to a ‘buy’ scenario,” said Mark Chodoronek, Verizon executive director for e-commerce and digital customer enablement. “We have made major investments over the last three years that have helped us offer industry-leading customer experience.”
And what sorts of things are customers demanding? “Customers require portals that demonstrate ease of use,” said Chodoronek. “They want sales-service. Self-service. Dedicated account teams. Service teams.” All of this underscores, rather than obscures, the fact that every business is just a little bit different. The needs of a home business don’t equal the needs of Home Depot or Coca-Cola. However, Chodoronek points to the scalability of Verizon’s offerings, as well as something that many may overlook: Ease of use.
On an anecdotal level, however, success stories abound.
It’s a cause that’s been adopted by CableLabs, which has this to say on its website: “Much of the new revenue growth in the cable industry is currently being driven by 'Business Class' services—providing voice, video, and high-speed data services to small and medium businesses.” It’s the wave of the future for cablecos.
However, recent estimates of cableco marketshare in the business space are still less than impressive, ranging from 3% of the overall business services market to 20% of the business internet market. Still, there’s considerable ground that needs to be covered before the cablecos are on level footing with the telcos in the business arena.
The truth is, if a portal isn’t intuitive and relatively easy to use, it does little good to a small firm with no IT department. AT&T and Verizon seem to get this. “We’ve worked diligently with our customers to develop task-oriented architectures,” says Chodoronek.
However, these telco giants aren’t the only ones in the business services game. Increasingly, cablecos are breaking into the space, though they haven’t, as yet, had the sort of penetration that they need to unseat the reigning telcos.
And they need this.
Revenue from basic cable video service isn’t exactly on the upswing lately, and the business market is an area in which cablecos can make up some ground. Interestingly, though the dearth of general advertising for business services that I opened this column with is still a reality, cablecos are the sometimes-exception. It’s logical.
On an anecdotal level, however, success stories abound. One such story is that of Optimum Lightpath. A CableVision subsidiary, Optimum Lightpath has created a niche of sorts by building out an impressive fiber network in one of the most imposing and intimidating markets in the world: The greater New York City area. By using Metro Ethernet, Optimum has demonstrated flexibility, and has managed to chip away at the heavily entrenched telco presence in the area, reaching out to serve hospitals, financial institutions, and other entities for whom fast, reliable service is key. Craig Clausen of New Paradigm Resources Group said as much as he gave the company one of its numerous awards: “Optimum Lightpath [stands] out for the innovation and competitive spirit the company has introduced into the dynamic communications market.” And, in doing so, the company represents just one of many examples of the legitimate competition coming from cablecos in the business space.
Pipeline
Publishing, Volume 6, Issue 9
