Siemens Mobile Phones: It's your life, live it in style

Siemens, a German-based mobile telecommunications company, is taking a fresh approach to doing business. It is introducing the concept of lifestyle for consumer goods in marketing its mobile phones.

Siemens has targeted various segments of society, their lifestyles and what they need and want in a mobile phone, and then introduced different models that cater to these needs with various features. The look and feel of Siemens' mobile phones also are geared toward its target markets, with different colors, shapes and sizes that will appeal to people across the social spectrum.

This new approach to consumers is clearly paying dividends for Siemens, which has steadily gained ground in the tough competition for supremacy in not only the Indonesian mobile phone market, but also the Asia-Pacific and the world markets.

With the launch of its new SL45 handset in November 2000, Siemens has made a strong move in the local market. Robby Darmasetiawan, general manager of PT Dian Graha Elektrika, Siemens' distributor in Indonesia, said the sales of the new SL45 were expected to push Siemens' sales to 200,000 handsets in the current fiscal year.

In terms of its market position in Indonesia, this will place Siemens second in sales. This is quite an achievement for the company. Back in 1994, when Siemens first started using the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM), the most widely used world standard, Siemens was placed fourth in terms of market share in the country. It maintained this position through much of the economic crisis.

Then beginning in 1999, Siemens moved to number three because of product mix. The company realized that people needed and wanted more than models that, while in terms of engineering were fantastic, were little more than bricks.

Beginning in 1999, Siemens changed its way of thinking. It introduced products that catered to the demand of the market, offering small models with different features.

This change has paid off not only in Indonesia, but also around world. In terms of world position, Siemens has gone from number six to number four with a bullet.

This charge has been attributed to Siemens' new approach to designing and marketing its mobile phones. The company now focuses on lifestyle and the emotions of the consumers.

Siemens' motto Be inspired is no empty slogan. The company takes the message behind this motto very seriously.

The SL45: Siemens' flagship

What makes the SL45 so special? Aside from its sleek and compact design, this phone features several special features that make it so much more than a mobile phone. It comes with Wireless Application Protocol (WAP), allowing you to browse the Internet and receive e-mail.

It also comes with a built-in MP3 player, allowing you to record and play up to 45 minutes of CD-quality music on a 32 megabyte MultiMedia Card, which can be expanded to up to 128 megabytes for greater storage space. You can also store Microsoft Powerpoint, Excel and Word files on the card.

The SL45 also is a digital voice recorder on which you can record for up to five hours. This is, naturally, in addition to the standard features of advanced address book, calendar, calculator, currency converter and voice dialer. Certainly a lot of power all packaged in a stylish and compact handset that fits in the smallest of pockets.

The launch of the SL45 marks the entrance of Siemens into the infotainment era, bringing a new dimension to entertainment.

The phone is aimed at the young and the young at heart. It is new and it is exciting, and all part of Siemens' plan to appeal to consumers by offering them the features they need and the image they wish to project.

In terms of its business in Indonesia, this fresh approach to mobile phones is sure to pay dividends. "To grab a bigger market share in Indonesia, any producer must meet what consumers want. We have to follow their lifestyles and offer what they need," Robby says.

Lifestyle and emotion

How exactly does Siemens plan to accomplish its admirable goal of offering consumers what they want and what they need? The first step the company is taking is building a solid relationship with consumers.

The company wants to build a relationship with people, but it also wants to ensure this relationship is based on friendship. Siemens is listening to consumers to find out what they need, taking the approach that as friends you have to listen to the people to know and understand their needs.

Part of this process for Siemens was to conduct a survey to allow it to identify and understand the different lifestyle segments in the market, and what the people in these segments were looking for in a mobile telephone.

From the survey, Siemens identified five levels of lifestyle. These five are: Ambitious, Performer, Cool Dynamic, Social- Centric and Traditionalist.

The company then explored what these segments want from their cellular phones. The Traditionalist is the first-time user who wants a nice phone but is budget-oriented.

The Social-Centric and the Cool Dynamic are the middle level of the market. This includes housewives who want to have a phone they can use to send SMS and young people who are active.

The Performer is the businesspeople who require cellular phones that sustain their activities. And then at the top is the Ambitious.

Siemens produces mobile phones according to these lifestyles, offering consumers features that touch on their emotions. This desire to touch on the emotions of people plays a large role in how Siemens Mobile Phones operates.

As a result of its findings and its commitment to cater to individual lifestyles, Siemens has introduced a number of very exciting mobile phones. It came out with the light, easy and affordable A35 for the Traditionalist. This phone has dual-band technology, text messaging, telephone book, call lists, clock, changeable design panels and many other features that consumers have come to expect from quality phones.

The M35 is for the Cool Dynamic. It comes with WAP, has picture messaging, games, DJ ring tones, calling faces and other special features. Plus, to meet the physical demands of the consumers in this lifestyle group, this phone has improved water, shock and dust resistance.

The S35 is for the Performer, with WAP, currency converter and calculator, dual band for international flexibility, mobile office and voice memo, complete organizer functionality, Infra- Red interface (IrDA) and voice dial, all packaged in a compact and smart-looking handset.

Superior Service

Siemens believes that what is most important is the "man behind the gun", meaning that Siemens stands behind its product and ensures that its customers get the best service possible. Again this is part of its desire to build a relationship with its customers based on friendship and loyalty.

This commitment to the customer influences the way Siemens sells its phones. The company does not just want to sell its phones, it seeks to touch the emotions of people with the benefits and features of the phone.

This leads to a unique approach to selling. Instead of just telling customers point by point the functions of a phone, Siemens retailers explains the benefits of a feature, touching the emotions of the customer.

The principle is not to give the impression that you are selling; the customer must feel that they are buying something and entering into a relationship.

An example of this that many of us can understand. Imagine you are running late and have to cancel a date, instead of just canceling, use your Siemens mobile phone to send a picture of flowers and a message apologizing for missing the date. You touch people's emotions.

The end result of this approach is that the customer benefits from improved service. Siemens understands the importance of this and knows even if you have a good product, if you have lousy service you can forget it. Customer care and service and selling have to go hand in hand, and at Siemens they certainly do.

Siemens ensures its superior customer service is maintained by holding training sessions for its distributors every three months and by sending its staff out into the field to see how the distributors are performing, correcting any problems that may exist.

Besides selling, Siemens also ensures it provides the best service possible by maintaining 13 workshops in Indonesia. And the company is strict in ensuring the quality of these workshops, knowing it is important that if a problem does arise with a phone, customers have to know that Siemens will correct the problem with as much care as they took in selling the phone.

A glimpse of the future

What can we expect from Siemens Mobile Phones in the future? First it must be noted that the company is high on the potential of the cellular market in Indonesia. It believes that by 2004, there will be more mobile subscribers in the country than fixed line subscribers. And Indonesia's population of 210 million is pointed to as promising good things not only for Siemens, but the cellular market as a whole.

According to Dian Graha Elektrika manager Farid Manan, "Mobile phones are becoming personalized phones and everybody would like to have one."

With that in mind, here is a quick peek at the new Siemens mobile phones and services that the Indonesian market can soon expect to enjoy.

Coming at the end of February is the S40, a refined phone that comes fully loaded. It comes with WAP, world-ranging triband, built-in data and fax modem, Infra-Red interface, Microsoft Outlook synchronization and voice and conversations memo. It is a smart-looking and a smart phone.

And expect sometime this year for Siemens to begin offering cellular phones for the GPRS system.

The GPRS is 2.5 generation cellular technology, and offers faster data transmission than GSM. This new technology is all part of the growth in infotainment and mobile Internet.

Given Siemens' current crop of phones, we can expect its next line of phones to be pretty special. And can you imagine what Siemens will unveil when the third generation phones hit the market?