It’s been said before that 2008 will go down as the year of the mobile device. Cell phones are getting smarter every generation and the rate of adoption is skyrocketing. Many smartphone buyers will probably tell you that they never pictured themselves buying one. Why is this happening? What has spurred this trend? One can’t really point the finger at one particular reason, as it’s a combination of many things happening in the industry.
Everyone knows that customer satisfaction is what drives people to buy or use certain products and services. Now, more than ever, those satisfaction rates are climbing. There are three things that happened over the last year within the cellular industry that started changing things forever: commitment to being open, pro-rated early termination fees, and the price war of 2008. These are the events responsible for the sea change.
Lately each company seems to be mimicking the next, afraid to get left behind. After all, if three out of four companies are providing something you’re not, your customers will be looking to go elsewhere. Take what Sprint did two weeks ago with their announcement of the $119 unlimited plan. While I am not an expert in the field, I can still add a few things up. Sprint was essentially forced to do something dramatic to keep from hemorrhaging customers. Maybe by dropping their prices and offering something so unique, people would forget their less than stellar customer service.
Sadly, that idea never came to fruition as Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile all announced similar, if not better, deals within a week. Verizon and AT&T made their announcements simply because they’d rather not be beat at a game they are currently winning. T-Mobile was in no position to jump Sprint at the current pace, so perhaps that is why they were so aggressive in their plans to offer unlimited calling and texting for $99 a month.
How would Sprint combat these other plans? The latest rumor at the time was that they were considering a $60 unlimited calling plan. This could not have come at a better time, as early termination fees were set to be prorated if they weren’t already. Customers would be able to switch carriers without that $200 hefty cancellation cost, making the burden to retain customers heavier every day.
By offering an open network, users gained the capability of switching to other carriers without being forced to buy a new phone. On top of that, they wouldn’t have to wait until their two-year contract was up. It wasn’t out of the realm of possibility that you could be switching providers every few months, at least until the dust settled a little bit.
