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T-Shop till you drop
The retail experience you get in Telstra's T-shops doesn't quite live up to the telco's brand promise of being human, caring, approachable and
trustworthy.
The promise
In recent years Telstra has stopped making its well-known brand promise of "Making life easier", presumably because the telco could see the damage it was doing
in not delivering it.
Rather worryingly though, Telstra seems to have exchanged its big idea for an old-school method of branding consisting of an internal strategy "one company, one
team, one brand, many customers" and a list of customer facing values (or messages): caring, clever and trustworthy. Its definition of caring is to have a human
face, to be approachable, to use the language of the customer and to understand customers' needs. This, in essence,
has become its brand promise. You can imagine what Telstra defines as clever, and its definition of trustworthy is no less than delivering its promise.
With the advent of 3G technology, Telstra has a brave new competitor in the shape of the 3 brand from Hutchison Communications. Although the competition from 3
will only affect a small proportion of Telstra's product range, the public's reaction to its stunning new store has provoked
Telstra into reconsidering its own retail presence in a bid to win back the title of the industry's leading innovator.
This month Brand Behaviour investigates whether or not Telstra's reply to 3, the new 'T-shop' at Warringah Mall, delivers Telstra's new brand promise.
The delivery: Environmental
It is the most stunningly impressive shopping environment ever to hit our malls. Step aside 3 shop, Telstra presents the all new 'T-shop'. It's a bit like what
you'd imagine the shop of the future to look likeÑif it was built 20 years from now. From the moment you walk into the store, you are surrounded by an
awe-inspiring display of technology and light.
To your left, a full-length, curved graphic wall displays the latest mobile gadgetry. With a giant, futuristic tapestry of numbers and techno graphics punctuated
with banks of touch screen plasmas to assist us with our choices, this wall is indeed a magnificent statement. The back of the store is also a full-height
graphic wall, this time internally illuminated for extra impact. In front of this is the cash desk (again internally
illuminated and graphics clad), behind which Telstra staff (presumably also from the future), can offer us the very best advice in the most straight-forward and
down-to-earth way. Even the ceiling, an ingenious blend of sculpture and light diffuser, is a testimonial to Stanley Kubrick.
That is unless of course Telstra's brand promise is about being human and approachable.
This show-stopper of a store is surely the landmark statement that will see Telstra steal back pole position as the industry leader, owner in our minds of
communications technology and our number one preferred telco brand. For anyone to have a memorable brand experience within a retail environment, they must have a
meaningful dialogue with that brand. This means two things.
Firstly, the brand must demonstrate that it understands their needs, aspirations and even anxieties.
Secondly, it must do this in a way that makes an emotional connection by displaying a personality.
The principal difference between communication and dialogue is that communication is often one-way, while dialogue is two-way in that it provokes response,
making the experience interactive rather than just passive. The real challenge therefore for any retail brand in such a complex category is to demystify the
buying process while simultaneously having a meaningful dialogue
with its audience in a way that helps to deliver the brand promise. In an effort to understand just how difficult this is to achieve, we have made some direct
comparisons between T-shop and the retail experience at 3, a brand
that we feel is meeting the challenge extremely well.
Our first example is at the threshold of the store. Telstra has chosen to use the window display and the first few feet of retail space for giant displays of
product promotion Ñ ie. sales. In contrast, 3 presents you with clear windows and then a charming introduction to the brand (). The photography and text in this
message give an immediate perception of the brand as being human and approachable, a welcoming contrast to the perceptions with
which this category is generally associated.
The second striking difference between the two experiences is the amount of space given to the customer. Telstra has chosen to dedicate the entire centre floor
to product gondolas selling fixed-line phones. There is some seating tucked away to the rear of the store, presumably for dealing with payment and detailed
explanation, but there is a disappointing lack of obvious 'customer' space. In stark contrast, the 3 store has dedicated an area right in the middle of the space
known as the 'Stay and Play' area, where customers can enjoy a fully
interactive experience seated at a computer terminal or with a staff member. The back section of this centre console is a customer sofa facing the rear of the
store, which is also where product demonstrations are given. The simple act of giving over this space to customers does two things: immediately, it says "You are
important to us"; furthermore, it gives a real platform to
forge stronger customer relationships because it's designed around customers' needs.
Now go back to the brand promise; has either of the points illustrated made the experience 'human' or 'approachable' for Telstra customers? There have been
attempts by Telstra to help consumers make unaided purchases.
An information panel attached to the fixed-line phone gondolas offers to 'find the phone that suits
your needs' by listing the features that each different model
has. Even more ingenious is the touch screen system on the curved wall that takes you through a step-by-step process to find the right mobile phone. Ultimately,
though, even this piece of interactive technology falls down as the infinite number of possibilities and choices become too much to deal with in one
go.
Everyone is aware that 3 has had problems with its product technologyÑthe brand is far from infallible. However, in the context of its store, 3 explains its
products and services clearly with a well-considered tone of voice and makes a big deal of facilitating
demonstrations, allowing customers to gain the right level of confidence in purchasing the product and therefore committing to the brand. This aspect is critical
because in purchasing phones the default for the majority of customers will always be to ask for help.
The delivery: Human
Before there is time to ask for help at Telstra, however, you are approached by a very friendly customer service member who offers you assistance in a way that
is non-threatening and genuine. In fact, it's all smiles in the T-store. The raw enthusiasm from the customer service personnel indicates that store based
service directives have been issued
from somewhere inside Telstra and staff training has become something of a priority. And rightly so, because never before have customer service personnel been
under greater pressure than when representing an industrial giant that promises to be
caring and trustworthy.
Is the message of understanding our needs and communicating in our language getting through? Well it depends largely on who you are and if you can hear the staff
through the upbeat tunes radiating from the ceiling, which appear actually to cheapen this
amazing visual creation. Assuming that you can hear your customer service person, if you are tech-savvy, aged between 15 and 27 and experienced in the two clear
revenue streams for
mobile phone connections (pre-paid and call plans), then yes life is most pleasant and very straight-forward.
However, if you happen to be in the majority of this baby boomer-dominated society, then your life gets significantly more difficult with the second service
greeting expression "What features do you want from your phone?". Why didn't they ask "What do you do?", or "Why do you need a phone?", or something that would
make you feel that they were interested enough in you to help
ensure you select the most appropriate phone for your needs?
From here things get worse. I am taken to the futuristic tapestry wall and shown lots of little shiny phones accompanied by detail cards that are littered with
technical jargon such as GPS, WAP and polyphonic ring tones. How many baby boomers know what WAP is? Telstra is not explaining it well. My guess is that some
might think it's a reference to Australia's infamous immigration
restriction act of 1850.
What you think
As usual, our investigations led to approaching a number of customers who had just visited the store. We asked 100 customers over a two-day period what they
thought of the store and whether they felt it was delivering telstra's brand promise. Obtaining unbiased responses was almost impossible. It appears that the
stigma so appropriately attached to Telstra's previous incarnation Telecom and its
monopoly of the '60s, '70s and'80s weighs heavily on people even now. We expected that the more senior respondents would be vocal about the old giant's
behaviour, but even our youngest respondents seemed keen to sling mud.
It seems that people still associate Telstra with its previous life form Telecom. And that is a problem. It is challenging to make life easier (let alone give
the perception of doing so) after having made life difficult for more than 20 years.
The T-shop? People liked the look and feel. Did they think the shop made their life easier? Some suggested that the layout made life easy, and the in-store,
customer-driven computer screens were a good way
to avoid being sold anything. Others said, "It looks awesome and very professional", and "It looks like they are trying to give an experience". However, the
larger proportion of those asked commented that it looked as though it belonged somewhere else.
The verdict
We imagine that this is what happenedÉ The incredibly innovative telco brand 3 was launched last year, bringing us the new G3 technology in a very dynamic and
appealing way with a great ad campaign to
boot. In one swift move, 3 had become the 'leader' of the telco industry, leaving the incumbent trembling. Telstra's response was to say, "Anything they can do,
we can and must do better". And that's where Telstra made its first mistake.
Let's think about it for a moment. 3 is a neat little package. Its products are superbly designed and the service is new technology in a rapidly evolving market
where consumers expect continuous
innovation. 3 is a very strong brand with a focused market audience, making it easy to create powerful and effective marketing campaigns. In essence, 3 is what
is now so commonly understood as a 'lifestyle brand'Ñpeople buy the emotional idea along with the phone.
3 is in an ideal position to create a high-tech,
high-gloss retail space where it can schmooze and interact with its target audience. As importantly, 3 does not have a chequered history leaving it with a
credibility problem when putting on this kind of retail show.
Now think about Telstra. On the one hand it is promising to be caring, human and approachable and on the other it is showing off, bamboozling and intimidating
customers with technology
while showing little sympathy with how they feel when buying this type of product. The inherent problem that Telstra faces with this kind of project is that its
customer base is very wideÑas is its range of products and services. It also has a very public history with its customers. Telstra needs to mend relationships
with the x generation and the baby boomers.
This store would have been an ideal opportunity to start that process by communicating the brand in a sensitive way. Instead, it seems to represent Telstra
beating its chest, appealing largely to the younger generation with its futuristic façade and not to Telstra's core
customer. In essence it's a great store, but the brief was wrong. The T-shop experience may be clever but it falls a little short of being caring or trustworthy.
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