Telecel looking to close the gap to Econet & NetOne with rewards promotion

The country’s smallest and most troubled mobile network operator Telecel has launched a rewards program called TelecelGo Points. Telecel is now offering subscribers points every time they buy airtime (ZWL$20 or more) and they can redeem the points for call time, SMS or data.

By buying airtime, Telecel customers will also stand a chance to win prizes worth ZW$10 000, ZWL$20 000 and ZWL$30 000 every month. On top of that there is also ZWL$50 000 grand prize up for grabs.

It looks like Telecel’s board is finally on the same page

Telecel has been ailing as a company primarily because there hasn’t been a share vision on the top floor. Shareholder groups have been at odds internally as well as attempts by members of the former first family to take over the company outright.

These squabbles have transformed Telecel from the once respectable MNO to one languishing at the foot of the table across a number of metrics.

	Active Subscribers	Share of Voice Traffic Market	Share of Mobile Data Traffic
Econet	8,773,300	81.7%	78.4%
NetOne	3,691,314	16.2%	21.0%
Telecel	727,094	2.1%	0.6%

Reports last month suggested that Telecel’s board wrangles were finally at an end and the launch of this promotion is a sign that they might all be pulling in one direction.

Telecel taking notes from EcoCash Rewards

EcoCash Rewards is the only other rewards program that is remotely close to Telecel that we can base assumptions from. Of course, there is a clear difference between mobile money operators and MNOs. But the intention behind Rewards Programs is pretty much the same, increase the flow of money and probably net some new customers.

Many might not like the EcoCash rewards program but the company was successful in its endeavour. They were able to get transactions back to Q1 2020 levels after the RBZ issued directives to limit mobile money transactions to ZWL$5 000 and then ZWL$35 000 in late Q2 to early Q3 2020.

	Q1 2020	Q2 2020	Q3 2020
Ecocash market share of transactions	95.92%	92.17%	95.75%
Variance from quarter to quarter	–	-3.75	+3.58

In Q4 2020 EcoCash was only able to increase its share of mobile money transactions by 0.04%. But however small that Q4 margin may be, its certainly better than losing ground.

This is something that I think Telecel is looking to do to make up the gap to Econet and NetOne.

Will TelecelGo Points work?

As with OneMoney’s free data for depositing money promotion, Telecel needs to learn from EcoCash’s shortcomings with points redemption. If Telecel’s system already offers manual points redemption then the Rewards program might be a hit and get Telecel closer to its competitors.

There were however no figures provided that show the points to airtime, SMS or data ratios. The only thing the TelecelGo promotional material had was that you will earn “points” for every ZWL$20 or more you recharge as airtime.