Engaging Business Customers in Competitive Energy Markets · 2017-01-04 · digital engagement have...

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420 Bedford St, Suite 200, Lexington, MA 02420 | 781.862.6500 | firstfuel.com 1 WHITEPAPER January 2016 Engaging Business Energy Markets Customers in Competitive

Transcript of Engaging Business Customers in Competitive Energy Markets · 2017-01-04 · digital engagement have...

Page 1: Engaging Business Customers in Competitive Energy Markets · 2017-01-04 · digital engagement have been shown to drive superior impact in customer trust, satisfaction, participation,

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WHITEPAPERJanuary 2016

Engaging Business

Energy MarketsCustomers in Competitive

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The Changing Retail Energy Landscape The retail energy industry is rapidly evolving from a purely price-driven commodity business to a much more diverse, complex, and competitive market of service providers and energy options. Diverse supply sources such as storage, renewables and other distributed generation are spawning new business models and cross-industry partnerships, while profits from power generation and retail delivery are increasingly at risk.1 In addition, increasing efficiency and demand reduction targets driven by regulatory mandates and grid congestion have further encouraged non-commodity differentiation and alternative sources of revenue.2

Meanwhile, commodity pricing pressure continues to intensify and dominate. In the United Kingdom, competition for business energy supply reached a 10-year peak, evidenced by the heightened rate of business customers switching providers.3,4 In the United States, energy retailers consistently identify competitive margins as the biggest challenge to growth.5 As customers of the digital era embrace choice and transparency, competitive energy providers must create new and unique value propositions to compete beyond thinning commodity margins.

In response, many competitive energy providers are transforming themselves into modern energy service providers. FirstFuel’s current and prospective clients in Europe and APAC have shared stories of dynamic new offerings in the business market. Research studies state that 80% of retailers in the US are considering launching new products and services in the next six months.6 Making this leap, however, requires more than the expansion of products and service offerings. Retailers must earn the right to become their customers’ trusted providers.

Survival of the Trusted As choice and complexity proliferate, energy customers now expect an experience that mirrors experiences from their most trusted multimedia, telecomm, retail, and financial services leaders: tailored guidance that meets unique needs, differentiated offerings with added convenience, and quality service that rewards loyalty. However, only 37% of SMBs in competitive markets currently trust energy providers to help them manage their energy costs, compared to 52% in regulated utility environments. Furthermore, Accenture finds that a striking 83% of Small and Medium Business customers (SMBs) would consider energy related product and services from an alternative provider, such as telecommunications companies.7 Retailers must aspire to, and reach, the high bar set by established service providers to attract and retain customers across the long-term. Winning customer trust begins with strengthening brand awareness, improving customer engagement, and building customer relationships. Through successful engagement, energy retailers can more swiftly react to changing customer demands, create differentiated value propositions, and stay ahead of the evolving energy market as a trusted advisor.

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Key Opportunities to Improve Business Customer Engagement Through detailed discussions with over 20 retail providers, FirstFuel has identified three major opportunity areas to improve engagement and trust with their business customers. Industry leaders have not only internalized these opportunities but also invested in various initiatives to streamline processes and create greater value.8

• Tailored Energy Offers: Rising customer expectations must be met with rising levels of personalization. This is difficult to achieve with business customers, given customer volume and heterogeneity. According to Accenture, 97% of SMBs are interested in tailored services from their energy providers, and 53% are willing to pay for them.9 Meeting this demand can lead to higher customer satisfaction, retention, and cross- and up-sell opportunities.

• Ongoing Advice and Resources: While price is consistently ranked as the top reason for customers to switch providers, business customers highly value offerings that help reduce energy bills and improve their bottom line. By providing ongoing insights about energy usage, competitive energy providers gain customer trust and win customer loyalty.

• Quality Service Across Direct and Indirect Channels: As with residential customers, business customers increasingly rely on multiple direct channels for retailer interaction, including web, phone, and email. This provides competitive energy providers with a great opportunity to strengthen brand recognition and maintain high service quality. However, many large businesses are served indirectly by energy brokers for procurement and guidance, which can limit these opportunities and introduce risk. A successful engagement strategy involves strong touchpoints across both direct and indirect channels to ensure a happy, engaged customer.

Only 37% of SMBs in competitive markets trust their providers to help manage energy cost, compared to over half in regulated markets.

Competitive Energy Providers Face Formidable Cross-Sector Competitors The lack of trust can be a significant barrier to driving growth.

Competitive MarketRegulated Market

33%

15%

52%16%

7%

40%

37%

Source: Delivering the New Energy Consumer Experience, Accenture, 2013. Other organizations include government/governmental organizations, academics/schools/scientific associations, and business/sector associations.

energy retail providers

other organizations

certified professional or trade organizations

third party intermediaries

utilities

other organizations

certified professional or trade organizations

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Next Generation Digital Experiences are Driving Business Customer Engagement As energy retailers continue to expand and refine their engagement approaches, leading companies are making digital solutions a cornerstone of their overall strategy. Best-in-class digital solutions not only provide business customers with the tailored offerings, ongoing advice, and multi-channel support described above, but also allow customers to interact through their method of choice. Investments in digital engagement have been shown to drive superior impact in customer trust, satisfaction, participation, and promotion than non-digital channels, yielding higher business value in retail energy as well as other industries.10

In the past few years, two converging trends are turning digital solutions from a ‘nice-to-have’ to a ‘need-to-have’ offering. First, the deployment of advanced data analytics platforms can extract meaningful customer intelligence from large quantities of data and deliver it to every business customer through their preferred channel, with the optimal message, at the right time. Second, greater widespread availability of granular energy consumption data from installed smart meters or interval meters11 provides the basis for personalized energy analysis and dissemination.12

Digital Engagement can increase customer loyalty and adoption of additional products and services. Digital Platform leverages rich usage and non-usage information to generate tailored advice and services for business customers.

DIGITAL ENGAGEMENT PLATFORMaa bb

CUSTOMER ENGAGEMENT

CROSS-SELL & UP-SELL CONVERSION

CUSTOMERSATISFACTION

CUSTOMER DATA

WEATHER DATA

METER DATA

Advanced Analytics

A Transition in Digital Customer Platforms

Yesterday’s Traditional Platforms

TransactionalLimited Insights

Benchmark ComparisonsBest for Specific Customer Types

Single Channel

Today’s Customer Intelligence Platforms

Engaging and StickyDeep InsightsUnique, Business Specific AnalysisBest for All Customer TypesMulti-Channel

vs.

Compared to traditional methods, digital interactions and value-added capabilities lead to significantly higher customer trust and exponentially more customer interest in energy offerings.

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Customer Segment All Small-Medium

businesses

Launch Size 430,000 customers

across 600,000+ meters

Data Availability Monthly and Interval/

Smart Meter data

Web Rollout Tab integrated into E.ON UK website

Intelligence UpdatesEvery day for all SMB customers

Case Example: E.ON UK Energy Toolkit E.ON UK, a competitive energy provider serving hundreds of thousands of business customers, engages business platform users with customized insights and tailored recommendations.

The more information we can bring to customers, the more value we can bring them.

Anthony AinsworthB2B Marketing Director, E.ON UK

Impact Potential for Competitive Energy Providers Building customer trust through Digital Engagement solutions translates into immediate and tangible business outcomes. FirstFuel’s work with retail energy clients has identifi ed four primary areas of economic impact:

1 Customer Retention 2 Customer Acquisition3 New Revenue Promotion4 Cost-to-Serve Reduction

Our research and analyses indicate that successful digital engagement can yield $22 to $50 of direct margin improvement per retail energy business customer.

Retain Customers with Personalized Insights and SolutionsWith up to 35% of customers considering switching providers each year13, preventing churn is the most effective way to improve energy retailer profi tability over time.14 Leading energy retailers recognize that digital engagement solutions focus on what really matters to business

customers: the bottom line. By providing accurate tailored advice that enables customers to better manage energy usage, retailers can unlock long-term loyalty.

What Matters to All Business Customers SMBs can spend up to ten percent of annual revenue on energy usage, driving 87% of SMBs to desire targeted solutions to meet their unique needs (“Importance”). Yet only 35% felt that their energy provider delivered on this expectation (“Satisfaction”).15 Larger C&I customers are increasingly incorporating energy management into their business strategies and are subject to regulatory mandates, such as various National Energy Effi ciency Action Plans16 in the E.U. and city benchmarking ordinances in the US. Through personalized digital advice, energy providers can help all sizes of business customers navigate through energy options and keep bills lower.

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Business-Specific Value Add

After identifying customer segments that are experiencing high attrition, a FirstFuel retail energy client deployed an advanced digital platform to help energy managers make smart, data-driven decisions. The platform’s online tools and tailored advice encouraged repeated use, improved customer engagement, and elevated customer satisfaction.

Effortless Energy Awareness and Management Business owners desire services that help manage, monitor, and budget energy usage. Advanced digital platforms present energy usage insights in terms that are easy-to-understand, intuitive and action-oriented. Low-touch functionality, such as usage monitoring reports, high bill notifications, and personalized reminders, enable customers to respond and make timely adjustments. FirstFuel‘s early results show that platform users of a major retail energy provider client reduced energy consumption by more than 2% compared to non-users.17 Over time, this will encourage customer’s continuous use and contract renewal from business customers.

RetailCo

SMBs’ Top Motivating Factors to Switch Energy Providers

1 Reduced energy bill HIGH

2 Rate plans tailored to my business needs LOW

3 Availability of energy-related products and services that can help me save energy HIGH

4 Enhanced customer service and support tailored to businesses HIGH

5 Better loyalty rewards program LOW

6 Access to experts who can advise me on how to reduce my energy costs MED

7 Better payment options NONE

8 Energy and non-energy product and service bundles tailored to my business needs MED

9 MED

10 Tools and services that reduce the amount of time I need to understand and manage my business energy bills

LOW

Potential impact of a digital platformFactors

Six of the top ten factors influencing customer decisions to stay with or switch energy providers are highly or moderately impacted by a digital platform.

Base: Competitive markets only | Source: Delivering the New Energy Consumer Experience, Accenture, 2013 SMB Survey asks respondents “What factors would motivate you to switch to a new energy provider?” Chart shows first 10 factors mentioned in top three. FirstFuel analysis: The impact of digital platform is rated high, medium, low, or none for each factor.

Ability to earn certifications for being a sustainable business

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B2B Customer Loyalty Significant evidence indicates that business-specific advice and differentiated services are sticky offerings that can impact retention. According to a Bain study, quality service attracts and retains loyal B2B “Promoters,” who have an average lifetime value ranging between 3 and 12 times that of “detractors”. As B2B Promoters buy more products, cost less to serve, and refer colleagues and friends more often, loyalty leaders tend to grow four to eight percentage points above their market’s annual growth.18 As deregulation invites more information transparency, early implementers of digital customer education can be an impactful competitive advantage.19 A retained customer yields 25% or more in profit for most competitive energy providers.

Improving customer retention and satisfaction are big themes this year and will continue to be so… Our industry altogether has lower NPS and retention scores than most. A digital platform could help us improve these scores amongst traditionally price sensitive and/or channel shoppers.

Marketing Executive at Large Eastern Competitive Energy Provider

Acquire New Customers by Refining Direct Targeting and Enabling Channel PartnersTo combat increasing competition and accelerate growth, the majority of retailers complement

direct acquisition with third party intermediaries (TPIs) such as energy brokers to drive growth. However, heavy reliance on third parties can complicate successful customer engagement efforts, leading to miscommunication of key product or service information, lower transparency, lost revenue, or even customer dissatisfaction. Through digital platform intelligence, competitive energy providers can improve internal direct customer acquisition effectiveness and strengthen sales channel performance.

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Fine-tune Direct TargetingThe majority of the small and medium business segment remains uncharted territory for channel partners. For example, just 14% of SMBs in the UK use a third party.20 As digital adoption grows at an astonishing pace across the business customer segments – from 33% to 57% of customers with online accounts over the last five years21 – digitally invested energy providers are well-positioned to inform direct marketing efforts.

Through advanced digital engagement platforms that merge load-specific analytics with significant non-usage business data (e.g. business type, square footage, fuel types, occupancy), retailers can leverage sophisticated segmentation techniques to identify their next best customers. For example, a notable 56% of SMBs are interested in variable rate plans that enable saving through active management.22 Rather than targeting all prospects, retailers can segment existing customers by load characteristics to identify those best positioned to benefit.

Winning with Channel Partners

One FirstFuel client, a major North American energy retailer, leverages the digital platform to ensure service consistency in sales channels. Using customer-specific insights, channel partners can address usage-related questions and recommend offerings to drive cross-sell or up-sell. Over time, partners’ improved service quality is expected to alleviate burden on internal customer service teams while achieving higher brand awareness, customer retention, and acquisition.

RetailCo

Ensure Consistency in Sales Channels Around two-thirds of major non-residential energy consumers in the UK use third parties and 70% of US retailers have sales channel programs.23,24 While channel strategies vary widely across energy retailers, a majority of providers indicate that channel partners underperform compared to internal sales efforts.25 In addition, smaller niche providers such as Dynegy, Energy.me, and MP2, leverage channel-friendly sales strategies to earn a place in the top 10 retailers by overall satisfaction.26

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Promote New Products and Services across Business SegmentsAs markets mature and competition intensifies, retailers have shifted marketing spend from building brand recognition to marketing various energy offerings.29 Digital engagement platforms are well-suited for driving cross-sell and up-sell across all business customer segments, particularly because digitally-

enabled energy customers are significantly more interested in signing up for products and services.30

Reaching the Hard-to-Reach The majority of SMBs are cost conscious, digitally-engaged, and interested in unlocking energy savings through products, but also traditionally costly to reach for cross-sell opportunities. Advanced digital platforms are designed to address this very challenge through proactive customer engagement.

The array of non-commodity, distributed energy, and alternative generation choices can be overwhelming. By matching savings opportunities to the specific load profile, the decisions that SMB customers face are simplified. In addition, a call-to-action feature for each recommended offering helps turn interest into action by guiding customers to the next step: request for audits, complete building upgrades, inquiry from contractors, etc.

Driving Conversion Lift Advanced digital platforms are a cost-competitive complement to the existing channel mix for commodity customers. The long-term nature of various energy offerings and bundles further

reduces churn and improves customers’ lifetime value. For example, digital engagement platforms can drive larger businesses to take action in energy efficiency performance contracts and advance commodity renewals, with each project securing an additional 3 to 4 years of commodity revenue stream.31 Competitive energy providers launching leading digital engagement platforms have the potential to drive cross-sell conversion of 1% to 5%, representing significant improvements to customer profitability.

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Advanced digital platform application could be very useful in many cities/counties/provinces for small and medium sized businesses that do not have the capacity to hire energy managers to manage day to day energy consumption. This is definitely a ‘thinking out of the box’ model to help small businesses.

Energy Manager Today

When third parties are a necessary part of the business strategy, leading energy providers are increasingly equipping channel partners with business-specific intelligence during the sales process in order to improve transparency and avoid straining customer relationships. For instance, when channel partners lack sufficient experience in selling new and non-commodity offerings, digital platforms can fill this need by delivering timely pricing, products, and services information. According to DNV GL’s survey, 45% of channel partners indicated that digital platforms improve their sales effectiveness compared to less than one-third who did not.27 Through various agent support tools, for example, FirstFuel client E.ON, has improved clarity in TPI’ sales communication and reduced customer misunderstanding.28 Even more importantly, digital platforms can lessen energy providers’ reliance on channel partners and empower internal staff to re-claim more parts of the customer relationship.

Reduce Cost-to-Serve through Self-Service and Higher Service PerformanceCost-effective digital solutions are crucial for energy markets in transition, where

escalating customer expectations can translate into 35% more contacts with customers per contract.32 Leading retailers further recognize that digital engagement and self-service options are not only a cost reduction measure but a pre-requisite to serve – 80% of SMBs prefer the digital channel for billing related transactions.33 Through digital engagement platforms’ educational and diagnostic capabilities, energy providers can alleviate call center congestion, add convenience, and improve service quality.

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Self-Service Adoption Advanced digital engagement platforms can provide deep energy intelligence to help customers understand the key drivers behind their bills and energy usage, consequently reducing call volume related to high usage and high bills, which comprises of 30% to 60% of business customer inbound calls, according to FirstFuel and Gartner data.34

Through seamless software configurations such as single sign-on (SSO) and website tab integration, digital engagement platforms can reinforce and extract greater customer adoption of self-services. For example, one FirstFuel competitive energy provider expects to drive 50% – 100% increase in self-service registrations across nearly half a million business customers by providing tailored advice and usage intelligence.

Customer Service Performance Access to customer intelligence from digital platforms can also enhance the service quality of advisors over the phone, including customer service representative (CSR) teams. An advisor can view business customers’ account portal to help explain the potential reasons behind a high bill, gather additional profile data, and cost-effectively promote new products and services. These customer service enhancements can improve key call center metrics, including lower average call handling time and repeat calls. FirstFuel’s client experience indicates potential service cost savings of 10% to 30% in addition to ongoing customer relationship building benefits.35

Driving Call Center Operational Impact

To improve CSR team performance, one FirstFuel competitive energy client trained their entire customer service staff in using customer-specific data analysis to help business callers understand their usage and potential energy savings offerings. Over time, the energy provider expects to see far lower call volumes and call handling time as customers take full advantage of self-service.

RetailCo

We need to first solve [the SMB customer’s] problem — change in service, rates, and high bills, etc. Only after establishing credibility can we offer more services.

Marketing Executive at Leading European Competitive Energy Provider

What’s it Worth? FirstFuel has conducted deep analysis of best-in-class digital engagement platforms’ measurable impact on competitive energy providers business customers. Through primary interviews, survey data, industry benchmarks, and our internal database, FirstFuel estimates that utilities can drive between $22 and $50 of annual recurring value per business customer depending on an energy provider’s portfolio of small, medium, and large business customers. (FirstFuel model excludes sales channel/TPI related impact.36)

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Cumulative Value Potential for Competitive Energy Providers

Customer Acquisition

Enhanced customer satisfaction

and retention

Higher product stickiness and switching cost

New Revenue Promotion

Increased impact per marketing $

Richer CRM for effective outreach

Cost-to-Serve Reduction

Cross-sell and Up-sell through new

digital channel

Cumulative Value

Digital Engagement Impact

Customer Retention

$12–24

$5–10

$2–8$4–8

$22–50

Increased Self-Service Adoption

Improved Customer Service

effectiveness

Recommendations for Competitive Energy ProvidersFirstFuel recommends that competitive energy providers investigating digital engagement platforms consider the following:

Make a Digital Investment: Rising customer choice and multi-product competition will continue to underscore the importance of customer trust and relationships. Building a loyal customer base requires sequential enhancements across time, allowing retailers to respond to evolving customer demands and innovations. Starting to invest now signals, to both internal staff and customers, that the organization is well equipped to maneuver through a complex and fast-digitizing energy environment.

Gravitate Towards Customer-Specific Analytics: In contrast to the residential sector, business customers manage and operate more complex properties and require more sophisticated and personalized customer intelligence to improve their energy performance. As a result, benchmarks, or like-business comparisons, may not always provide the depth or accuracy needed to drive trust, actionability, and true engagement in the business sector. The analytics approach and depth of platforms enables retailers to take advantage of increasing availability of customer analytics, which can be the difference maker between a “nicer website” and a new channel that yields higher sales and fuels new offerings.

Design for Business Customer Heterogeneity: Related to the point above, business customers represent a widely varied customer class, and one-size-fits-all platforms will not meet the needs of the majority. Consider platforms that pair simple and intuitive usage charts, savings tips, and messages for less complicated customers (e.g. small business owner-operators) with deeper analytics that meet the needs and credibility thresholds for more sophisticated customers (e.g. building operators or regional energy managers). The breadth of analytics capabilities and features are crucial to serving all business customers.

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Ensure Fast and Seamless Integrations that Reinforce Your Brand: Digital platform investments require long extensive integrations, and a lack of built-in configurability can lead to misalignment with other customer-facing (internal) and branding (external) objectives. Ensure that your platform-of-choice can be stood up in a reasonable timeframe, usually 6 months or less, and allows effortless complementarity with your existing branded experience for customers. Brand equity is a key advantage in today’s multi-sector competition.

Embrace Cross-Selling: Energy customers are seeking tailored advice, reaching beyond energy providers, and demanding more than a commodity contract. Whether the solutions are provided through a competitive energy provider’s internal capabilities or through partners and third parties at arm’s length, the digital channel is best-positioned to present personalized offers and connect customers with resources. Rich customer intelligence from digital platforms will help inform new product and service developments as well as future campaign strategies.

1 Bain, “Distributed energy: Disrupting the utility business model,” 2013.2 European Commission Energy Efficiency Directive of 2014. https://ec.europa.eu/energy/en/topics/energy-efficiency.3 Cornwall energy, Competition In British Business Energy Supply Markets, 20144 Ofgem, “The Retail Market Review – Impact Assessment For The Final Non-Domestic Proposals,” 20135 National Energy Marketers Association, Retail Energy Marketer Trends Survey Results, 2012.6 DNV GL, “The Retailer Landscape,” September 2015.7 Accenture, “Special report: Small and medium businesses: The untapped energy consumer,” 2013. 8 JD Power research suggests that top quartile utilities spend proportionally more on initiatives on servicing their customers, JD Power, 2013.9 Accenture, “The New Energy Consumer Handbook”, 2014.10 Accenture, “Unleashing Business Value in a Digital World,” 2015; McKinsey, “High satisfaction at lower costs: digitizing customer care,” 2014; Capgemini

Consulting, “European Multi-Client Retail Utilities B2C Benchmark,” 2011. Bain, “Turning on utility customer loyalty,” 2012.11 Monthly, daily, hourly, 15 minutes meter data.12 The Edison Electric Institute estimates that 50 million smart meters have been installed across the nation’s electric infrastructure. IEI, 2014.13 Accenture, “Special report: Small and medium businesses: The untapped energy consumer,” 2013.14 Bain, “Turning on utility customer loyalty,” 2012.15 Accenture, “Special report: Small and medium businesses: The untapped energy consumer,” 2013.16 EU Energy Efficiency Directive, European Commission, Article 8.17 FirstFuel’s early results show that, all other factors held equal, businesses that logged on to the digital engagement platform of a major Energy Retailer Client

reduced their consumption by an average of more than 2% when compared to those that did not. Longer term studies are expected to confirm this trend.18 Bain, “Do your B2B customers promote your business?” 2014. Bain measures customer loyalty with its Net Promoter® system, which divides customers into

three groups (promoters, passives and detractors) based on their response to a simple question, “How likely is it that you would recommend us to a friend or colleague?” NPS correlates closely with sales growth, expanded share of wallet, sales force productivity, greater market share, greater employee engagement and higher profitability, according to Bain research and client work.

19 JD Power, “Customer Impact Report: Energy Efficiency Programs and Awareness”, 2014. J.D. Power, “Gas Utility Business Customer Satisfaction Study,” 2015: Gas Utility Business Customers who are aware of 4 or more products and services score 20% higher in satisfaction. JD Power, “Electric Utility Residential Customer Satisfaction,” 2014: The highest‐performing utilities are also the highest spenders per customer on demand-side management programs.

20 Ofgem, “Third Party Intermediaries: exploration of market issues and options,” 2013.21 J.D. Power, Electric Utility Business Customer Satisfaction Study, 2015.22 Accenture, “Special report: Small and medium businesses: The untapped energy consumer,” 2013.23 Ofgem, “Third Party Intermediaries: exploration of market issues and options,” 2013.24 National Energy Marketers Association, Retail Energy Marketer Trends Survey Results, 2012.25 DNV GL reports that competitive energy retailers have not been satisfied with CPs ability to broker these increasingly complex deals, with only 25% satisfied and

more than 45% dissatisfied, and dissatisfied channel partners have noticed a deterioration in retailers’ communication of key information, resulting in delays of contract closing. Similar breakdown were also observed in TDIs operating in the UK; OFGEM has identified that a lack of clear contract information, billing issues, and problems with transfers as the top barriers in business customers’ experience. National Energy Marketers Association, Retail Energy Marketer Trends Survey Results, 2012. DNV GL, “The Channel Partner Market,” 2015. Ofgem, “Third Party Intermediaries: exploration of market issues and options,” 2013.

26 DNV GL, “The Channel Partner Market,” 2015.27 DNV GL, “The Channel Partner Market,” 2015. Retailers with higher responsiveness scored higher in satisfaction.28 Bain, “Do your B2B customers promote your business?” 2014.29 Capgemini Consulting, “European Multi-Client Retail Utilities B2C Benchmark,” 2011.30 Accenture, “Unleashing Business Value in a Digital World,” 2015. 70% of digital consumers would sign up for energy management devices compared to 48%

non-digital customers. Accenture, “Special report: Small and medium businesses: The untapped energy consumer,” 2013. 53% of this segment willing to pay for tailored offerings.

31 FirstFuel research and customer interviews. Data is in-line with utility estimations of program lift impact from best-in-class digital platforms. 32 Capgemini Consulting, “European Multi-Client Retail Utilities B2C Benchmark,” 2011. Retailers in competition observe 50% to 60% increase in operational cost

to serve per contract.33 Accenture, “Special report: Small and medium businesses: The untapped energy consumer,” 2013.34 Gartner, “How Much Does it Cost to Serve Customers in the Utility Industry?” 2013. FirstFuel primary research and customer interviews.35 FirstFuel primary research and customer interviews.36 Research shows high variance of sales channel reliance and structure across retailers’ business model and energy markets. Improvements related to the sales

channels are additive business impacts that affect multiple business priorities related to customer retention and acquisition, marketing and service costs, and revenue generation.