The business of delivering satellite services is highly competitive, with all the leading operators aiming to steal a march on their rivals.
To do so, they perhaps not surprisingly do their utmost to differentiate their offers in order to make them more appealing to customers.
Take the case of Poland, where Astra now reaches 2.6 million people via the 19.2 degrees East position. There, Astra CEE has taken the conscious decision to focus on its business partners, as their trust, support and constant cooperation are essential to achieve the growth it continues to enjoy.
As part of this strategy, which is called Astra-Service project, it has launched a promotional campaign named Astra – see more that has as its main objective making customers aware of the opportunity they have to watch hundreds of free-to-air (FTA) channels, many in HD, with standard reception equipment and for no monthly charge.
Significantly, the campaign, which second phase ended on December 21 2012, is addressed at both end users and points of sale (POS). It has been heavily promoted online and in the press and indeed won a special prize at the SAT-DIGI-TV 2012 Awards.
Astra CEE has itself been handing out awards, only in this instance to the most successful POS participating in the campaign, with winners being given the chance to win a trip and visit SES’ headquarters at Betzdorf in Luxembourg.
Astra-Service project was established last spring and targets Astra CEE’s business partners, who include wholesalers, satellite reception equipment suppliers and points of sale. However, in the first instance it is addressed at Astra CEE’s long-term partners, who have and continue to support the company to grow its business, and forms part of a broader strategy of building and maintaining relationships with clients. Their engagement is really amazing!
Looking at other markets, Astra can point to the close marketing and PR cooperation it has established with Skylink and CS Link, the leading DTH platforms in both the Czech Republic and Slovakia. This has helped raise their combined subscriber total – the two have both been owned by the Luxembourg-based M7 Group since 2011 – to over 2.5 million.
Ultimately, the company does much more than just sell satellite capacity, offering – amongst other things – to share its experience and expertise. Its main differentiator is nevertheless the market support it provides on the ground via over 4,000 POS and dealers across the CEE region. This certainly strengthens its position in a satellite sector in which competition is fiercer than ever.
