December 7th, 2022, YouGov
In this piece, we round up the key trends and insights our data revealed in the telco world for 2022.
There might not be a better indicator – within our data, anyway – of telco’s importance to global consumers than the fact that a brand arguably synonymous with the sector topped our Global Best Brand Rankings this year.
Beyond Samsung’s strong performance, our data revealed that 2022 was a year of change for many consumers. On a global level, one in six (16%) ditched their phone carriers over the past year, and when asked why, consumers were most likely to cite reasons related to cost. Factors such as customer service (8%), network coverage (9%) and even speed (7%) were far behind reasons like reducing spend (17%), getting a cheaper deal (16%) or seeking out greater value for money (13%). You can find out more here.
In any case, at a time when inflation is soaring across the world, money is clearly on the public’s mind. In the US and Great Britain, our data found that the public were simply not ready to pay more for 5G; just 24% of Americans and 14% of Britons were willing to fork out for the next-generation network technology.
Nevertheless, 2022 was a year when the public became more willing to accept the supposed virtues of 5G – such as the improved digital experience – and price is not necessarily a definitive factor across every aspect of telco. Just 15%, for example, say that price is the least important factor to them when buying a mobile phone, with 13% saying the same of quality.
But the things most likely to be immaterial to consumers are product packaging (25%), and brand (18%): a big name and a shiny box aren’t going to be enough to win over consumers who are tightening their belts and giving serious consideration to the proliferation of options at their disposal.
So what will? We explored marketing to telco consumers in a number of stories, but our study on influencer-promoted phone ads revealed that some two in five consumers (42%) take notice of endorsements by prominent people on social media, rising to more than four in five (84%) in India and falling to just one in six in Denmark (16%) – with a lot of variety in between.
The reliance on these influencers to inform purchase decisions may speak to a lack of confidence in product knowledge among some members of the public. Our data shows that a quarter of the public (24%) don’t have much confidence in their understanding of mobile phones, rising to as many as two in five consumers in some markets.
Educating consumers about how their cellular networks and phones work might therefore be a productive approach for some manufacturers.
The above represents a snapshot of the work we’ve done in this sector over the past year, and we’ll be releasing more insights in the year to come.
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