A high profile advertising campaign fronted by Hollywood star Willem Dafoe has helped BT sign up more than 300,000 customers to its nascent mobile service according to the firm’s latest market update.
The figures mean BT added 100,000 additional mobile customers in the final three months of last year, with the firm saying most customers are signing up for its two highest tariffs.
BT Mobile launched in March last year and will sit alongside the EE brand which BT today confirmed would be kept as a consumer-facing business.
Figures released today also show that BT’s exclusive UEFA Champions League and UEFA Europa League coverage helped attract a further 97,000 customers to its TV platform which now has all-time high of 1.4m subscribers.
The European leagues helped grow viewing figures for BT Sport, with average audiences 42% higher during the group stages of both contests.
Broadband customers have also grown, with BT winning an additional 130,000 retail broadband users – 71% of all customers signing up for a copper or fibre broadband connection in the quarter.
And, for the first time in a decade, BT saw growth in the number of landlines it provides with the customer base growing by 6,000, significantly up from a loss of 60,000 in the same quarter last year.
Growth in the consumer business combined to drive Average Revenue Per User (ARPU) by 7% to £439.
“BT Consumer had a standout quarter, increasing its overall line base for the first time in well over a decade and capturing 71% of new broadband customers,” said CEO Gavin Patterson.
“Customers like what we’re offering, whether that’s superfast broadband, Champions League football or mobile data bundles.”
BT used today’s market update to confirm it would continue to offer subscribers access to Sky Sports 1 and 2 pending an appeal against a recent ruling that its rival was no longer obliged to provide the channels at regulated prices.