Will Utilities be Their Customers’ Next Retailer of Choice?

Sprosty Network continues to serve more energy companies that are pursuing new businesses with the goal of accelerating growth. While growth is clearly important, we are seeing many energy companies prioritizing those initiatives that broaden and deepen customer relationships, thus making their collective offerings stickier, which can provide a buffer from churn. Branded smart home offerings and establishing or expanding a retail presence – both physical and online – are widely adopted strategies to create deeper trusted relationships. Utilities and competitive energy suppliers alike are implementing such initiatives to proactively address customer retention while diversifying revenue and ROI opportunities while providing customers enhanced peace of mind. Energy companies, as measured by direct customer feedback, are well positioned to take the lead in selling bundled home services and smart home products. Trust has emerged as a critical factor in the buying decision for smart home products and services. Energy companies can leverage existing relationships to fill the role as a customers’ trusted whole-home advisors. Many consumers have subscription fatigue as they no longer see the value in the underlying subscription service when alternatives exist. Energy companies are not typically measured like other subscription services as energy as a ‘product’ is deemed to be the same. However, with the emergence of energy as a ‘service’ that puts the customer in the middle of the value proposition addressing all of the customer’s needs, the door is open for energy companies to enter smart home and other energy adjacent verticals. Most energy companies that follow this path don’t have all the operational capabilities internally, but they do have many and the remainder can be sourced through 3rd parties with surprising low levels of capital and technology risk. We have seen many clients aggressively move from ideation through building and launching new consumer IoT businesses using time tested processes and tools. Sprosty Network is a business acceleration consulting firm, helping companies drive growth by creating innovative new opportunities. We identify and help commercialize pragmatic innovation processes and tools. We support clients from ideation through execution, bringing a profound understanding of consumers’ wants and needs, we dig deep into market and technology trends, helping our clients find new paths others don’t see.