Confessions of a Cellphone Salesman
I’ve spent 3 years of my life working in a retail cellphone kiosk, selling the phones and services of Cingular/AT&T, T-Mobile US, and Sprint PCS, and thought it fit well with recent conversations here at SMStextnews to do a 2-part entry on the US mobile phone market. The first part will list a few things that really stink about it. I want to give you an idea of what it’s like selling handsets and service in the United States, to give a better depiction of the market.
1. The RAZR still rules. Yes, that’s no exaggeration. With a wall of 24 handsets, 5 of them are the RAZR V3 or a variant and Normobs still flock to them. Obviously it’s a nice looking phone, but regardless of quality issues, for some odd reason, people still want them. I’ve had a customer tell me she hated her silver RAZR so much because she’d gone through 6 of them under warranty, and then still pick the “new” pink one for her upgrade.
2. Free is better, regardless of feature set. With T-Mobile US, we had the RAZR V3 in Magenta for free, and the V3t in Black for $10. We still sold more V3’s. Seriously, the $10 was enough to keep normobs away from a 1.3MP cam and memory card slot. Amazing. What’s even more amazing is when you start the conversation asking what they use their phone for, or want to use their phone for. They’ll tell you all sorts of things that they want to use their phone for such as pictures of their friends, listening to music, etc. When I point them to the $40 phone that addresses every one of their needs, they have a heart attack and point back to the free phones.
3. SMS/Data is bad because it only runs up your bill. The carriers really botched this one a few years ago when they first launched data services. By activating pay-per-use as the default, most consumers have had the unpleasant experience of the ‘surprise bill’, which left a bad taste in their mouths. Add to that the fact that every handset has at least one shortcut key to the internet, and you can imagine that consumers dislike mobile data. 8 out of 10 people, when asked, “Would you like to go ahead and add a data package, as well?” reply “No, actually, I want you to disable everything but calling. Don’t want any surprise bills…” I wish the carriers would have offered people their first month free and unlimited, to give the customer a better idea of what their usage would be and offer customers a pleasant way to experience the mobile web and all it can do.
4. Normobs love leather cases, as Ewan knows. This is actually driven because it’s expensive to replace handsets when you’re still under contract, so consumers want to protect their investment. They will select the V3 RAZR, because it’s thin, but then purchase a leather case that wraps around the entire device, including plastic layers that cover the screen. With this case on, the phone is now roughly twice as thick, defeating the entire purpose altogether. I would say that 6 out of 10 consumers will ask if we have cases for their handset.
5. Ignorance is bliss. Consumers don’t understand things such as cameras on phones (most older consumers still think this means that whoever they’re talking to can see them) or anything that involves connecting their handset to their computer, either for data sync or music. The issue, I think, is that they don’t want to take the time to learn and salespeople don’t want to take a few seconds to teach them. I found that taking 1 minute after the sale to explain to them that pressing the button with the camera on it would activate the camera, and how to navigate the menu and whatnot made a HUGE difference in post-sale satisfaction. The best thing I think I could tell a customer was ‘you can play around all you want, and if you get lost, just press this red button here. It will always take you directly back to the main menu. That way you can’t mess anything up.’ Removing the fear of messing things up does wonders, specifically for the older generation. ‘
6. People don’t pay attention to the mobile usage. They don’t count minutes, and the majority of users haven’t a clue when their contract expires. This makes it frustrating for the salesperson to offer up an accurate plan when they want to switch carriers.
7. The biggest problem is with upgrades vs. new activations. Carriers pay agents a bigger commission for a new activation than they do for an upgrade (existing customer extending their contract) and agents price their handsets accordingly. This means that a handset might be $40 for a new customer, but $80 or more for an existing customer, regardless of what plan or data package they sign up for. This is extremely frustrating to customers and salespeople alike, and ironically, only serves to increase churn, which is what carriers are measured against on Wall Street. You’d think they’d want to work harder to retain existing customers.
Those are just a few of the frustrations of working in retail in the US mobile phone market, and some of the barriers that exist. In context with most readers of SMStextnews, these are hurdles that developers of applications and services face, as well. Overall, the average US mobile customer is largely uneducated as compared to other markets, and averse to using mobile data.
However, don’t despair, it’s not an entirely bleak market. There’s several aspects that are favorable, as well, which I will cover in a followup post soon.
