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Why PLDT myDSL Became a Marketing
Success
MANILA, January 2, 2006 (STAR) bull market, bull sheet By Wilson
Lee Flores - One of the trendiest products of Manuel "Manny"
Pangilinan’s Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT), PLDT
myDSL, recently became a success. For one, PLDT myDSL has been
so deft and efficient that it has gobbled up 70 percent of the
broadband Internet market in the country and is growing at 100
percent every year. It is also now boldly pushing an aggressive
advertising campaign highlighting achievers as positive role
models for the youth instead of hedonistic showbiz celebrities.
One corporate marketing strategy that should be commended and
encouraged is the ongoing advertising campaign of PLDT myDSL to
promote its price-busting Plan 999 offer with wholesome and
brainy young achievers as endorsers.
Its massive billboard on Pioneer Street along EDSA features the
winners of the 2005 Ten Outstanding Students of the Philippines
(TOSP) awarded by RFM boss Joey Concepcion. All of them are
subscribers of PLDT myDSL Plan 999 – Bryan Albert T. Lim
(University of the Philippines Visayas), Jeffrey P. Mora (Far
Eastern University), Beauregard Grant L. Cheng (De La Salle
University), Joseph Patrick Echevarria (Ateneo de Manila
University), Mehlan R. Josol (University of Southern Mindanao),
Anna Theresa L. Licaros (University of the Philippines-Diliman),
Kip F. Oebanda (San Beda College), Butch O. Saulon (University
of Nueva Caceres), Bryan M. Ty (Ateneo de Davao University), and
Kiran Tina M. Vaswani (Ateneo de Manila University).
Others in the PLDT myDSL Plan 999 Young Achievers Billboard
include Ateneo straight-A student and model Georgina Wilson,
Oliver To, Cholo Ramirez, Formula 3 teenage racer Tyson Sy and
Patricia Evangelista.
The young team behind PLDT myDSL are themselves young and driven
achievers – senior product manager Marc Concio, who has both
management engineering and economics degrees from the Ateneo de
Manila University, and assistant Thomas Ting, a magna cum laude
graduate of computer science from De La Salle University.
Helping them promote their product is Ateneo-educated beauty
Angelique "Anj" Gaston. PLDT myDSL is under PLDT’s retail
business group headed by Mernardo "Butch" Jimenez Jr.
The high-velocity PLDT myDSL makes quality broadband Internet of
384 kbps (kilo bytes per second) more accessible and affordable
for its users for only P 999 per month. It was launched in
October 2000 with only one staff, Marc Concio, and a total
budget of P1.3 million. In 2005, the product’s revenues hit P2
billion andthey expect to reach a minimum of 100 percent growth
this year. "I don’t know of any other product in the Philippines
that’s growing this fast," Concio said. "We at PLDT hope to
register double or 100 percent revenue growth every year with
PLDT myDSL."
What is incredible about this roaring success is PLDT myDSL’s
lowering costs through the years. It was P2,500 per month in
2003, then P1,500 per month at speed of only 128 kbps. In July
this year, they slashed their price to only P999 per month and
tripled the broadband speed to 384 kbps. Even for business
packages, the rate is an affordable P3,000 per month at higher
committed speed of at least double the P999 Plan.
The Philippines has a population of 84 million people, of whom
an estimated two million have access to the Internet in offices,
homes or through Internet cafes. Of this total, there are
500,000 home users of the Internet. Marc Concio said: "There are
only 130,000 broadband Internet subscribers in the Philippines,
and we shall work harder to bring this convenient and efficient
technology to more people, especially to the youth and to
far-flung rural communities. Through PLDT myDSL wireless
broadband technology and Smart WiFi, we can even service
communities with no telephone landline facilities. We can
provide broadband Internet access almost anywhere in the
Philippines, provided you’re near a Smart-based station."
PLDT myDSL is one of the Philippine economy’s unheralded success
stories in these times of political tumult and high world oil
prices. Through savvy marketing, advanced Internet
infrastructure and integrated networking facilities, it has
grown to dominate the DSL market with an estimated 84,000 myDSL
subscribers nationwide. It commands an incredible 70 percent of
small and medium-scale business clients throughout the
Philippines. PLDT myDSL is also the leader in servicing the
Internet cafe and network gaming markets nationwide. Netopia
president Raymond Ricafort said that in a survey, 6,700 Internet
cafes out of the total of 8,000 Internet cafes nationwide use
PLDT myDSL.
Why the non-traditional marketing blitz using brainy or
sports-minded young achievers and students instead of the usual
showbiz celebrities? Concio said: "Though we service people of
all ages, our primary target market is the youth, those
estimated 40 million young people ages 22 and below. Through
PLDT myDSL, we want to spread this message to all our young
people. You don’t have to be just pretty or popular to be a real
young achiever. We hope to promote positive and wholesome moral
values among the youth. Starting February this year, we at PLDT
myDSL plan to give free broadband Internet service to all
schools – especially the public schools – together with
Microsoft and Intel as our partners. We are optimistic about
2006, and we are investing in the future of the youth."
PLDT myDSL should inspire all entrepreneurs to do more business,
ignore the doomsayers and aggressively seek out golden
opportunities. The phenomenal success of PLDT myDSL proves that
private sector efficiency, marketing savvy, commitment to better
services, keen sensitivity to the needs and changing tastes of
Philippine society, and bullish faith in a better future can
defy all the economic uncertainties caused by our
rotten-to-the-core corrupt politics.
source: philippine headline news online
http://www.newsflash.org/siframe.htm
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