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Rogers CEO: “customers will not be buying products per se, but buying into brands”
A few weeks ago Rogers created an blog called Red Board, this is a place for their social media team to start a conversation with their customers. The topics are for all Rogers products, not just wireless. In the first video interview they went to the top and interviewed Rogers President and CEO, Nadir Mohamed.
The interview is just over 2 minutes and is about what 2010 will shape up to be. There’s not much said that’s different from what we’ve heard in the past, but what is really interesting is how Nadir stated 2010 “will be a very interesting time, we really have an industry that’s transforming… it’s a whole new world. The traditional products are starting to mature, we have a whole new set of products that people are going to buy. You’ll have new players coming into the market, competition is going to be more intense. The key for us at Rogers is to stay focused on where the customer is going and build on the brand and the reputation we have… Rogers is a brand that everybody understands, it’s the place to go where there’s new stuff… More and more customers will not be buying products per se, but buying into brands… what’s the underpinning of our brand? It’s Innovation for sure, but I think one of the things we’re looking to build up is this idea that Rogers being a company that’s easy to do business with. It’s frankly not a place that I feel we’re there yet”.
It’s interesting that Nadir said the traditional products are maturing and people will buy new products, but then states that eventually people will not be buying products but buying brands. Rogers is a big Canadian company and in all sorts of markets (telecom, media, sports) and what it sounds like for them is that it’s all about joining up their “information, communication and entertainment” into a great customer experience.
The real question to ponder is if Rogers wants to be a company/brand that’s easy to do business with… how long will it take to get there and will you as a customer wait?
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22 comments for “Rogers CEO: “customers will not be buying products per se, but buying into brands””
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You can’t buy into a brand unless everything behind it is above average quality.
If Rogers thinks they can achieve that, they need to make their service (both technical and customer) at a much higher level than it is now.
Personally, I would be hard pressed to believe that they will ever get to that level without very strong outside force. As that’s not possible with their core cable business, It will be slow going through the CRTC.
Now that Ted Rogers is gone and it’s not being run by fiat, it’s likely that they will improve but it will be at least a decade before all the changes that need to be made can be made. I doubt anyone will wait for that but many may change over once (if) the changes are made.
They need to reduce their wireless plans for consumers, not just business, break out of the package model for cable, and catch up to other countries for price/speed of internet service.
Merging their wireless/home phone business is a good start. It will likely take 4 or 5 years for them to even get a handle on that.
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Hahahahhahaha.
Rogers as a place for innovation?
Maybe for marketing…they have innovated and thought of new and annoying ways to charge me more for things that don’t cost them anymore to offer over and over and over again. They are brilliant at that.
Oh…and stop branding your cellphones with Rogers labels and software…I am embarassed to have people see that.
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What company doesn’t brand their products? Take a marketing class. You’re embarrassed yet for some reason you’re not with another telco. Try wielding a toys r us-like Koodo phone. THAT is embarrassmentmania.
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Sorry, not to be anal, but “per say” should be “per se”.
Has anyone ever tried to add something to their cable from Rogers’ website? Or tried to get a specific answer to a question from there? It’s the most bloated, non-helpful website ever. It seems they’ve kept adding to it over the years, and have completely lost their direction and overal plan for the site.
These days, a good website is essential if you want to be an “easy to deal with” company. Rogers is truly not.
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I’d have to side with Randy on this one. They definitely don’t have an easy task ahead of them. I’ve dealt with every telecom company out there, and I can honestly say that they are all pretty much the same. It’s a vicious circle, as in order to lower prices for the consumer, the company needs to cut costs. Chances are, the company is not paying it’s customer service reps huge amounts (the same for all of them), and by doing this, it creates a come-and-go workforce which is hard to deal with, as most of them are still in the learning process. In a market where all products are the same, it will be superior customer service that will prevail. I think all the companies need to work on this.
I called Telus yesterday, and I had to speak to a supervisor just to make sure my plan was ok. All this after speaking to 3 reps, who all gave me different information. Honestly, I wouldn’t mind paying 5$ more a month for knowledgable support when I needed it.
This is today’s reality.
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Why can’t carriers just act like dumb pipes and provide cheap, reliable plans? Everything they do is terrible!
Seriously, no one cares about carrier brands. People say “I have an iPhone” or “I have a Google phone”, not “I have a Rogers phone”. The two most common things people say about their carriers is “Rogers is screwing me with their expensive plans” or “Rogers coverage sucks here, my calls get dropped”.
Clearly, the two things they should do is keep their plan costs down and build a more robust network. Stop spending money on useless marketing schemes!
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He is absolutely right. Innovation is where Rogers excels right now. You can’t deny how impressive their networks are, for both wireless and home internet, and the quality of their other services.
It’s a shame Rogers feels they need to nickel and dime us for that innovation though. I hope they realize that goes hand in hand with the “brand” they are trying to build
My view of their brand is currently a bunch of sneaky crooks, adding the Government Regulatory Fee, increasing the home internet bandwidth caps, and anything else to squeeze every cent out of me. I don’t care about customer service, I’ve rarely had to deal with it. I just want honest pricing and value.
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Forget the Rogers website, have you tried getting answers from their call center? My theory is call 5 times, ask 5 different people, and hope the most popular answer is the correct one. Not even their staff fully understand their product offerings. How can they expect us to?
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HA! no one would wanna buy into this brand especially after screwing over all the companies its taken over:
skydome
sprint canada
fido
citytv
fci broadband
… dare I go on?
I mean honestly, this business buys out the competition and then runs them down. think of how much more selection we’d have around if those ^ companies weren’t owned by Rogers…
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I have a Wind phone. And TekSavvy Internet. Just switched this week. Enough of the big 3.
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Rogers is like the Mafia, they have the controlling portion of the market so they charge whatever they want and no one can say anything otherwise. Speak out and they’re ready to cut off your service. Easy as pie.
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I have felt taken advantage of by Rogers for far too long to ever go back. How can we trust a company that removed the SAF…only to replace it with some entirely made up charge called the “Government Regulatory Recovery Fee?” Seriously? They just stick “government” in there to trick people into believing it has something to do with the government, or that it’s mandatory or some BS like that.
Or how about charging me $70 for 800k of data? Even though their current overage amount is something like $3 per MB, they decided to nail me with the overage charge from three years ago when I signed my contract. Sure it’s in the contract, but good customer service means giving customers current rates!
Also, offering phones without crippled features and poorly implimented Rogers firmware would be a huge plus.
Way to much anger here for me to ever go back.
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I am sick and tired of looking at this BRAND already. They just a group a robbers!
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Perhaps the problem is the communications industry in general and not just Rogers? Seriously, look at any telco in Canada and you don’t have to go far to find “anti-(insert any telco name here)” rhetoric.
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ALL of the technology service providers in Canada suck. They ALL overcharge for their services and they ALL give sub par service for any price point. Ask somebody from the UK or even from the US how fast their internet connection is, how fast their cell phones are, how many channels they get on their TV and how much they pay. You will be shocked (unless this is old news to you of course). We should be paying 1/3 what we are paying for our services, or getting 3X more for the same price. The monopoly the big companies hold over services in Canada is disgusting and I wish there was something I could do about it beyond just going to little ‘no name’ companies for poor service, just to say I don’t use the big guys…
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Most people see Rogers as the dumb pipe. They give me my internet, cable, and wireless and thats it.
Rogers tries to make people see it as “ROGERS” being so much more. They have apps and music and pay on demand and give you free email addresses and virus scanning, and branded software on your phone even!
I wonder how much cheaper they could make our service if they stopped wasting their time with these side businesses. I wonder how much stockholder money has been wasted buying up or producing these side ventures?
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I found out TODAY THAT I NO LONGER HAVE 60GB USAGE ALLOWANCE, and that I KNOW HAVE 25GB USUAGE ALLOWANCE!!!!!!
I Truly Hate Rogers/ Retention just offered me Express Internet for the same price as Lite for 1 Year
I Hate Rogers/ a bunch of crooks
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Wow! unless i misread there isn’t one positive comment about Rogers in these comments. If that can be extrapolated the Roger’s brand is apparently worse than worthless.
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I hate paying out of my a$$ as much as everyone, but I don’t know how you blame Rogers for “overpricing” when every phone company charges the same. If Bell or Telus decide they’re making too much money, then you’ll see prices drop across the board. Try to suggest that at the next stockholders meeting… see where it gets you.
Also, I just love when people chime in with this sense of entitlement… “well, in the US, they get…” or “you should see the plans in Europe!”
We’re not IN the US, or Europe. We’re in a country that requires an immense amount of coverage due to its size, but one that can only be supported by a small fraction of the population or either the EU or the US.
Blame the CRTC if you want for regulating international business laws, but if the government started allowing in foreign businesses, Bell, Telus, and Rogers would be eaten up immediately. As would Canadian owned radio stations and tv stations. It’s a double-edged sword. Lose Canadian owned businesses to save a few bucks on your cell phone bill?
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I gotta agree with a lot of what’s been said here. But particularly I do agree with Josh.
If you look at the USA’s population density compared to that of Canada, is it any wonder that their plans are cheaper than ours for any and everything? Or better yet, those saying that European plans are so much better… let’s take France for instance. Those who know the musical group Arrogant Worms will recognize this one, but you can fit FOURTEEN (14) Frances into Canada’s borders. Our carriers have to provide coverage across as much of that as they possibly can. So I can, again, understand paying more than Europeans.
This all said, I do agree that prices are still high, and hope that they do begin to come down as well… though we all know the likelyhood of that don’t we.
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Wow… They have to approve their youtube comments… Talk about preventing the truth.
Thank-you MobileSyrup for not censoring the true voices of Canadians!
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This is a publicity for rogers made by rogers; filmed by rogers and edited by rogers; am i correct?
thks for letting us know.
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