OFF TOPIC RANT: PALM PRE AND SPRINT MARKETING
It seems that Palm and Sprint are losing steam already with the new Palm Pre phone. I WANT a Pre. Not enough to go out and trade in my 2 year old Motorola Q to get one, but I want one. The thing is, I’m unusual. Most folks who buy phones probably don’t want them for the same reason I or -for that matter- my readership does. Multitasking? I care, but I’m a minority in the phone buying public. The question is, why doesn’t Sprint or Palm get that?
Let’s begin with Sprint. I like their ad campaign touting their now network, but it’s a bit too high handed for the weakest of the big three US mobile carriers. My experience with Sprint has been this: Around 2002, I got tired of feeling violated by Verizon’s billing department and switched to T-Mobile. Then I got married and moved 2 blocks west to West End Avenue on Manhattan’s Upper West Side where GSM coverage was nil. Zero. Nada. AT&T’s then new GSM service didn’t work, neither did my T-Mobile phone. Reluctantly, I switched to Sprint and I’ve been a satisfied customer ever since. I no longer reside in Manhattan, but my coverage here in Northern New Jersey has been uniformly of high quality. I’ve always been able to satisfactorily resolve any billing misunderstandings with a phone call and more often than not Sprint was the generous party. The coverage, at least here in the Northeast, is quite good, if not as good as Verizon, and (subjectively) waaay better than AT&T’s. Then there’s data. IMHO, Sprint offers the most reasonably priced data plans and the best 3G service combination out there. So where do I stand? My personal, subjective opinion is that I get more bang for the buck from Sprint with the concession that Verizon has better coverage that you pay through the nose for and I just pity AT&T customers. I’m pretty sure I’m not alone in this sentiment. SO WHY CAN’T SPRINT MARKET THIS FACT instead of some fuzzy “Now network” concept? High mindedness doesn’t sell phones, buddy. Let’s see an ad where some savvy Sprint customer is smirking at the iPhone poseur with no coverage and the Verizon customer who has to pay the meal ticket for all those “it’s the network” people following him/her around. I think it would move the merch. What say you?
Palm. Where do I begin? You’ve successfully created a compelling alternative to the iPhone and then proceed to market it with a dancing school of Shaolin students? Whiskey-Tango-Foxtrot big time. I get the concept, but who sees through a bunch of dancing orange robes to the inner beauty of multitasking and says “I want THAT phone?” Again, EPIC FAIL. The ad may catch the eye of the ad industry, but it won’t sell phones. Let’s get back to why Joe Buyer would want a Pre:
- It’s sexy
- It has a keyboard
- It is not a tethered device by default (more on that in a minute)
So you’ve got a phone that, by design, looks like a polished river rock. Great. Work with that. Show a hiker on a scenic trail at the foot of a glistening riverbed full of smooth black river rocks. The very picture of (American) individualism and freedom. Have him spot a rock. It looks rectangular, like an iPhone. He tries to pick it up but it’s stuck to the riverbed. The voiceover talks about the freedom to communicate wherever you are without needing your phone to be connected to your computer to sync your contacts. music, etc. Something to the effect that without a computer, the phone is just a useless rock. (OK, it’s a stretch, but this is marketing.) The hiker spots another rock. He picks it up. (It’s unattached.) It is an oval rock. The voiceover speaks to the effect that if all your information is out there, shouldn’t you be able to connect to it without having to set up your phone with a computer? The rock turns on (lights up) The phone is a Palm Pre and the hiker –way out in the middle of the wilderness- can see his contacts, calendar, friends, music, do facebook, whatever… You have the FREEDOM to use it the way you want to use it (Cue keyboard sliding open.) The hiker uses the phone for a few seconds, closes it, admires the “rock” he found, puts it in his pocket and keeps walking. Maybe this isn’t the greatest idea for an ad ever, but Palm doesn’t have the time or money to teach us to love our phones all over again Hal Riney style. Prediction: Get with the program, Palm or you’ll squander your lead to Android.
We now return to our regularly scheduled broadcast…