How to run independently: A business case for digital brands within the world of SaaS
How to run independently: A business case for digital brands within the world of SaaS
How will SaaS solutions drive the future of telecom? We need to first look at the rise of digital brands and how they deliver services with agility, speed, and flexibility.
I have always enjoyed a diverse and international perspective in my work and life.
After growing up and obtaining my master’s degree in Lisbon, I got a diploma from Glasgow University. Then, I lived in Madrid, London, Paris, and Belgium. I also worked with companies in the Netherlands, Germany, and Switzerland before joining Amdocs in 2015.
My roles in Amdocs took my international experience to the next level, giving me the opportunity to work with very talented people worldwide. I'm currently head of product management for Amdocs ConnectX, providing telecom business support systems (BSS) to accelerate our customers’ digital transformation journey.
Amdocs pioneers a modern, full-stack customer management and monetization solution — a software-as-a-service (SaaS) BSS stack that gives our customers access to the latest technologies to launch new capabilities with speed and agility. Here’s how SaaS solutions can help telcos stay relevant and competitive by introducing digital brands.
The rise of digital brands in telecom
How will SaaS solutions drive the future of the telecom industry? To answer the question, we need to first look at the rise of digital brands and how they deliver services with agility, speed, and flexibility.
Successful digital brands have one thing in common: they’re run by teams of 10 to 20 talented people with diverse skills and perspectives. They’re visionaries, and they think big. They move fast, fail fast, and learn fast.
These teams represent a modernized way of working. They get things done in small group settings and make the best decision based on available data. Then, they implement, learn, and iterate.
While these digital brands are still selling products, they focus on delivering a frictionless customer experience (CX) — wowing customers with not only new technologies but also a deep connection with the brand.
What does the customer experience look like?
Let’s say you want to end your Netflix subscription. You can go to your account page and unsubscribe with one click — there’s no contract or hidden clause that’ll prevent you from doing so. Consumers want the freedom to come and go as they wish, and brands must meet their expectations.
We used to associate these demands with Gen Z consumers. But more people have adopted the instant gratification mindset during the pandemic when interacting with digital services.
Consumers want to interact with brands through apps instead of going to a store or calling customer support. They prefer to chat with a bot instead of waiting on a call center line for an hour. They want the ability to leave a service if they don’t need it with no strings attached. And they don’t want to be surprised by a big invoice.
So how do these expectations translate to digital brands?
Each digital brand must establish a unique positioning and have a differentiator to appeal to a specific customer segment (e.g., gamers.) After identifying a target audience, you must develop content, user interfaces, and offers that appeal to them. Otherwise, your competitors will.
Additionally, digital brands must build products that are innovative yet familiar enough to the users to drive adoption. Users must be able to understand how the product can benefit them. Then, you can establish a user base, grow your brand, and introduce new features and services.
"Successful digital brands have one thing in common: they’re run by teams of 10 to 20 talented people with diverse skills and perspectives. They’re visionaries, and they think big. They move fast, fail fast, and learn fast."
SaaS solutions propel the growth of digital brands
Legacy infrastructures can’t provide the agility you need to launch digital brands and meet customer expectations. This is where SaaS solutions come in. A SaaS model is all about hyperscaling, adaptability, and reusability — developing a product once and making it available to millions with minimum additional effort.
WhatsApp is a great example — it’s a single product that can scale up to accommodate all customers.
Did you know that the company has only 55 employees serving 2 billion users?
The customer experience and business rules make a digital brand unique. It’s no longer about the infrastructure, which is abstracted and very low-touch. Everything is on the cloud, and you consume cloud resources to support growth.
The model allows you to focus on the customers. Since you can automate operations and leverage self-healing capabilities, a small team can maintain the entire system and scale up to serve millions worldwide without driving up costs.
Moreover, you have the pay-as-you-use advantage. By switching from CapEx to OpEx, you can take a digital brand off the ground with low risks and a small upfront investment. You can launch a product quickly to capture revenue and grow from there.
This model isn’t limited to digital brands within large telcos. You can apply the same concept to put together a team of 15 to 20 people, leverage the agility of SaaS solutions, and become a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO.)
How telcos can incorporate SaaS solutions into their business models
Start by assembling a lean team of around 15 people who share your vision and mindset. Keep processes simple — don't hamstring the team with complex enterprise processes — and focus on aligning the operation with your customers’ vision and expectations.
Leverage the strength of SaaS solutions to help you realize your vision — namely, the composable architecture inherent in the technology. It gives you the flexibility and agility to deliver new experiences and capabilities at the drop of a hat.
The process of launching and growing a digital brand is a journey. Start small, and let customers try your product with low commitment. Then, add new products, features, or services as you grow.
Customer satisfaction is essential for the ongoing success of a subscription model. Metrics like net promoter score (NPS) and measurements of customer engagement are critical KPIs as you move to digital sales.
Ultimately, you need to create strong digital engagement on the customer side and automate all processes on the operational side so you can scale up infinitely. This residual growth is the key to profitability.
The bottom line: Your success is our success
Another good reason to adopt a SaaS solution is that your vendor must invest in your success. You can’t sell your services unless we build features and capabilities your customers want. And you can’t buy our products if you don’t make sales. Simply put, we must help you succeed to create a win-win situation.
So how do we help our customers achieve the agility they need to make their digital brands a success?
It starts with disconnecting your technical ecosystem from cumbersome enterprise IT operations. Digital brands must build their own technology ecosystem. Thankfully, you can achieve this cost-effectively with composable architecture and SaaS solutions delivered as microservices.
When you need a new feature, someone has likely already built it. You can simply integrate it into your BSS, pay for the capacity you need, and bring the new capability to market in days, not months.
Your ecosystem of partners is constantly growing and adjusting to what you need to meet market demands and customer expectations. You can bypass cumbersome internal processes yet build a complete, robust end-to-end system.
Amdocs is a success because we put our customers’ success first. Our team is always learning from our customers — we share their vision and build end-to-end partnerships that allow us to grow together.
