During the past five months, we’ve been tracking the UK’s perception of brands across various sectors to uncover their performance on trust and likability and their overall response to the Coronavirus pandemic. Our aim is to understand which brands are coming top in each sector across these factors and predict their future performance based on consumer behaviour.

The telecommunication sector has shown the worst decrease in trust from 32% to 29%. However, following the trend observed it has increased by 1% in the last month. This might be because many companies are not returning to work in offices in the foreseeable future and working from home is fuelling a surge in sign-ups for the UK’s ultrafast broadband. The case of BT is exemplar, the company reports a near 70% increase in upgrades, as Covid-19 crisis keeps Britons at home (source: The Guardian).

The telecommunications sector has also shown the worst performance in good response to COVID-19. However, the sector is now recovering +1% from 23% to 24% respectively from August to September.

We asked UK consumers how much they trust the retail, banking, telecommunications and grocery sectors. We’ve discovered that since the start of April, trust in all of these sectors has decreased but from August it starts to increase again.

From the beginning of April, there has been also an overall steady decline in the number of people who believe each of the sectors has responded well to Coronavirus. This shows that brands perceived as offering a good response to the pandemic have, in turn, generated a high level of trust among consumers.In the last month the grocery, retail and Teleco sectors are showing a 1% increase, banking is instead stable at 25%.

Source: Rare: Consulting. UK adults 18+. Data collected between 7th April and 18th October 2020 (N=8,929). Those aware of the brand: three months’ moving average centered on the reference month. Average base in Retail (N=7,861), Grocery (N=6,484), Telco (N=7,434), Banking (N=6,734). Full data tables available from **www.rare.consulting**.

Overall, likability has decreased towards the different telco brands but we are starting to see a steady uplift in the number of people reporting they like the brands operating in the telecom sector and we expect this trend to continue, as the sector recovers from the effects of the Coronavirus pandemic.

The best performing brands in the telecommunications sector are:

EE

EE has remained the most like brand in the telecommunications sector throughout the course of the Coronavirus pandemic despite likability dropping by 4% by August, likability seems to be on the increase rising to 35% just 3% below levels at the start of the pandemic. To give thanks to the NHS workers for their support during the pandemic, EE has given NHS workers unlimited data until 31st January 2021 (Source: ISPreview).

Vodafone

Vodafone is on average the second most liked brand in the telecommunications sector. However, likability has dropped 3% since the beginning of the pandemic, that being said, it does appear that likability towards the brand is starting to rise again. Vodafone deals come with a rewards app ‘VeryMe’ , a rewards app that gives customers free coffees, discounted cinema tickets and more (Source: Techradar).

THREE

Over the course of the pandemic, likability towards three has remained relatively stable with likability towards the brand dropping 2%. Recently, three reported that they are investing £2bn into improving the network intending to increase 4G speeds by 150% (Source: Telecomlead). It seems that likability towards the brand has started to increase in recent months and so we expect this trend to continue.

GiffGaff

Despite not being one of the top three most liked brands in the telecommunications sector, overall, likability towards GiffGaff has only declined slightly on average between the months of may and august (down 3%). Since then, likability has risen towards GiffGaff to 25% in September. GiffGaff have recently announced that they will launch a 5G unlimited data goodybag plan which is good news for consumers however, their Fair Usage Policy threatens to disconnect customers who breach their FUP or slow connection speeds which the advertising standards authority may not support therefore, this deal could either increase or decrease likability towards the brand in the near future.

Virgin Mobile

Throughout the Coronavirus pandemic, likability towards Virgin Mobile has been the lowest of the brands we measured. Virgin Mobile is the only brand that likability has not increased between the months of August and September. One of the reasons for this may be the ongoing data breach scandal where Virgin Mobile has been accused of compromising personal data of 900,000 customers (Source: YourMoney). The outcome of this ongoing legal battle could potentially damage likability towards the network further.

Three Key Insights

Transparency with deals offered are Key to ensure likability towards a brand, if a network is offering a deal that may see customers disconnected from the network for using it may impact likability towards the brand as well as brand performance.
Improving the performance of the network such as network speeds, without customers needing to pay extra as seen with Three could improve brand perception as customers do not have to pay for an improved service.
Protecting customer information is important for likability as the consequences for the customer of personal information being leaked could be detrimental to them and the brand.

Methodology

We calculated the Rolling averages, to identify long-term trends, by averaging a group of three months (e.g. April-May-June, which would be ‘May’). The number (%) obtained becomes representative of that period in a trend line. The period-based averages "roll," or "move," because when a new observation is gathered over time, the oldest is dropped out.

For more information on the data gathered, email hello@rare.consulting.

Brand Reputation Series - October Review - Issue 1 Telecommunications: Who’s making changes?

EE