BT Transformative PPC: Evolving from Volume to Value

Client: BT

The internet service provider (ISP) market appeared, at first glance, to be buoyant heading into 2021. While it had been impacted by the rolling lockdowns caused by COVID-19 in 2020 there were clear signs of growing demand for reliable broadband services supporting a future of hybrid working, evidenced by the highest forecasted subscriber volumes (net adds) in over two years.

However, nearly all ISPs saw (and were forecasting) a decline in Average Revenue Per User (ARPU) over the same period. Additionally, BT was in the midst of rolling out its premium broadband package - Fibre To The Premises (FTTP) - as part of an astronomical infrastructure project We needed to find a means of improving ARPU without drastically changing the communications plan, and achieve our objective to capitalise on the opportunity of net adds growth with a meaningful ARPU boost and FTTP uptake, bucking the forecasted trend of declining ARPU. We worked hand-in-hand with BT’s digital onsite specialists to support the design of a new data layer across BT.com ecommerce pages (order journeys) to improve the quantity and quality of data captured for each purchase. By feeding value data into our systems, we were able to meet our challenge of driving an increase in profitability and revenue for the business, with no increase in media cost. The success of the test has paved the way to scale the new approach to other digital demand generation channels, and unlocking even greater revenue for BT.