‘Our next ambition is to go completely digital’ - reveals Talk Talk digital director
The director of digital at Talk Talk, Rahul Chakkara, has revealed that the telecoms group has aims to make the company completely digital after transforming it from operating digitally in “single digits” to around 50 per cent in just four years.
Speaking to an audience at the RAR Digital Awards last night, Chakkara also shared the challenges of turning a “very offline company” that marketed via telephones and TV into one that operated with a digital mindset.
“The challenge I had was to take this away from phones, make this digital and make this such a brilliant digital experience – make this company a brilliant digital place to be.
“When I joined, the percentage of digital contacts were near nothing, at the moment we are tracking around 62/63 per cent so we made a tremendous shift.”
Chakkara attributes the success of Talk Talk’s digital turn-around to his ambitious plans in the first few months of the role, where he laid out a strategy to the company’s CEO to surpass the “best-in class” conversion aims of 20 per cent, aiming instead for 40 per cent. When he broke the news to his team, he was met with a shocked response: “If anyone believed that I was not smoking something, they were lying," he joked.
Speaking about running a successful digital department, Chakkara stressed the importance of hiring a talented team and making sure you have “the basics” in place.
“It’s amazing how companies still get the basics wrong. Basics mean getting the right proposition, selling the right product and giving the best deal online. Secondly, when I took over the website, it did not have a buy button. So getting the site, getting the conversion, getting the data, getting the SEO, getting the marketing and putting in affiliate program – just the basics.”
At the inaugural event in central London Periscopix and Purestone scooped the Grand Prix prizes.
Earlier today, TalkTalk announced the launch of a new TV player.