Earlier today, T-Mobile held its Un-carrier 11 event where they announced a few surprises lined up for its loyal customers. The main topic for the event was T-Mobile's move to give one share of stock to the customers they have as well as a chance to earn more shares whenever they refer friends and family to switch to the carrier.
In addition to the stock giveaway, T-Mobile also introduced a new app called T-Mobile Tuesdays; which promises to give away freebies every week. Just like the name suggests, each customer will be entitled to a freebie every Tuesday. Customers who use the app will be able to enjoy a free medium two-topping pizza from Domino's, movie rental from Vudu, and an order of Wendy's Frosty. There will also be one-time freebies that will be added onto the app over time such as free movie tickets. T-Mobile has partnered with a number of companies to help bring in bigger prizes like a $10,000 Gilt shopping spree and other prizes from Samsung, Lyft, StubHub, and Major League Basketball. There's also reports of a free hour of Wi-Fi access using GoGo's service available on several domestic flights.
While T-Mobile's stock giveaway seems like a promising deal, prepaid customers under T-Mobile are only entitled to the T-Mobile Tuesdays app. Only postpaid customers may be entitled to T-Mobile's stock option. Not to mention, it's unsure whether the free GoGo passes are available for prepaid customers too.
The announcements made at Un-carrier 11 event are efforts made by T-Mobile to win the loyalty of its customers. Instead of focusing on lashing out at its rivals, T-Mobile has finally decided to shift its strategy to thanking its customers by offering various incentives for their loyalty. And like CEO John Legere shared: "This Un-carrier move is all about giving you good thanking! No strings. No gotchas."
Source: ReCode
A new customer on postpaid is more "loyal" than a two year prepaid customer? Typical carrier thinking.
ReplyDeleteWhat marketing consultant keeps coming up with all of these bogus rewards, bonuses, perks, fringe benefits programs and convinces the carriers these are things customers actually want? I'm paying for phone service, not a monthly door prize lottery. Just cut rates $2-5 per month and be done with the whole nonsense.
ReplyDelete$2-5 is nothing, but free monthly perks creates retention. A lot of smart people did the market research and thought it was a good idea. Do you not like free things? If you want savings, move to prepaid and lose the perks. The point is these perks keep customers from switching because they like the benefits they get. It's no different from employers that pay for health plans or free meals.
DeleteWell..they better improve their signal sstrength than all these perks.
ReplyDeletet-mobile probably paid close to $0 for the freebies for tuesdays. Mostly paid for by sponsorships of the other brands offering the deal. i.e. dominoes, wendys, vudu etc...I think it is genius. It makes sense the stock is only for the primary account holder of a consumer plan. (the main account holder not each line.) I would expect t-mobile will expand the gogo deal in the future for international flights.
ReplyDeleteI agree. T-Mobile has grown very fast, and Companies want to have the 66M customers get to know the products, which are donated for this promo. And yes, postpaid customers are more loyal. Lower churn rate means less money spent to replace them. Thanks!
DeleteThis is a step in the right direction, but the problem with sponsored goodies is that they're worth is entirely subjective.
ReplyDeleteWhat if I'm a prepaid customer who doesn't like pizza or frosties, rent movies, fly often, or enjoy blisteringly loud theater volume that appears to be ratcheted up for the hard of hearing (instead of just allowing them to plug in headphones)?
With that said, there are obviously strings attached to this offer.
It's more of a give away to those who already meet those criteria and value those services, rather than an appealing offer to those who might consider switching.
Personally, I'd rather have across the board price cuts and free, Ringplus-style service (except on T-mobile).
But even then, it'd still be hard for them to pry the lowest spenders away from their current carriers without much better phone subsidies (like $50 octa-cores instead of $100 quad-cores).
"..I'm a prepaid customer who doesn't like pizza or frosties, rent movies"
DeleteIf you don't like free pizza, frosties and movies, you're beyond help.
And maybe you should talk to someone about those invisible strings you are seeing...
With the weekly prizes, T-Mobile PayGo could be net free. If you can't beat Tmo, join them.
ReplyDeleteThings like this and Legere's rhetoric add to a feeling of a T-Mobile community, and that the company cares. This can have an effect on brand loyalty and making the company seem "cool".
ReplyDeleteWhich might or might not translate into new customers, lack of churning away, etc.
Whatever the case, T-Mobile has this going for it, while Sprint seems totally out to lunch (like Montgomery Wards for decades before its death... a big old thing dying slowly due to its size), AT&T seems like faceless Ma Bell, and Verizon is "we're the best and nothing else matters.".
Sprint is off balance. The National Advertising Division (NAD) told Sprint to stop advertising Cut Your Bill in Half. They did not mention the $36 activation fee, or the fact that Tmo customers had to be on a 2, 6 or 10GB Simple Choice plan to get any discount. Sprint pulled all advertising.
DeleteThe best quotes I read from Legere about Uncarrier 11 was something like: "Now you own our success." and “Why should Wall Street be the only ones to benefit [from our company’s success]? You should too.” Referring to the free Stock Up offer.
DeleteIf you really want to know what makes Legere tick and why, take 10 minutes to read this whole article. You won't be sorry:
http://www.fastcompany.com/3046877/who-the-is-this-guy-john-legeres-strategy-for-taking-new-customers-by-storm
I love the comparison of Sprint to Montgomery Wards before its death.
DeleteDid anyone see the new Sprint commercial with that Verizon "Can you hear me now?" guy?? He now collects money from Sprint to say "Sprint is now within 1-percent of Verizon's coverage for much cheaper price" LMBO!! Talk about false advertising.
Hang onto your cheeks. The Sprint spokesman includes roaming. On Verizon, of course.
DeleteI liked this quote from Legere during the Get Thanked presentation:
Delete“You now own the Un-carrier revolution.”
One analyst said today that Sprint can become the fastest and least expensive network based on its spectrum and small cell strategy for LTE and 5G. The stock jumped 3.3% on that report. Story here:
Deletehttp://www.wirelessweek.com/news/2016/06/fbr-sprint-has-potential-become-lowest-cost-and-fastest-data-network
grab me a free ticket to warcraft and a medium pizza free. you can't beat that
ReplyDeleteBut to be clear the freebies other than the stock is for each line even non primary accounts. I have an old Harbor Mobile account and it is the basic $33 a month plan and it qualifies. Really cool it works on non primary accounts. Kudos for t-mobile for shaking up the industry. Keep those uncannier events coming!
ReplyDelete"...grab me a free ticket to warcraft..."
ReplyDeleteYou tell 'em, Leeroy! At least you've got chicken.
I think what T-Mobile did right is awesome! I can see a lot of teens and college students signing up for T-Mobile to attain the benefits..and having a share in T-Mobile stock that appeals to me on a personal level. However,I most certainly agree with some of the comments. The drop calls are horrendous! Even though T-Movile entertains us with all these new incentives, what good is it? If you can't even hold a conversation if your service keeps dropping your call
ReplyDeleteBad news everyone tmobile got us good by not giving a sh!t for its buggy app due to massive user traffic. Free stuff my a##!!
ReplyDeleteStraight Talk is copying T-Mobile and will offer an EIP for expensive phones. Lease to own an iPhone 6S or Galaxy S7, for example. Only at Walmarts - Straight Talk Plus.
ReplyDeleteWell it took all day before they finally got the app working again. Whew what a roller coaster for t-mobile on opening day.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading the app comments on the Play Store, I didn't install it. What a train wreck!
ReplyDeleteWell us folks at Cricket is just wishing for reliable service that won't cut out for 14 hours on a Friday afternoon!
ReplyDelete