By Claire Reilly
Virgin Mobile is conducting a major rebranding project for its Australian retail store network, tying in with a new marketing campaign and new mobile plans for consumers, all of which are focused on aligning Virgin Mobile more closely with the international “family” of Virgin brands.
The new branding strategy sees Virgin mobile rolling out a new logo, a new store format and website and a new mobile plan that provides customer benefits from within Virgin's global network.
The initiative follows last year's “Fair Go” marketing campaign featuring Doug Pitt, brother to Hollywood actor Brad Pitt. According to David Scribner, head of Virgin Mobile Australia, the campaign was a success for the brand.
"We think we became a credible alternative to the top three,” said Scribner of the campaign, which saw the brand grow its postpaid consumer base by 19 per cent year-on-year, increase profitability 44 per cent year-on-year and take out number one position in Roy Morgan’s Customer Satisfaction Award, based on figures Scribner shared at today's brand launch.
From that base, Scribner said Virgin set new goals to increase brand awareness and expand the presence of Virgin in the local telco space.
"We wanted to now focus on keeping those customers,” said Scribner. “Absolutely 100 per cent retention of our customer base, that's our goal. We think it is an aspirational goal, but we think it's attainable well.
"We want to be more than mobile — we want Virgin Mobile to be a window to the Virgin world,” he added. “We want to be the most loved and irresistible mobile brand in Australia.”
The new brand campaign sees the old red ‘lozenge’ logo make way for a simplified branding that ties in more closely with the logo consumers recognise from the tail of Virgin’s planes. This is matched by a red-and purple-hued paint motif that is splashed across the company’s website, promotional advertisements and catalogues.
In the retail space, Virgin’s 74 retail stores and kiosks will be made over with the new branding over the coming days, with Virgin’s flagship store in Sydney’s Pitt Street mall bearing the new look from today. According to Derek Cummins, Virgin Mobile Australia’s director of proposition and strategy, Virgin “wanted to focus on our branded stores to give customers a better experience”.
With the drive to become Australia’s most “irresistible” mobile brand comes a new mobile plan — aptly named the Irresistible Plan — which will offer consumers benefits from other Virgin companies.
This includes benefits from Virgin Money (including insurance and credit card offers), bonuses from Virgin Wines, and the offer of a free international flight with Virgin Australia to Fiji, Vanuatu or New Zealand. The flight offer is available from the major Australian capitals for every customer who signs up to the new Irresistible Plan. Priced at $140 per month (minimum total cost of $3,360 over 24 months) the plan includes unlimited standard national calls and text, $200 in international call and text value and 6GB of data.