Cord-Cutting, Customization, and Cable Cartels
2003 was a year of monumental launches –– the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Google AdSense, the world's tallest and fastest roller coaster in Ohio, and a certain digital platform that changed the music industry as we knew it, forever.
The debut of the iTunes store was a harbinger for the "a la carte" world we live in today. We've come to expect products and services to be hyper-customized to our liking, and brands that haven't accepted this reality are a lot like the traditional record companies in 2003 that infamously resisted digital music consumption.
In the age of cord-cutting, it's a wonder that telecommunication and entertainment monopolies like Comcast and Time Warner Cable have yet to offer customized cable and Internet packages for customers.
Last month, Fortune reported that Comcast's most recent quarter saw a better-than-expected increase of 53,000 in its subscriber base, an unprecedented amount, considering the company was down 8,000 subscribers in the same quarter last year.
While Comcast may have lured subscribers with new customer discounts or promotions, it's possible that the company is concurrently losing long-time cable subscribers to Smart TVs and devices like Roku, Chromecast, and Amazon Fire that house entertainment apps like Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, Pandora, and live television streaming services like SlingTV.
Comcast's Internet business, on the other hand, is thriving, as WiFi is a necessity for cord-cutters who are streaming entertainment, but, again, where are the customized Internet services?
Imagine what a difference it'd make if subscribers could pick the channels they want to watch, and pay per data usage, download speed, or per minute of long-distance phone calls.
Consumers would be much happier and less likely to cut the cord, and Comcast could reclaim what's left of their tarnished brand image, instead of resorting to a meaningless rebrand or getting desperately defensive against their future competition: Google Fiber.
If customized products and services have the potential to save one of our nation's largest cable cartels, think of how much it could benefit your brand.