Digital marketing plan for ACT Broadband Several Digital and Traditional methods of digital marketing is used in the project for the successful launch of ACT broadband in various southern part of India as a major Internet Service Provider having a good presence in this part of India while competing with major ISP’s such as BSNL and AIRTEL.

2015

Nitin Kumar Shukla IMT Nagpur

ACT Broadband

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Introduction

ACT (Atria Convergence Technologies Pvt. Ltd.) had its humble beginning in the year 2000 founded by Mr Sunder Raju, Managing Director. Today, ACT is one of the country's most renowned triple play service providers with 1 million+ happy customers experiencing broadband, digital TV and IPTV services. ACT is funded by IVFA (India Value Fund Advisor), a premier private equity investment fund which played a pivotal role in facilitating several companies to develop into world-renowned organizations. Some of their most successful portfolios have been - Biocon, Radio City, HDFC Bank, Meru and TTK Healthcare, just to name a few.

ACT (Atria Convergence Technologies Pvt. Ltd.), the country's fourth largest ISP in the wired broadband category and a brand that stands out in the market as a pioneer in the use of Fiber-to-the-Home technology, announced the launch of its new brand, ACT Fibernet. ACT Fibernet reinforces the company's commitment to offer consumers the fastest, most consistent and unparalleled Internet experience, through the use of superior fiber technology. Living up to the promise of staying at the forefront of change, the company also launched incredibly fast 60 Mbps plans, which is the fastest speed currently provided by any service provider in the retail segment. The new brand resonates as a more fun, youthful and vibrant one. Speaking on the change, Mr. Bala Malladi, Group CEO of the ACT Group said, "We believe that ACT is at the forefront of driving Internet consumption in India, not just in terms of growing the market but also changing the online user behaviour and enhancing the way users experience this medium.

ACT Fibernet has launched its digitally-led campaign to mark the brand's reinvention as well. The campaign, run under the hashtag #BeIncredible on Facebook, aims to promote a complete online experience by encouraging users to utilize the Internet to discover the incredible in life everyday and actively seek out ways to accomplish the things they have always wanted to do in life. ACT Fibernet is already live on the company's corporate website (www.acttv.in) and dedicated internet portal - portal.acttv.in.

FiberNet, earlier known as Beam Fiber of Beam Telecom Pvt. Ltd. (now ACT Group) and

formerly Beam Cable Systems Pvt. Ltd. is an Indian Internet Service Provider with its major

operations based in Hyderabad, India and Bangalore. The company has been operating since

2006 and is now a part of ACT Group.

Vision

To be the most admired in-home entertainment, education and interactive services company that creates radical social transformation and delights and empowers customers

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Mission

Deploy cutting edge technology to continuously innovate to serve customer needs in a user-friendly way Partner with technology, content and distribution firms for speed to market, scalability and leadership Set new benchmarks for customer care Set new standards in operational excellence resulting in profitability and attractive stakeholder returns Provide a vibrant and fulfilling work environment for a passionate and empowered team

Digital Initiatives taken by the company

There are certain initiatives taken by the company to gain market share among its competitors in the southern part of India where ACT has strong hold and getting a good response from its target but that is not sufficient to generate revenues for the company and not helping its growth. Initiative includes various digital and traditional mediums like face book, twitter, you tube and various outdoor promotions which are mentioned below:

On Face book

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On Twitter

On YouTube

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ACT Broadband

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ACT as a Brand

When a company is competing with the brands like BSNL and Airtel it is very necessary for

them to build a brand so that their existing and going to be customers do not churn out due

to the brand image of some other service providers and for that ACT needs to be a well

known brand by giving information about their services to their customers by various means

and one major means will be Words of Mouth. So some points which they should highlight

to their customers are:

1. Brand Essence: Giving unparalleled Internet experience through

Fiber technology and Extended– Enriching lives through superior

technology which will always allow the brand to stay a step ahead of

competition.

2. Brand positioning: Providing unmatched speed at a cost that defies

industry standards.

3. Brand Insight: Today more than ever before, we are ready to

upgrade to the latest in any category especially when there is a

tangible benefit. This behaviour is evident more in the technology

space. A common refrain among users - “I wish I could get faster

speed at an affordable/ reasonable cost” , which is promised at ACT.

4. Brand Benefit: Fastest speed at the best price, Assured and equal

upload and download speed, Consistent speed for a delay/ j itter free

Internet experience and Weather-proof connectivity.

To develop a successful digital marketing strategy ACT needs to concentrate on the

following important points which will be discussed in detail in the report:

1. Identifying your target audience.

2. Developing your business goals.

3. Designing and implementing a strategy for meeting those goals.

4. Monitoring your chosen strategy.

Target

It is the most important factor that generates business for the company so ACT has to be

very clear about selecting their target and differentiating them from the competition and for

that they need to understand and create target in two parts which is interrelated:

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1. Demographic: They need to target their customers in between the age of 22 to 40 in urban areas (SEC A1, A2, B1) and both male and female because they are providing services in southern part of India where most of the target works in the IT sector which lies in this age category and they are independent too and they require fast internet services with low cost and good after sales service. Most of the users in this category are the first time broadband users in the particular geographic area so they believe on word of mouth of their colleagues and neighbours and if ACT builds reputation in terms of after sales service and low cost internet services then they will be the first choice of the target in this age category.

2. Behavioural: ACT needs to study the behaviour of their target as they are progressive and believe in keeping themselves up to date with whatever is happening in the world. Though information hungry, they do not get influenced easily as they believe in finding facts on their own before forming opinions and also they are very active on social networking sites which suggests ACT to have a vast presence in online promotional activities to come in the radar of this target. They truly belong to the internet generation and use it for self-empowerment. For them internet is like an oxygen in the virtual world. They are highly impatient and they want everything ‘here and now’. They do not believe in waiting as time is luxury for them, they are also highly value conscious and wouldn’t get carried away by the speed alone unless the cost at which the speed is available sounds logical to them. So ACT could tap them from their high speed internet services which they are providing at very low cost in comparison to their competitors

Business Goals

The first and foremost goal of the company is to have a greater market share than its competitors in its target segment for which they need to make their online presence better than their competitors in their service zone and also to have a better digital marketing strategies because the target which they want to acquire spends lots of their time surfing on Internet and other digital mediums so to achieve these goals major issues that company is facing are:

1. Customer engagement 2. Emotional connect with the customers 3. Despite the growing demand and the cost of the bandwidth going down in the global

market internet still is an expensive commodity. The fierce competition is expected to bring about a price war in the near future.

4. There is a possibility that the existing ACT customers may shift to the competition ISP the moment there is a better offer available in the market.

5. Customer’s interaction with the brand remains limited to the transactional activities like complaint, bill payment, up-gradation/down-gradation etc.

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Digital mediums used as a strategy and reasons

There are several digital techniques mentioned above to make ACT a brand and to fulfil its

goals related to market share and cover greater region in relation to its current presence.

1. Mobile WAP Ads: A WAP mobile ad is a text ad or image ad that's made to show on WAP-enabled mobile devices (sometimes called "feature phones"). WAP-enabled devices let people browse mobile websites that are specifically designed for small mobile devices. These websites are typically much simpler than the full-fledged websites you'd normally see on a desktop computer. WAP mobile ads allow you to reach people who are searching on their feature phones for products or services that you offer. These people would miss out on regular search or high-end mobile ads that might be shown for the same queries on other devices.

2. Search engine optimization: Search Engine Optimization (SEO) leads have an average close rate of 14.6%, while outbound leads (such as cold calls or print advertising) have an average close rate of 1.7%. Having your website optimized for SEO is a necessity heading into 2015. By having an SEO strategy in place, you can increase your leads and grow your business for next year.

3. Email marketing: If you are a business that only sends out one email blast per month, start doubling this number and send out at least two per month. Nordstrom sends out multiple email blasts EACH DAY! If you have compelling content that would be informative to the subscribers on your email list, tell them about it via email communications. According to econsultancy.com, email marketing remains the best digital channel for ROI. Start strategizing heavily as to how you will make this of online marketing work for your business in 2015!

4. Facebook lookalike audience: ACT is already promoting them on facebook but only creating a page will not help them to attract more audience as they have to post ads on the page and change it on regular basis with regular updates along with this ACT have to work on facebook look alike audience. What exactly is a Facebook Lookalike Audience? According to Facebook, Lookalike audiences let you reach new people who are likely to be interested in your business because they’re similar to a customer list you care about. When you use Custom Audiences, you can choose to create a lookalike audience that targets people who are similar to your Custom Audience list. Let’s say you have an email marketing database over 5,000 contacts and are in the heating and cooling industry. You can upload this onto Facebook’s advertising platform and target the EXACT demographic similar to your existing customers! This is a neat feature that advertisers should at least test during the upcoming year.

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5. Get started on Instagram: If you haven’t started an Instagram account for your business, what are you waiting for? The younger generation has flocked to this social media platform with over 200 million monthly active users (according to Expanded Ramblings). Advertisers are getting more of an opportunity to share their content through filtered photos. Instagram is one of the most natural ways to share content for your brand. It is better to be a step ahead of the game than 2 steps behind it.

6. YouTube videos: ACT is using this technique but that too is ineffective in creating new customers for them because they are repeating the same videos again and again instead of that they need to show their modified plans related videos and videos of their satisfied customers to make a emotional connect with the and by implementing videos into your online marketing mix, you can start to get search engine exposure for the videos that you upload onto YouTube! There are a lot of great tricks to obtain more video SEO Exposure. Choosing a proper title tag, uploading a transcript and embedding the YouTube video are just some of the tricks for optimal SEO exposure. Online video should definitely be included in your 2015 digital marketing strategy as this form of rich media can be a game changer in terms of publicity for your company. People will interpret your YouTube videos that you are taking your marketing initiatives very seriously!

Traditional Mediums

1. Radio Advertisements: Whether it’s driving to work, school or a store, chances are, you’re going to be listening to the radio at some point in your commute. Advertising on the radio can provide the opportunity to be heard and (hopefully) remembered by a variety of potential customers. Many companies have been very effective with radio advertising, implementing catchy jingles that are easily remembered upon hearing them only a few times, which can help with establishing brand equity. Radio should be used as a front line for marketing, use it to funnel people into your location or to other advertising mediums (web, Facebook, Twitter, etc). Too many companies concentrate on a catchy message and forget to include a strong call to action.

2. News paper Advertisements: Newspaper advertising is advertising that readers are likely to spend the most time looking over. Furthermore, you can target newspaper ads to particular groups of consumers. For instance, if you're advertising a new electronic gadget, you can have your ad appear in the "Tech" section of the paper. If you want to target a specific city or region, you can place your ad in the newspaper's various regional sections. Furthermore, you have flexibility in your ad - you can run half pages, full pages, quarter pages or classifieds, depending on what fits your budget.

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Digital Mediums not to be used as a Strategy and reasons There are certain digital techniques which do not make impact on the business model of ACT as its

target customers are entirely different.

1. Compelling graphics: The more compelling your graphics are on various social media channels, the more interaction you will receive. If you have a graphic designer, start sending him or her over your social media calendar so they can help create beautiful imagery. In 2015 you will want to increase engagement and great pictures certainly help. If you don’t have a graphic designer, don’t worry; there are affordable sites that offer stock photography like BigStock.

2. Digital PR: You can build off of the content contribution by implementing a Digital PR strategy. If you reach out to various media related websites and send them over a solid pitch, they might just write an article on your company or feature your CEO in a blog post. The more people talking about your company, Tweeting about your business and mentioning your brand, the better exposure you will receive for the upcoming year.

3. Content contribution: If you want your content to be seen by more eyeballs and gain more exposure, start contributing content to other blogs in similar fields. If you own an apartment community in Nashville, start writing for a local Nashville website that talks about the best activities around town. You will be seen as an expert in your city and this can help drive more traffic to your website. While people might not be looking for an apartment immediately, they will remember that you have invested time and effort into content within the community!

4. Yahoo! Bing network: The average cost per click on Yahoo! Bing was 10% to 24% lower than on Google AdWords. A lower cost per click can yield a lower cost per acquisition, which is the exact reason why you should start taking the search network seriously that receives 11.6% of the market share this upcoming year. If you are in an expensive industry in the pay per click world like the legal profession, insurance industry or medical field, having a lower cost per click can help with a profitable PPC campaign.

5. Unique promotion: Brainstorm a unique promotion that people will actually enjoy that can drive massive publicity for your company in 2015! Whether it is coming up with a user generated jingle contest or a photo upload promotion, entice your great fans on social media to interact with your brand in a clever way. If the

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promotion is a success, it will be one of the most talked about campaigns for your company in 2015.

Traditional Mediums

Television Advertisements: Message is temporary, and may require multiple exposures for the ad to rise above the clutter. Ads on network affiliates are concentrated in local news broadcasts and station breaks. Preferred ad times are often sold out far in advance

Limited length of exposure, as most ads are only thirty seconds long or less, which limits the amount of information you can communicate. Relatively expensive in terms of creative, production and airtime costs

Monitoring of the chosen strategy

Major concerns for many companies that invest in digital strategies are that they did not get

good ROI and the basic reason behind it is that they strategise through various digital

mediums only once and never look back for the problems that they are facing related to

those strategies. So if you want to succeed in your digital campaigns one needs to monitor

their each and every digital strategy and always keep on changing according to their target

so that they stick to your brand.

Conclusion and Recommendation

1. Position ACT Broadband & Beam Fiber as the fastest ISP in the country that provide value for money services

2. Create glide path (short and long term goals) for both the brands on how the brands are going to evolve on the digital platform

3. Ideate and execute the brand transaction from Beam Fiber to ACT Broadband on digital platform

4. Increase the website ranking by increasing the number of visitors (through SEO, SEM, SMM initiatives) to the site

5. Increase positive WOM online by effectively managing online reputation of the brand and creating personalized communication and solutions for the customers affected by service

6. Engage prospects and the existing customers through social media. Reach 1 L Fan Base on Facebook for ACT by March 2015. Reach 2.5 L Fan Base on Facebook for Beam

7. Increase the number of leads – From current 60% of total leads coming through digital, increase it to 80% by March 2015 for ACT and Beam both.