I had a great time at TM Net’s workshop yesterday, attended by 30 - 40 managers from sales and marketing. Apart from my online marketing presentation, we discussed about the problems faced and new strategies for their Internet services. It’s tough being a hosting provider these days - your margins are razor-thin and you need to compete with global players. A customer could easily register a domain name and subscribe to a budget hosting plan in the U.S. for under $39/year, complete with 24-hour technical support. If you don’t have value propositions or an efficient/lean operation, you’re finished! Malaysians are also a savvy but demanding lot. We want things fast and easy, yet cheap and good. As in the 4Ps of marketing, having a good and well-priced product doesn’t guarantee success. You need to understand your market and how to position your product as well - don’t try to sell to every market segment. In promoting your service, it’s not enough to just advertise but you must know how to market it, i.e. instead of just telling the customer what you have, you must convince them why they need it. One Miss Zakiah from the sales team pointed out that you must help customers answer the following: In TM Net’s case though, I think that public relations would be their biggest hurdle. They attract so much bad press on the Internet (just search for “TM Net sucks” on Google) but never really do anything about it, e.g. TM Net could have created a simple blog or send an email to notify their customers about planned downtimes. Instead, Streamyx broadband customers had to rely on 3rd party message boards or the newspapers to know why their Internet connection was down. They should also aim to sell end-to-end solutions and not just products. For example, don’t just sell e-commerce (e-biz) packages but support the customers with online marketing training to help them profit. Remember that you can’t sell cars, no matter how good they are, if we have no roads. Personally, I would really like to see TM Net lead the charge in developing the Internet in Malaysia, e.g. to champion the blogging community and promote online shopping. Because if you want to be the leader, you have to first be a player. Gain the trust of online icons like Jeff Ooi and let them help sell your brand. Finally, I would like to assure my readers that TM Net does have a good team of product, sales and marketing people. I was surprised myself at how driven, vocal and dynamic most of these guys were at the workshop. Give them some time because they’ve acknowledged their weaknesses and are working hard to change. Thank you Mr. Ibrahim (Asst. General Manager, Product Marketing) for inviting me to participate in your workshop - it was a pleasure!
- why should I buy the product?
- why should I buy from you?
- why should I buy it now?
My beef with TMNet is that I’m a customer by monopoly and not by choice. I know that they can perform better and they should!
The problem is, there’s no incentive for them to improve; “Not happy with TMNet? Go elsewhere lah! Ooops! There’s nowhere else to go now is it?! Hahaha!”.
I’m not suprised that they’re finding the hosting market to be challenging. This market is global as you’ve said so yourself. Even if I have a .my domain, I can host it wherever I please. I’m not forced to subscribe to TMNet’s service.
In terms of the industry, they’re more visible as a broadband service provider. As you’ve pointed out yourself, their public image is not rosy to say the least. Not a day goes by where I do not see a negative story about poor Streamyx connectivity and/or support issue being highlighted in the local papers or on the Internet.
Press releases of “improved connectivity”, “service upgrades”, and “speedy service” from TMNet have now fallen onto deaf ears made numb from expectations that were never fulfilled for decades. Not months, not years, but decades.
No offence to you, but I think that they don’t really need a marketing consultant to get them to “see the big picture”. We TMNet customers have been painting that picture for far too long. It’s TMNet who refuses to open its eyes.
Comment by Azmeen — April 11, 2007 @ 11:51 am
Believe it or not, I actually told TM Net the same thing, i.e. voiced my views as their customer. They’re aware of the situation and would like to change …but it’s a bit complicated in a big, government-linked company like TM. ;)
However, the fact that they actually roped someone in, and having been talking to the big boys like Yahoo and Google, I think they’re serious this time.
I’ve worked in a joint ISP between Keppel (Singapore) and Telstra (Australia), and I can tell you that the TM Net team is as good if not better.
Comment by Larry — April 11, 2007 @ 1:27 pm
tm net sux i paid rm88 for 1m streamyx but give me 1k service makan duit ah not just only me.
Comment by john — January 19, 2008 @ 9:06 pm
Are you sure they had “acknowledged their weaknesses” ? how long do i need to give them for improvement the service? somemore they had implement p2p blocking system , do you know about this? …..i dun think u are the right person to be a manager as you are not comparing the event with you heart/eye, but you are just listenning to what people say so. If you think i’m wrong, then just give me a proof to support your opinion.
Comment by Jiat — January 23, 2008 @ 7:01 pm
Jiat: firstly, I’m not a TM Net employee. Secondly, my opinions were based on what happened at the event at that time - fair? Thirdly, Streamyx is no longer under TM Net but has been returned to TM.
Comment by Larry — January 23, 2008 @ 11:36 pm
I agree with Azmeen. Improving?
Wonder when will be the turning point of their improvement.
Should we say the turning point is
a) when more big players join in as competitors in the league or
b) when they feel the heat of market share takeover from emerging niche player or
c) when there are huge change on the market situation which affect their sales?
Take Proton’s (national car) historical event as a lesson learnt. Today they are no longer the all time car market leader in Malaysia as far as I understand. Thanks for the early bad impression they gave to their customer and recent changes on the government regulation. Although they are improving now but it has cost them a lot and may never achieve the same standing when they first started.
As a consumer of TM Net’s streamyx for years I have never experience any improvement so far (not at least for me and some subscriber I know) and yet more complaints are made or heard.
Things are more iritating when they can do well in marketing and promoting their product to attract more subscriber but less can be visibly seen or heard about their commitment/plan to fix the problem and improve their service to existing customer.
If it is true of the advertisement I notice from the yahoo site today that M1 Sg is offering unlimited 10Mbps broadband with SGD40.60 only, the subscriber of streamyx are getting a total ripped off by paying almost 10 times higher to TM (Streamyx Unlimited Broadband 1Mbps cost RM88/month). Not to mention poor aftersales service experience you’ll get.
The point is clear that there are no incentive to change or stake to improve if the business segment are monopolised.
If using GLC as an excuse for performing badly, I have never heard GLC like MAS (Malaysia Airlines) being negatively publicised as TMNet and yet they are able to compete globally, bag internaltional awards and survive turbulence of world market fuel price increase. Simply because they are not taking the monopoly path and they are committed to improve for survival.
Comment by Cayner — August 18, 2008 @ 1:25 pm