Spinner

Superman and Clark Kent; ONE PERSON OR TWO?

Well it depends who you ask. To most of the general population at the office and on the street the connection is non-existent. We, however, know the truth. And yet, even his closest friend and acquaintances, supporters and adversaries, do not recognize or connect one and the other depending on the outfit he is wearing.

Mobile operators have a similar view on a significant part of their customer base. The effect of rotational churn comes into play when a customer decides to stop using a SIM card (e.g. a pay as you go card) and purchases a new SIM from the same operator. This creates a false perspective of one churning customer and one new customer in the network. Of course in reality we are looking at the acquisition and churn and acquisition again of one and the same Spinner.

Customer usage drops more than 15% during the first month after the spin. Moreover, Spinners adversely affect companies’ acquisition and retention activities and budgets, skew the marketing department’s perspective and hinder effectiveness and productivity of spend on campaigns.

You want to be able to recognize Spinners whenever they return and whatever hat they are wearing. You want to be able to target them correctly over and again and to avoid repeating strategies that all too often effectually cannibalize existing plans and campaigns. Additionally, it would be good to know how they affect the behavior of their network of contacts.