There are glad tidings in BSkyB’s latest quarterly report, but its churn rate of 10.6 per cent isn’t one of them.
The success of BSkyB’s marketing to prospects has rarely been matched by customer retention. It’s a cut-throat sector, but even so, it’s worrying that the proportion of customers defecting from Sky is persistently in double digits.
Once upon a time BSkyB actually had a person in the role of “head of churn”. They did away with that glamorous job title.
The broadcaster is said to have one of the most enlightened organisational structures when it comes to managing the retention and acquisition functions. The acquisition and retention departments are integrated, a feature that few brand owners can boast.
Indeed, the last time Marketing Direct ventured into the company’s Osterley, west London, offices, BSkyB customer marketing director Mark Anderson sat across from the man responsible for acquisition, John Orriss, the director of direct sales and marketing. Both reported to William Mellis, director of customer acquisition and retention.
Back then, Anderson told Marketing Direct that “customer experience is our new battleground, and we believe passionately that it is our differentiator," he says.
But the latest churn figure suggests otherwise. It seems that the battle with Virgin Media, BT and Setanta has become so adversarial, that losing swathes of customers to them has become an accepted part of BSkyB's business model.
