Romtelecom targets SMEs through special offers

This is a premiere on the local data services market as none of the local providers of fixed-line data services offer free-of-charge IT equipment along with their services. The business model is extremely similar to that in mobile telephony, where the operators offer free handsets to their customers depending on the value of their subscriptions. The company previously announced it would launch a joint offer with Cosmote, adding mobile voice services to the already existing services. “We will add to our offer mobile voice services, in partnership with Cosmote, which will increase our attractiveness to business clients,” Makowski added.
Company development plans for the current year and future period focus on customer care services. Romtelecom has set up a separate organization to serve clients, within which there is also one department for small and medium enterprises.
The first call center dedicated to these clients became operational at the beginning of October. “A business customer who is paying a different fee will have a different service level agreement (SLA) than, for example, residential clients. We are therefore differentiating the level of products and services,” says Makowski adding that Romtelecom is the only company on the Romanian market to offer SLA to voice customers.
“The standard SLA option is offered for free to all voice customers.” According to Makowski, the company is still growing in terms of fixed telephony lines. Following EU accession, new companies have entered the market, and they need telecom services. “Therefore, my objective is to grow the business in terms of both revenues and market share, with regard to both voice and data services,” he says.
Romtelecom has over 3 million customers, out of whom around 250,000 are corporate customers. In this last category, 25,000 are large size companies. Romtelecom has a dedicated unit for business clients in order to better concentrate on this segment. “This allows us to begin a true offensive on the business services market,” says Makowski. The company intends to invest and recruit additional sales people. “We are looking to hire 250 people only for the business organization in the next months, to join the other 600 that are already working here,” says Makowski.
Business customers generated over 40 percent of the retail revenues in 2006. According to Makowski, Romtelecom's most successful product for the corporate segment is the virtual private network (VPN), a service which although introduced later in the services portfolio, compared with other competitors on the market, registered significant growth in about 18 months.
“VPN revenues doubled from the beginning of the year; if we were to compare with the business plan, we surpassed our objectives by 150 percent for revenues,” said Makowski, adding that currently, 80 percent of banks have a VPN delivered by Romtelecom.
The company continued its infrastructure investments, and has a 100 percent digital network. “We're investing huge amounts of money in order to upgrade the infrastructure. Technologically speaking, we have one of the most advanced networks in Central Europe,” says Makowski, adding that the company has also changed its customer support system since corporate customers need a completely different support infrastructure.
The company is aiming to make a name for itself among the fixed-line operators in Central Europe. Aiming for an aggressive sale policy, Romtelecom is changing the format and structure of its corporate sales force. “We want to put more and more bundles together for our customers and you will see more and more offers like this coming on the market in the following months,” says Makowski.
The potential is “huge” in terms of new corporate client additions, and the company intends to maximize it, says Makowski, since more than 10,000 companies are created every month and they need voice and data services. “For small companies we put on the market, a bundled offer, My Office, which provides Private Automatic Branch Exchange (PABX), voice line, internet access and voice minutes at a discounted price,” says Makowski.

Otilia Haraga