Summary
Airtel's Xstream Fiber: Revolutionizing Broadband Connectivity Across 25.6 Million Homes In March 2020, India witnessed a digital revolution with internet users surging from 718.74 million to 743 million. Airtel, recognizing the demand for connectivity, introduced Airtel Xstream Fiber, aiming to connect 25.6 million homes. The campaign's objective was extensive digital acquisition with sustainable CAC. Collaborations and automation with Orbital Ads, Smartly, Rocketium, and Meta provided actionable insights.
Challenge
The campaign's objective was to achieve swift and extensive digital acquisition in both mobility and non-mobility sectors. This expansion was targeted to reach all serviceable pin codes while maintaining a sustainable Cost of Acquisition (CAC) despite the high average ticket size. To attain this, Airtel planned to capitalize on their in-house automation tools and collaborate with automation engines on various digital platforms, aiming to enhance efficiency and productivity. The ultimate business goal was to achieve a 2x growth rate while ensuring that the CAC remained at a profitable level. To devise effective automation strategies, consumer insights were utilized, leveraging data modeling from their vast customer base of 300 million users
Objective
March 2020 marked the beginning of a digital revolution. The number of internet users surged from 718.74 million to an impressive 743 million, a testament to the country's hunger for connectivity. Among them, 720.7 million were wireless internet users, while 22.4 million opted for the reliability of wired connections. Search trends for keywords like "broadband connection near me" and "Wi-Fi connection." were growing exponentially. As the demand for internet services soared, companies started crafting innovative plans that not only provided high-speed internet but also bundled enticing extras like OTT App subscriptions and TV services. It was a race to capture the attention and loyalty of the ever-growing digital audience. However, this surge faced limitations, especially in Tier-2 and Tier-3 regions where the expansion of high-speed internet hit a roadblock – restricted fiber cable penetration. The digital wave, while sweeping through urban landscapes, struggled to reach the more remote corners of the country. Airtel had the vision to connect homes seamlessly, Airtel introduced its Airtel Xstream Fiber service offerings. The goal was to connect 25.6 million homes, with a strategic focus on rolling out fiber across the nation.
Strategy
Automation for Efficiency: Airtel realized the importance of automation and formed partnerships with stakeholders capable of automating manual tasks across various platforms. This resulted in streamlined processes and provided a consolidated overview of daily metrics, facilitating prompt decision-making and favorable results. Collaboration with Orbital Ads: To enhance efficiency, the campaign formed a collaboration with Orbital Ads. This enabled optimization process for Google search terms and keywords resulting in bringing campaign efficiencies by bringing CPLs and CPAs down. Collaboration with Smartly: To personalize the communication, Airtel partnered with Smartly.io, where it bifurcated the entire geo strategy into multiple markets, and each market had localized communication to focus on personalized content. The objective was to increase upper funnel metrics like click-through rates, which would eventually result in better CPAs. Collaboration with Rocketium: Airtel used its partnership with Rocketium, an automated bulk editing creative creation tool, Airtel utilized its capabilities to create numerous location-specific and vernacular creatives. Meta' Actionable Insights: Meta's unique offering to the telecom, actionable insights provides granular information around user networks, coverage, speed etc. which was leveraged to identify user segments which are valuable to the brand. This provided an opportunity to identify cohorts based on their problem statements and built tailored communications and offerings to target and covert. Payment Apps: In a successful partnership, Airtel collaborated with three major payment apps, namely Paytm, Phonepe, and GPay, offering exclusive deals to tap into the expanding digital payments user base. They launched scratch card campaigns specifically targeting users who make OTT payments through these apps, users of competitor broadband services, and even existing Airtel customers who utilized other lines of business such as postpaid. Partnership with Cred: To reach the high-end Indian audience, we collaborated with the Cred app. Targeting Own Base:
Data
Through a strategic collaboration, automation tools were implemented, integrating target cohorts, locations, and communication channels at scale. Utilizing consumer insights from our in-house Airtel IQ tool for WhatsApp Marketing, we focused on high-paying postpaid users and broadband enthusiasts, employing ingenious strategies for retargeting and achieving impressive month-on-month scalability. To further optimize our customer base, dedicated in-house teams utilized cutting-edge data modeling, gaining invaluable insights into customer behavior, intent, and browsing patterns. This drove impactful push notifications, innovative WhatsApp Chatbots, and engaging SMS campaigns. Skillfully crafted push notification campaigns effectively re-engaged website abandoners and lead drop-offs, while curated premium audience segments, including DTH postpaid and prepaid users, were captivated and converted through seamless integration of SMS, RCS, and WhatsApp channels. Automation tools like Rocketium and Smartly boosted efficiency with bulk creative editing and localized creative optimization. The division of the geo strategy into multiple markets allowed personalized communications based on user intent, optimizing deployment bandwidth and improving key metrics. Meeting increased demand from search queries was achieved with Orbital Ads, automating relevant search term insertion and improving campaign efficiency while scaling leads and activations.
Solution
Results
• 65% incremental growth in Broadband connections • CAC reduced by 22% • Airtel Xstream Fiber is now present in 1,225 cities, up from 983 cities the previous year • Airtel has already passed 25.6 million homes
