Lithys 2012: giffgaff - Best Social Customer Experience

Lithys 2012: giffgaff - Best Social Customer Experience

Company: giffgaffGiffGaff.jpg

Entry Submitted by: Vincent Boon Head of Community (Vincent)

Community: giffgaff (http://community.giffgaff.com/)

Lithy Categories: Best Social Customer Experience, Best Community ROI



'giffgaff’ is an old Scottish term referring to the process of mutual giving – the perfect name for a company whose passionate and knowledgeable members are not only the front line of customer support but also a driving force in the running of the company itself. In fact, our tag line is ‘The mobile network run by you’.

 

giffgaff3.pngWe don’t do large call centres and we don’t do big budget advertising. Instead, we rely on our growing user-generated pool of knowledge that is our community, where people get help fast and where customer debate and discussions helps us shape and grow the business. And using this community-based model saves costs and ensures giffgaff is outperforming month-after-month across a wide variety of metrics, from traffic to active members.

 

Our customers are so helpful we do not need a traditional customer service centre, but use our community support forums instead. Saving us the cost and overheads of traditional CS.

 

Although giffgaff saves a lot of costs by not having a traditional customer service model, the quality of service is still a high priority, which is reflected in a recent customer satisfaction survey, where our members rated our customer service 9/10 and our Net Promoter score was 73% (in context, according to the NPS website, Google rates as 73% and Apple as 74%).

 

giffgaff's Community Health Index is 877, which puts giffgaff as a leader when compared to all communities globally serviced by Lithium.

 

We are seeing these types of results through a combination of programmes we run here with the community, which ensures that any question asked on the community is answered within 90 seconds on average.

 

But not only does our community help by answering peoples specific questions, we can see 8% of all page views going directly to an accepted solution, guaranteeing a great many call deflections.

 

With our highly-engaged community, we create a huge volume of content, which gets picked up in search engines, driving more and more traffic to our site. So much so, that we can see 30% of all organic traffic going straight into our community and finding answers to questions they didn’t even know they had!

 

Of course, just like any other business we look at the retention rates in our business and are able to see the following amazing results over a running twelve month period:

 

  • People who’ve received payback are 52% more likely to stay with the network 
  • People who’ve activated a friend are 35% more likely to stay with the network 
  • People who’ve posted on the forum are 31% more likely to stay with the network 
  • People with more than 5 page views are 41% more likely to stay with the network 

giffgaff2.pngThrough our community we use a 'member get member' program, which enables people to bring new customers to our business and we are extremely successful with this, ensuring our existing members bring in much more than 25% of our total new customers.

 

There are as many people who participate in ‘member get member’ activity on our forums as there are not. However, those people who are involved on our forums are twice as likely to bring on a friend. Our members are helping us out with marketing, sales, development, creating anything from marketing materials, to handing out our product to developing mobile applications for us.

 

In terms of developing the business we use a dedicated Ideas Board, with over 6,000 ideas and more than 50,000 comments and on average an implementation of 1 idea every 3 days.

 

giffgaff's mutual model paves the way for a new generation of social brands, which provide real consumer value through embracing the passions and skills of their membership communities, whilst growing an army of loyal advocates in the process.

 

I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as we enjoy all the various great things we do with our community.

 

Without them, giffgaff would be nowhere.

Tags (2)
12 Comments
Contributor
Giffgaff is more than just another boring old mobile phone network. Yes I call and txt using my giffgaff sim, but the community is like having a whole address book of experts and friends ( and yes the odd enemy ) . When I first started everyone got my sim working in my various phones for the family and helped with general newbie quearies. As time has passed I have learnt so much about so many things and not all just about phones. There's usually a friendly face on line day or night and often someone who knows the answer to your on or off topic. Vincent certainly has set the standard, lots more growth and opportunity for the future Pink 🙂
Guide

The giffgaff community isn't just a support forum like all others I've seen. The giffgaff community is a place to be social and most people on their are friends. The educators aren't like moderators, they are like friends to the community members - they talk to members of the community and don't do heavy-handed moderation but advise you what you should do instead.

 

It's a great place to be and you know you've always got a friend there. Thank-you Vincent, Craig and the educators team. Smiley Happy

Contributor

This is Giffgaff and Me.

 

When contracts were expensive,

I was too submissive.

When pockets were shallow,

I was too mellow.

When internet was crap,

I used to take a nap.

When texts were limited,

I was inhibited.

When my phone was in chains,

I was like left in the rains.

 

I realised - enough is enough,

Someone whispered "Have you heard of giffgaff?"

I said what what what?

Someone said "giffgaff is hot!"

I got a SIM in my post,

At first I thought, "F*$&, I am lost!!"

I found my way in this community,

It was like partying in a huge city!

I met the boys and the girls,

We even wore the matching furs.

I paid peanuts since that day,

It was June then, now nearly another May.

The texts are unlimited, so is the internet.

The tops ups are smaller than the green hornet.

There also are paybacks and happy kudos,

If you're not giffgaffed, you in a big big loss!

 

My little creativity this morning for the happy giffgaffers.

All rights reserved by me, a happy giffgaffer.

Guide

Ever since I joined up  ( 16 months ago )  I've been convinced it was one of the best decisions I've made  , even the odd " blip" has not made me think otherwise ........... So I wont be thinking about moving . Smiley Happy

Contributor

I joined just over a year ago, definitely one of my better decisions!

As brulaw said above, there's been the odd blip but hey, not as many as other networks I could mention...

When you look through the forums you could be mistaken and think that they are riddled with issues...but think about it...which other mobile network lets its members (or encourages them to) share their experiences (both good and bad) publically? Also, as we well know, someone is more likely to complain than praise publically.

So...in a nutshell...great network, awesome community and dedicated staff who are a pleasure to deal with.

 

Contributor
This is the best network in the uk for me cheap calls texts internet and a great forum.the staff do a good job.
Helper

On joining giffgaff about 18 months ago, I really didn't know quite what to expect from a Community Run Mobile Newtork, but since joining, found that participating with other giffgaff members by seeking, and giving each other advise and suggestions became very satisfying and beneficial.  Most questions are answered quickly by members, and help is always available to anyone seeking more technical advice through our Eductors, and everyone has the opportuniy to put forward any ideas they may have to improve the running of things if they wish.  

giffgaff seem to have managed to change the way a lot of people use their mobiles (not least, through their pricing, offers and benefits), and have shown how inexpensive it can be.  Lots of improvements have been made over the past two years, (some of those due to  member input), and are ongoing, so I think we can look forward to an even better network in the future.
There are no finacial conditions in place to qualify members to receive payback, they are only required to at least just use their phones now and then, after all, that 's what they're for.  Nor is there a financial requirement to keep your sim active if you're a very low volume user, so it would seem that everyone who is here,  wants to be here, and not because they're tied.
I wish giffgaff every success in what they do!

Contributor

The GG forum is the most friendly forum on the internet. I feel part of a family on there and can chat about anything without being picked on. I also love helping out in the main help forum and for this I even get rewarded?? Incredible! I have been with GG for over a year now and seen it have its teething troubles as any network has but I would never leave the network and the family that I have come to know and love. GiffGaff will have the last laugh Heart

Contributor
I really really love giffgaff. Since I joined them back in 2010 they have effectively bought me my last 3 phones and they'll also buy me my next phone.

They have also effectively bought me a Blu Ray disc player and a new flat screen TV for my bedroom.

They have done this through the giffgaff payback system where they have a system called member get member where for every new recruit to the network you earn £5 worth of payback points (500) and your new recruit receives a bonus £5 worth of credit applied once the sim card has been activated with a minimum of £10

Payback is paid out twice a year in June and December and since the last payback in December 2011 I have earned over £300 up until the end of March.

So in June I am gonna buy myself Nokia Lumia 800 sim free with my payback.

They also have fantastic prices and a thing called goodybags which are similar to bolt ons/add ons from the other networks.

The most popular goodybag (which I use) costs only £10 per month and gives you a months worth of use. It comes with 250 minutes of calls, truly unlimited texts and truly unlimited internet usage.

Now before I waffle on any further and start to bore you take a look at the video below which features my very self singing giffgaff's praises. Enjoy.

Daniel Hale.

Ace

I've been with giffgaff for over a year now and have a special interest on the ideas board.  

 

I really love the way that the community can influence and help giffgaff with this type of involvement. Smiley Happy