• by Shankar Gupta , August 17, 2005

Unaffiliated wireless sites, such as Wirefly.com and LetsTalk.com, consistently offered a better consumer experience than those operated by mobile service providers such as TMobile.com, SprintPCS.com, and Cingular.com, according to a study released Tuesday by Keynote.

For the study, 2,000 consumer testers visited wireless Web sites by shopping for wireless plans and phones at a total of 10 sites (200 researchers visited each site).

The top sites were Wirefly.com and LetsTalk.com, which were first and second, respectively, in Keynote's customer satisfaction index. Customers also ranked them first and second in ease of shopping for a plan--which, according to Keynote, was the top driver for customer satisfaction.

Wirefly.com and LetsTalk.com also have extensive plan comparison functions across different service providers, as opposed to sites run by individual providers, which only showcase their own plans.

Lance Jones, a Keynote analyst, said that online aggregators tend to devote a lot of resources to their sites, because they only have a Web presence, whereas mobile service providers also have brick-and-mortar stores where they can sign up customers. "They've focused all their money and attention on the online experience," Jones said of the independent aggregators.

Wirefly.com and LetsTalk.com also came in first and second, respectively, in Keynote's acquisition index, which measures how often a consumer ends up purchasing a plan through that site.

T-Mobile's site, however, consistently came in third behind Wirefly.com and LetsTalk.com, in both the customer satisfaction index, the acquisition index, and in the ease for shopping for a plan. Jones singled out T-Mobile's site as one that is doing quite well in competing against its aggregator competitors. "T-Mobile did very well as a provider," he said. "It's up there and competing with the aggregators. T-Mobile really does perform at near the same level as Wirefly and LetsTalk."

Also on Tuesday, Keynote released a study ranking mobile service providers regarding their online customer service level, in terms of reliability and responsiveness. Virgin Mobile consistently scored highest in both responsiveness and reliability, over both dial-up and broadband. Other standouts in customer service level included Sprint, Cingular, and Qwest.