers SIM only tariffs allowing customers to benefit from the Vodafone network whilst keeping their existing handset.

Enterprise

The Group continues to grow usage and penetration across all business segments. VGE manages the Group’s relationship with Vodafone’s 270 largest multinational corporate customers. VGE simplifies the provision of fixed, mobile and broadband services for MNCs who need a single operational and commercial relationship with Vodafone worldwide. It provides a range of managed services such as central ordering, customer self-serve web portals, telecommunications expense management tools and device management coupled with a single contract and guaranteed service level agreements.

The Group continues to expand its portfolio of innovative solutions offered to small office home office (‘SoHo’), SME and corporate customers. Increasingly these combine fixed and mobile voice and data services integrated with productivity tools.

Marketing and brand

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Vodafone has continued to build brand value by delivering a superior, consistent and differentiated customer experience. Communication activities are focused on delivering the promise of “helping customers make the most of their time”. The Group’s vision is “to be the communications leader in an increasingly connected world” expanding the Group’s category from mobile only to total communications. To enable the consistent use of the Vodafone brand in all customer interactions, a set of detailed guidelines has been developed in areas such as advertising, retail, online and merchandising.

Vodafone regularly conducts brand health tracking, which is designed to measure the brand performance against a number of key metrics and generate insights to assist the management of the Vodafone brand across all Vodafone branded operating companies. An external accredited and independent market research organisation provides global coordination of the methodology, reporting and analysis.

Vodafone’s global sponsorship strategy has delivered a strong set of results across all Vodafone markets, with central sponsorship agreements such as the title sponsorship of the Vodafone McLaren Mercedes F1 team. The winning performance of the Vodafone McLaren Mercedes F1 team during the 2008 season enabled Vodafone to maintain a dominant presence in one of the world’s most popular sporting events. Vodafone successfully integrated the sponsorship into a wide variety of business activities including communications, events, content and acquisition and retention promotions.

Distribution

Vodafone directly owns and manages over 1,800 stores selling services to customers and providing customer support. The store footprint is constantly reviewed in response to market conditions. The Group also has 5,200 Vodafone branded stores, which sell Vodafone products and services exclusively through franchise and exclusive dealer arrangements. Additionally, in most operating companies, sales forces are in place to sell directly to business customers. The internet is increasingly a key channel to promote and sell Vodafone’s products and services and to provide customers with an easy, user friendly and accessible way to manage their services and access support, whilst reducing costs for the Group.

The extent of indirect distribution varies between markets but may include using third party service providers, independent dealers, distributors and retailers. The Group hosts MVNOs in a number of markets, selling access to the Vodafone network at a wholesale level. Where appropriate, Vodafone seeks to enter mutually profitable relationships with MVNO partners as an additional route to market.