Circles.Life unveils first campaign in Australia, aims to make telcos more 'likeable'

Singapore-based telco Circles.Life has launched its first campaign in Australia, named "likeable not hateable". It focuses on Circles.Life's DNA in the country to give power back to the customers and make telcos more likeable than hateable, a spokesperson told Marketing in a statement.

Executed mostly on digital, followed by out-of-home mediums, the campaign runs alongside a limited-time promotion waiving off bills for four months. This comes after the homegrown telco made its foray in Australia just last week in partnership with one of the largest telco players in the country, Optus.

BMF is the creative agency behind the campaign, while Mindshare and Edelman look after media placement, and PR and influencers respectively. Circles.Life aims to change customer experience to one that is more "likeable".

In a press release, the company explained that Australians are unhappy with the quality of customer service currently provided by telcos, citing the latest quarterly report from the Australian Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman and Communications Alliance. According to the report, telco complaints have consistently remained at a rate of over six complaints per 10,000 services in operation, and customer service made up the most complaints at 40% overall.

To improve customer experience, Circles.Life has rolled out features such as bill shock protection, straight-forward pricing and no long-term contract. It also commits to having real people answer customer queries through its in-app live chat rather than bots.

“We’re stepping up the game by offering a premium customer experience. We are proud to partner with Optus and we aim to set a new benchmark for customer satisfaction in the country,” said Rameez Ansar, Circles.Life’s co-founder.

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Australia is Circles.Life's second market outside Singapore, after Taiwan in late June. The company credits the rapid expansion in new countries to its technology stack, which eliminated all proprietary hardware and appliances and moved the entire architecture to a software-based cloud environment. It said: "Circles-X tech stack enables the company to measure its innovation in weeks, resulting in rapid product development that is closer to other technology companies such as Netflix and Uber instead of traditional telcos." In Singapore, Circles.Life has already expanded beyond telco to create digital lifestyle products and insurance products, with more in the pipeline.

Read more:
Circles.Life hires former InMobi talent as head of product team
Singtel takes a jab…at itself (and subtly fires back at competitor Circles.Life)
Circles.Life gives away free money (again)
Circles.Life marketer on going viral: ‘It went viral because I faked the hype’
Circles.Life publishes open letter on newspapers for fellow telcos ‘red’ and ‘green’