Triple play becoming a tougher sell

Despite previous studies showing that customers would willingly accept bundled services, carriers actually selling triple-play service of voice, high-speed data and video are finding them not as profitable as they once though, according to a new report from Pyramid Research.

The study, “Demystifying Triple Play,” focused mostly on European providers but has applicability to carriers in other markets, said Joel Cooper, an analyst at Pyramid Research and one of the authors of the report. Among the study’s most interesting finding is the fact that as carriers deploy triple-play services they often find their market share percentage of the overall broadband market falling.

“The reason they’re not increasing market share is twofold,” Cooper said. “A lot of these triple-play companies don’t operate on the same geographic scope as pure broadband providers. NTL for example passes 8 million homes, which is only about one third of all homes in the UK. The second reason is that not everyone wants triple play. Some people just want broadband and maybe they’ll use their wireless handset for telephony. The number of people that want all triple-play services is quite limited.”

At the same time, offering all three services is a good way to increase average revenue per user, overall revenue, brand awareness and market positioning while also reducing churn. Ironically with all of the technology development in the triple-play market, the study also found that price remains the number one reason people will take bundled services.