microsoft

advertising / creative / microsoft / observatory — 5 Comments
4
Aug 11

Microsoft’s “PCs for Dummies” campaign

Oh, you devilish marketers at Microsoft. I see the game you play.

You zig when other companies zag. They try to win by making customers feel smarter — but you’re going to win by treating them like idiots. Clever!

Back in May, I put up an article poking fun at what was then the newest Microsoft ad. It featured a rather dim customer whose home is turned into a PC store, exposing her to today’s amazing choices in PCs. Her big discovery: “So there’s no more tower? Wow!”

It was such a shallow spot, I never really imagined it would blossom into a whole campaign. But since then, a number of these things have popped up, each featuring someone you’d never want to be, learning something you don’t need to learn: new PCs are better than old ones.

I’m stirred to action only because this new one seems to be getting a lot of air play of late.

In this ad, we meet Cheryl, apparently the victim of a break-in. A gang has built a PC store in her home without her permission. (Unlike the original  spot, there’s no spouse in on the surprise here — it’s just a home invasion.) Cheryl too is a bit on the dim side: “Where’s the tower for this?” she asks. Heh heh. That one never gets old.

Where I come from, agency people get into fights about these things. Some believe it’s important to do a smart ad vs. one that appeals to the lowest common denominator. They believe in building brands vs. going after the low-hanging fruit.

Unfortunately, when you aim for fruit that’s hanging this low, you look pretty silly to customers who are a heck of a lot smarter. Which is probably 98% of them.

To see more people you can’t relate to, view more ads in this campaign here and here.

microsoft / tablets / technology / windows phone 7 — 10 Comments
26
May 11

Ballmer: making the wrong kind of mistakes

Yes, you

I have a new theory about Steve Ballmer.

Maybe earlier in his life, or in a previous life, he did such wonderful things, he earned himself a guardian angel.

Really, how else does one explain how a man can remain employed through one planet-sized bungle to the next?

Many companies make mistakes in the pursuit of greatness. Apple makes some doozies.

But Microsoft, under Ballmer, consistently makes the kind of mistakes that can easily turn the company into the type of case study you don’t want to be: the “rise and fall” type.

I don’t pretend to understand the dynamics inside Microsoft. However, this is business. Very big business. No amount of loyalty, favoritism, appreciation or whatever can possibly rationalize the company’s poor showing since Ballmer assumed office.

How Microsoft, formerly the most valuable and profitable technology company on earth (“formerly,” thanks to Ballmer), with virtually limitless resources, could fall into its current state is almost impossible to comprehend.

After failing miserably with Vista, Ballmer has completely missed the two biggest technology revolutions in recent times: smartphones and tablets. And let’s not even talk about the $8.5 billion he just sunk into Skype.

The smartphone failure alone should have earned him his gold watch. It took Microsoft three years to come up with a viable alternative to iPhone. Even then, “viable” is probably being generous. Now, after Android, Microsoft must fight to be a distant third.

His public statements have become laughable, from predicting that iPhone can’t possibly succeed to passionately defending the PC as other technologies make it less relevant.

This week, Ballmer’s theater of the absurd redefined absurdity. First he blurted out that their newest OS, to be called Windows 8, will be released in 2012. Shortly thereafter, a Microsoft “spokesperson” issued a clarification: “It appears there was a misstatement.” Turns out, there is no timetable yet for the new OS, and there is no confirmation of its name.

Honestly, can you imagine this kind of screwup taking place at any other company?

It’s not like there isn’t a growing chorus of calls for Ballmer’s retirement. The latest came yesterday from the president of Greenlight Capital, David Einhorn. He describes the Microsoft CEO as being “stuck in the past.”

The good news for Microsoft is that Ballmer doesn’t have to be stuck in its present. It’s not all that hard to send a CEO packing.

Though I have no current fondness for Microsoft, I’ve often wondered how things might change if they actually had a visionary CEO. I imagine Microsoft’s stockholders have been wondering the same thing.

advertising / microsoft / observatory — 8 Comments
12
May 11

Microsoft perplexes again

Many years ago, I was actually a fan of Microsoft.

There, I’ve said it. I’ve been holding it in all this time. I feel much better now.

Yes, as a writer who loves technology, I used to anxiously await each new release of Microsoft Word for Mac. I enjoyed exploring the labyrinth of buttons and menus. The more, the merrier. I couldn’t give Microsoft my money fast enough.

But it gets even worse: I was a stockholder too. I rooted for them to succeed.

So it’s not like I slam Microsoft out of some genetic hatred. I do it because I find them absolutely perplexing. I like smart companies — and Microsoft, once a symbol of smarts, now so often plays the fool.

I wonder how a company with practically limitless resources can go MIA when revolutionary changes are afoot. I wonder how a CEO can keep his job when all those lapses take place under his watch. I also wonder what they’re thinking when they approve many of their ads — the latest example being the one above.

It appears to be an encore performance of their I’m a PC campaign, which was a timid comeback to Apple’s Mac vs. PC campaign. Where I come from, encores happen when enthusiastic audiences demand more. This campaign’s end was met more with relief than disappointment.

More perplexing, though, is the content of this ad. It’s hard to believe that creative directors, strategists and finally, the brain trust at Microsoft, would ever approve such a silly “let’s build a PC store in your house” idea.

The coup de grâce comes when our hero experiences her grand revelation: “So there is no tower anymore? Wow!”

Yikes. Who’s going to break it to her that we now have smartphones and microwave ovens? Way to make your customers look smart, Microsoft.

Then again, maybe this explains why Microsoft was so willing to overpay ($8.5 billion) for Skype this week. “We can actually make audio and video calls on our computers? Wow!”

advertising / creative / microsoft / observatory / windows phone 7 — 3 Comments
14
Apr 11

Windows 7 Channel: visit to a ghost town

Call me a renegade, but sometimes I like to sit down at the computer and visit places where few dare to venture.

Yesterday, I followed a link to the Windows 7 YouTube Channel. I didn’t see tumbleweeds blowing through or vultures gathering in the sky — but I didn’t see much evidence of life either.

The number of views on the videos there seemed almost absurdly small. Especially for a monolith owning 90% of the global PC category. 4,000 here, 20,000 there. Heck, a kid in my neighborhood got more than 300,000 views for his Bar Mitzvah video.

The lack of traffic here seemed puzzling until I started looking at the videos. Let’s just say they’re not exactly show-stoppers. Hard to imagine any of them going viral.

The ad that follows, You spoke, we listened, is for Windows 7 Pro. It’s been up since March 22nd, having gathered only 10,000 views. The “we did it because you asked for it” approach is as old as the hills, and entices viewers accordingly.

The biggest crowd-pleaser seems to be the next one, but it’s only drawn about 30,000 in a month. (Technically, it’s an Asus ad subsidized by Microsoft.) It seems to have generated about as much excitement as the idea of Windows 7 powering a tablet.

After that, things really go downhill. Behind the Design of Windows Phone 7 has attracted 3,800 views in two months.

Another Windows 7 Pro video, What do you want from your PC? — one of the most mediocre videos I’ve endured in some time — has 2,900 views in a full year. You’d think they’d do a little cleanup around here once in a while.

Dig deep enough in the dust and you can find a few videos with decent numbers. An ad unveiled at a Microsoft developers conference has about 172,000 views, but then it too has been mellowing for a year. (Side note: this ad depicts a series of people, all staring at their phones to do their thing — even though last year’s Windows 7 Phone campaign ridiculed people who were glued to their phones.)

How does this compare to the action over at the Apple Channel?

There’s a long list of videos well up in the hundreds of thousands, and one over a million. Only down at the bottom of their list, when they get into app-specific videos, do the numbers even begin to resemble Microsoft’s.

Of course, it isn’t exactly a shocker that videos about Windows 7 would generate less interest than those about Apple’s i-things. And that’s Microsoft’s problem.

Until they start making products that capture people’s imagination, or start making ads that do the same, the Window 7 Channel will remain a very lonely place.

iPod / microsoft / music / observatory — 6 Comments
15
Mar 11

A brief eulogy for Zune

Dear friends, neighbors and colleagues,

We gather here today to remember the life of Zune,

A life that touched more people than you can count on one hand.

Zune’s journey was short by most measures.

It was lonely by all measures.

But no one will deny that Zune stood for something.

It dared to be different.

Zune proved that you don’t need legions of fans to feel like a success.

You can do just fine on annual cash infusions from a very rich dad.

Zune didn’t need a clever interface, a giant music store, or even a good review.

Zune was a rebel. The anti-Pod. Born on the wrong side of the bell curve.

If iPods were blue and green and pink, then by god — Zune would dare to be brown.

When iPod spoke in dollars, Zune would speak in Microsoft Points.

While iPods were solitary affairs, Zune once offered a neighborly “squirt.”

Thrown to the lions, Zune would grow up remarkably fast.

In fact, before it was even a year old, it was wheezing like an octogenarian.

No matter how badly Zune was humiliated in market share, Dad would always say, “we can beat them.”

Then, one day, even that bottomless wallet would run dry.

Despite his endlessly encouraging words, Dad was forced to pull the plug,

And Zune’s body was left to wither.

But now, before the last charge has even run out, we learn that the spirit of Zune may yet live —

In Windows Phones and tablets that we can only dream about today.

Yes, one day, when Microsoft is back on top,

When long lines of customers form around Microsoft Stores the world over,

The crowds clamoring for a taste of that Microsoft magic,

Someone, somewhere will conjure up a home screen,

Touch a button,

And maybe,

Just maybe,

Zune will live to squirt again.

microsoft / observatory / tablets — 19 Comments
27
Jan 11

Apple’s final humiliation of Microsoft

Given the latest financial reports, it defies belief that just 13 years ago Apple was wheezing on its deathbed.

Even  harder to believe, Steve Jobs was forced to grovel before Bill Gates to keep Apple viable with a $150 million investment and a public pledge to support Office for Mac for five years.

How different are things today? Well, as we all know, last year Apple surpassed Microsoft to become the most valuable technology company on earth.

Some shrugged that off because, market value aside, Microsoft still made far more profit than Apple. The profit margins in the software biz are much higher. In fact, Microsoft has trounced Apple in the profit department for 20 consecutive years.

Don’t count on 21.

According to Reuters, Apple is about to deliver the final blow. Microsoft is expected to announce a $5.93 billion profit for the last quarter — while Apple has already announced its $6 billion profit for the same quarter. (Correction 4:00 pm 1/27: Reuters’ analysts missed. Microsoft hit $6.63 billion in profits. For now, still the leader. For how many more quarters, your guess.)

But it gets juicier.

Philip Elmer-Dewitt writes for Fortune that while several research firms reported fairly poor numbers for PCs last quarter, a firm called Canalys saw a whopping 19% growth in PCs during this time. That’s because they counted tablets as PCs — and iPads sold by the millions.

By including iPad sales, Canalys shows Apple’s PC sales growing an astounding 241% over last year. This pushes them into the #3 spot worldwide, ahead of Dell and Lenovo, second only to HP and Acer.

Hold it right there, you say. Tablets are not PCs. That’s just twisting the numbers to make Apple look better. And yes, many would agree. (Just read the comments below the Elmer-Dewitt article.)

Your honor, I call Steve Ballmer to the witness stand. Here’s what Ballmer said when interviewed by Walt Mossberg at the All Things Digital conference last June. Skip to the 3:26 mark to see this exchange:

Mossberg: …this is semantics maybe, but, you’re using the term PC — I thought I just heard you use the term PC — to kind of envelop the things that I think a lot of average people don’t think of as PCs, like the iPad, or other tablets that might be coming. Is that kind of thing a PC?

Ballmer: Sure, of course it is.

Mossberg: It is.

Ballmer: Of course it is. It’s a different form factor of PC.

While it hurts to be on the same side of an argument as Steve Ballmer, I agree. Ballmer’s comments validate the Canalys numbers. With Apple now at 10.8% of the worldwide PC shipments, they’re a stone’s throw behind Acer’s 12.8%. And not imaginably far behind HP’s 17.7%.

This is shaping up to be an interesting decade.

app store / microsoft / observatory / strategy — 13 Comments
14
Jan 11

Microsoft: coveting Apple’s magic words

Every so often, there comes a bit of technology-related news that just makes me smile. Microsoft is pretty good at generating such stories.

The latest: Microsoft has taken action to oppose Apple’s trademark application for the phrase “App Store.”

It’s not hard to understand their logic. These days, apps rule the world. They’re the basic price of admission for any smartphone contender. How can Apple own a phrase made of common words?

The quick answer is: those words weren’t common until Apple started to use them.

The evolution of the word “app” is actually a pet topic of mine. Since Microsoft has struck my justice nerve, I can’t stop myself from sharing.

Everyone who has ever been tasked with writing ads for a technology company will tell you that before apps became popular, there was no simple word one could use to describe a software product. In fact, we had only two words to choose from: application and program. If your goal was to write people-friendly ads, both of these choices sucked.

The word app was indeed part of our vocabulary — but that was only on the inside. Real people didn’t talk that way. Whenever some maverick would suggest that we just say app and be done with it, clients would reject it on the grounds that it was too techy. For the sake of advertising, application and program were left to do the job.

What Apple did when they introduced apps on iPhone may seem innocuous now, but it was actually quite ballsy. They made the conscious decision to take the word app to the mass audience. Others might have used the word on occasion, but Apple was the company that really stepped up to the plate. They put millions of dollars into the “There’s an app for that” campaign. They alone made app a household word.

With App Store taken by Apple, Apps Marketplace taken by Google, and App World taken by Blackberry, poor Microsoft finds itself in an awkward (yet familiar) position. They can either try to be original, or spend a few million bucks to echo someone else.

It does make one wonder why Microsoft isn’t trying to wrestle the other companies’ descriptors away from them. Isn’t the world as common as the word store?

The fact is, companies trademark combinations of common words all the time. When you’re first to think of something, you take legal precautions to prevent others from copying you. The Money Store is trademarked, as are countless other common word combinations.

If Microsoft wanted to be more true to their DNA, they might grab The Copier Store. That one was actually trademarked by some guy in New Jersey, but it’s available now.

android / iPad / microsoft / observatory / steve jobs / strategy / tablets / technology — No Comments
3
Jan 11

CES: the second annual tablet-fest

No matter how hard I Google, I can’t find the exact number of tablets that were launched at last year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas. Best I can come up with is “dozens.”

Whatever the number was, it’s a perfect match for the number of tablets that have been largely forgotten in the 12 months since. Steve Ballmer, Vapor Master, made the keynote speech in 2010, delivering a non-demonstrative demo of HP’s Slate tablet, which never saw the light of day. At least he didn’t try to hype Microsoft’s own Courier tablet, which was quietly euthanized three months later.

Now comes CES 2011. Once again, Ballmer will take the stage for the keynote, giving him a chance to wash down the emptiness from last year. With the tablet floodgates opening, one would hope he’d have an easier time coming up with a few devices that actually work. Logic says he’ll try to wash away the bad memory with sheer quantity.

Another company with big dreams is Toshiba. A quote from their director of marketing in today’s New York Times sums it up perfectly: “We could have done this a year ago and rushed it out, but it wouldn’t have had the right features.”

He might just as well have said, “We could have done this a year ago and rushed it out, but we didn’t yet know what to copy.”

There’s really only one strategy these guys can follow: offer more features than iPad, hopefully at a better price. The problem, of course, is that iPad is more than just iPad — it’s rich ecosystem with 300,000+ apps and countless accessories. A few more features or a slight savings don’t quite make up for the lack of such things.

While one of the favorite anti-iPad zingers is “It’s just a giant iPod touch,” we will now see a deluge of tablets that are simply giant Android phones. This is not a criticism, as I’ve long felt that this is exactly what tablets need to be — a faster and bigger-screened version of the smartphones we’ve already come to love. Now that the Anti-Apple is following Apple’s course, we’ll see if that put-down begins to fade.

Expect also to see the haters out in force, damning Apple’s evil plan to control us all, cheering on a spate of superior devices that will finally turn the tide against Apple. By necessity, they will gloss over the fact that none of these new devices would exist if it weren’t for Apple’s invention. And never mind that Apple customers have been enjoying the tablet’s benefits a full year before everyone else.

As always, the problem with copying Apple’s technology is that you’re copying last year’s model. Just a month or two after all these new models show up at CES, Apple introduces iPad 2. For the most part, competitors are playing a game of leapfrog in which they never manage to leap the frog.

This year, I refuse to get my information second-hand. I will be journeying to CES to get my furry little hands on these devices myself. I’ll let you know how it goes…

advertising / microsoft / observatory / windows phone 7 — 6 Comments
19
Nov 10

The Microsoft festival of comedy

The comedy writers at Microsoft have really been working overtime this week. There is much to be delighted with.

First, we have Microsoft’s entry into the zombie genre with the Return of the Kins. Yes, the very same Microsoft phones that died before the packaging was even dry, just 60 days after launch. The Kin One and Kin Two phones are back, courtesy of Verizon. They have curious new names (Kin One-m and Kin Two-m), fewer capabilities and they’re now billed as feature phones instead of smartphones. That oughtta work.

Laugh #2 comes from the video above. To be honest, I did not believe this was real when I first saw it. Not even Microsoft could be this inept. But lo and behold, there it is proudly playing on their official YouTube page.

Obviously this spot isn’t meant for broadcast — but that doesn’t make it any less of a criminal act. It’s one of those ads that leaves you aghast that so many people in the approval chain could possibly give it the thumbs-up. Not just because it has all the class of a Pee Wee Herman production, but because its strategy is so misguided.

The big advantage of Windows laptops? They can play Blu-ray discs. Like (a) you’ll really appreciate Blu-ray on 15-inch screen, and (b) you’d rather carry discs around than just download high-def movies onto your Mac.

More stunning than Microsoft’s strategy are some of the comments I’ve seen where this ad is posted. Some commenters believe Microsoft is “really fighting back now” after Apple beat them up for several years with the Mac vs. PC campaign. Must be a fine line between fighting back and total surrender.

Add to this the fact that Microsoft’s own chief XBox man in the U.K. recently said “actually Blu-ray is going to be passed by as a format.” Hopefully word will get to Microsoft’s marketing department soon.

The last laugh comes from Bellevue, WA, where a mega-Microsoft Store opened to a large and raucous crowd, complete with an appearance by Steve Ballmer. Not wanting to mess with success, Microsoft used its well-proven method of manufacturing large and raucous crowds — they offered free Miley Cyrus concert tickets. Guess those Blu-ray-enabled laptops weren’t quite big enough a draw.

See the festive opening video here. And don’t miss the 2:30 mark where Steve Ballmer actually does his famous tongue-sticking-out act as he welcomes an eager customer. Scary!

Anyway, good work Microsoft. If the whole technology thing doesn’t work out, at least you have a future in entertainment.

advertising / creative / microsoft / observatory / windows phone 7 — 11 Comments
14
Oct 10

Microsoft tries the “Lemmings” approach

And now, Windows Phone ad #2.

This one will be more polarizing than the Windows Phone launch ad, because it doesn’t just have some fun with current smartphone users — it judges them.

That first spot poked fun in a kind-hearted way. It said, “Hey, ya gotta laugh at yourselves.” In this follow-up spot, our happy host turns into Mr. Hyde, saying, “You’re all a bunch of zombies.”

This isn’t too far off from Apple’s famously misguided moment, when they ran a commercial that said, “You’re all a bunch of lemmings.” Coming just one year after its historic 1984 commercial, Lemmings bombed horribly because it insulted the very people Apple was trying to impress.

This new Windows Phone ad portrays iPhone and Android users as lost souls living in a twilight world, enslaved by their phones. Oblivious to the consequences of their addiction. Connected to the world yet disconnected from each other.

A first-time smartphone buyer might be spurred to action by this approach. Current iPhone and Android users, not so much. The message Microsoft sends to them is, in effect, “You’re doing it wrong” — which is either insulting or naive.

There’s no mystery why people are so engaged/mesmerized by their phones. It’s because they’re enjoying the hell out of them. They feel no need to be “saved,” especially by a phone that has only a wisp of an app library.

“Getting in and out” quickly, as Microsoft suggests, is not the point of having a smartphone. Accessing rich content is. And every smartphone user already has the ability to get to their content quickly and efficiently.

Okay. Now that I’ve gotten all that off my chest, how schizo would I appear if I said I really liked this spot? Well, I do. I love it purely as a creative effort, removed from its strategy. The one-take staging, the slo-mo mood, the Donovan soundtrack — it’s hypnotizing and delivers its message well, ill-conceived as that message might be.

This, of course, is the problem. Creative alone won’t make the world beat a path to Microsoft’s door. A compelling strategy would come in handy.

Remember, Lemmings was a creative gem in its day — but it generated more hostility than love.

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