Toople Plc Regulatory News (TOOP)

16 August 2017

Toople Plc

("Toople" or the "Company" or the "Group")

Toople achieves customer acquisition targets ahead of schedule

Toople Plc (LSE: TOOP), a provider of bespoke telecom services to UK SMEs, is pleased to announce that earlier this month it passed the significant milestone of over 1,000 small business customers (excluding wholesale). This growth in customer order numbers follows the continued success of the Company's finessed digital marketing campaign using the funds raised in June 2017.

The initial achievements of Toople's revised digital marketing campaign, which was first implemented in March 2017, have been replicated in recent months. Customer order numbers in June and July are comparable to those achieved in March and April, demonstrating the effectiveness and longevity of the finessed campaign.

Since Toople raised gross proceeds of £1.41 million, July has seen the highest level of customer order activity to date and the aggregate number of customer orders has increased over 81 % from March to the end of July. Further underpinning confidence, is 20% growth in July customer orders in comparison to June in what is a typically seasonally supressed period.

Toople has established itself with the UK Small business market and positioned itself as an alternative to large telecoms companies by fixing the cost of telecoms for small businesses. The Company has put a focus on customer experience to differentiate the Toople proposition. This is underpinned by the independent Trustpilot score of 8.8 out of 10, ranking Toople at the top of end of customer satisfaction scores, against its industry peers.

The current cost of customer acquisition is in line with previous guidance, between £40 and £91 per customer, with the aim of achieving a 30% gross margin over the contract life of a typical customer. The Directors believe this is in line, if not lower than other major UK B2B networks.

Andy Hollingworth, CEO, Toople Plc, said: "Having targeted 1,000 contracted small business customers by the end of the summer, I am delighted to inform the market that we have achieved this ahead of schedule and within budget. There are currently five million small businesses in the UK which means our business model is now ready to scale and actively market to this lucrative customer pool. We expect to see continued growth and momentum building during the second half of 2017 and I look forward to updating the market in due course."

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Notes to Editors

Toople Plc offers broadband, VoIP and landline services and mobile phone packages to SMEs in the UK. Customers can visit the Toople.com web site to buy online, request a quote or instantly chat with an agent and chose the services relevant to their business.

The web site is powered by Toople.com proprietary Merlin software; a cloud based telecoms resourcing platform that acts as a portal for transparent, live pricing for services across the main four providers. Merlin also makes it easy for customers to add new services to their bespoke packages at any time.

Toople Plc has three core elements to its business. Firstly Toople.com, its online first approach for small businesses where customers can buy connectivity, mobility and business telephony in a simple online journey. Customers can do this by simply requesting a quote or instantly engaging into a chat with an agent. Potential customers experience Toople.com through digital media channels like Google, Bing, Business cost comparison sites and social media. Secondly, the wholesale business has a number of other telecoms companies that buy services wholesale, white label the propositions and resell on to their own customers. Thirdly, the Merlin software platform gives access to wholesalers who want to interconnect with carriers for provisioning and billing services for their own customers, where a monthly licence fee is applicable to access merlin.

Toople plc is addressing a market of over 5 million companies in the UK that are employing less than 50 people. These companies are looking for straightforward telecom solutions, explained in a way that they can understand, provided at attractive consistent prices and backed up by high quality service support. Toople aims to be easy to do business with, offering transparent, competitive pricing and excellent UK based customer service.