UPDATE Superfast Broadband Delivery UK Project Starts TV Advertising
As expected the Government’s Broadband Delivery UK programme, which with BTOpenreach’s help hopes to make fixed line superfast broadband (24Mbps+) services available to 95% of the population by 2017, will tonight launch a major new TV advertising campaign in the hopes of boosting take-up
According to Campaign, which was spotted by Thinkbroadband, the TV advert opens by saying, “Welcome to the superfast nation. Now’s the time to get superfast broadband” and later redirects viewers to get more information by visiting gov.uk/gosuperfast (this in turn links to various postcode availability checkers run by BTOpenreach, Virgin Media and KC [Hull only]). Various related promotions across the press, radio and other sectors will follow.
Chris Townsend, CEO of BDUK, said:
“Our rollout is on track with 1.5 million homes and businesses now having access, but evidence suggests that many consumers and small businesses don’t know that superfast broadband is available in their area, or what they need to do to take up the service. That’s why we were keen to work with Enter on a multi-channel marketing campaign to raise awareness, highlight the benefits and support take-up.
The new team at Enter has given us an exciting and vibrant ad which we think will have real cut through with our target audience.”
The move follows concern that take-up of the new service has remained low, which is often put down to a lack of availability awareness. But such issues could also be due to the higher prices of FTTC/P, consumers being locked into long contracts with their existing ISP, a lack of general interest (i.e. if you have a decent ADSL2+ speed then you might be less inclined to rush for FTTC/P) and concerns over the ease of migration etc.
Fostering take-up is also important as many contracts contain a claw-back clause (e.g. take-up above 20% in some projects may start to trigger a return of some public investment), which could be used to further improve superfast broadband coverage in other areas or upgrade existing services. We covered this a lot in our recent article – First BDUK Fuelled BT “Fibre Broadband” Take-up Figures Emerge.
Never the less a general deployment scheme, as opposed to a more commercial demand-led approach, will always take longer to mature and any additional advertising is sure to help.
UPDATE 16th Dec 2014
In case you didn’t catch it yet, here’s what the TV advert looks like.
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on Twitter, Google+, Facebook and Linkedin.
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wow hope they don’t make the money due to there shoddy quote” superfast tripe “
Its simple – my exchange isn’t on the list or even planned. Worse than that it has no 21CN WBC in service date and the checker says the Phone No and Post Code Exchange don’t match – yes we know that BT , its the way you built it.
Hmm the checker have been updated.
My mum’s address has gone from accepting orders to exploring options. This is good news because the predicted Fibre speed was less then ADSL. Perhaps they will switch the line over to the cabinet that is nearer (and serves all other properties in the same post code)? Or perhaps they will look at doing FTTdp or FTTP?? … The exchange was down for FTTC/FTTP so it is a possibility.
Is there any aspect of the GPO’s, sorry, I mean, BT’s offering that the taxpayer doesn’t have to pay for or contribute towards?
BDUK’s you mean?
Just watched the new ad….what a load of c**p!
Northern Ireland not even highlighted on the map displaying what has been said as the best fibre rollout in Europe.
Something to do with that Northern Ireland wasn’t BDUK most likely.
He has a point cos if you go to the website in the advert
https://www.gov.uk/gosuperfast
and scroll to the bottom and click on “Find out when superfast is coming to your area” It proudly displays a google map with Northern Ireland included.
Which is confusing because earlier in the advert the print at the bottom of the screen says….
“coverage already 78% of UK homes and businesses. Source: DCMS November 2014”
Which is all well and good but the DCMS from what i recall is nothing to do with Northern Ireland, they have “Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure (DCAL)” Rather than the DCMS.
So why the government are including Northern Ireland in DCMS stats is a mystery. Or rather another case of one government department not knowing what the other does.
Opps time to report the government to the ASA maybe LOL
I can confirm, as one of the fibre planners on the Northern Ireland fast and superfast broadband rollout, that Northern Ireland has the fastest and most widespread penetration of fast broadband in the UK. I retired recently and was laterly planning the final FTTP push to bring us up towards the 100% mark.
I think that the advert is most misleading by not showing NI lit up like a Christmas tree!