Ballmer: More marketing of Windows needed
With Apple gaining significant market share, Microsoft is finally acknowledging that it needs to do a better job of selling Windows.
(Credit:
Caroline McCarthy, CNET News.com)
"We're going to have to invest more than we ever have in consumer excitement," CEO Steve Ballmer told financial analysts Monday. "We are going to be doing more to highlight Windows, and that is going to require more investment."
Ballmer also mentioned the need to work on the next Windows, but offered no new details on Windows 7, Vista's successor.
"We're very hard at work on the next version, which we won't talk about," Ballmer said.
Ballmer also addressed Windows Mobile, saying the company will be investing not just in the operating system, but also in new mobile applications. News on that front is expected shortly--I'd guess at the big cell phone trade show next week.
During her years at CNET News, Ina Fried has changed beats several times, changed genders once, and covered both of the Pirates of Silicon Valley. These days, most of her attention is focused on Microsoft. E-mail Ina. 
I think MS got upset about all those Mac ads and tried to "outcool" Mac by making a shiny new Windows version with lots of "cool" stuff like the Aero interface.
What they forgot to do was to provide a reason to use Vista. The Aero interface is quickly forgotten when you discover it runs much more slowly than XP.
If you make an exceptional product, it will sell itself. Yes, you will always need good marketing, but the problem with Vista is certainly not lack of good marketing, but rather lack of value for consumers.
Vista was supposed to be the biggest and best version of Windows ever. Biggest, they achieved (15GB of spaced needed for install? gimme a break!), but best is highly debatable. Now, if you pick up the pieces of your shattered hopes and use them to make Vista's successor what Vista should have been, you might just be able to save some face. But honestly, give the marketing a rest and focus on making a product that people will actually want to buy without being brainwashed.
Otherwise, I think your comment was right on the mark.
story. I had to "Google" it to find out that it is an operating system
used on the majority of PCs. :)
I'm unhappy with my Vista notebook. It has 4G RAM, T7300 processor and 256MB video RAM and it's too darn slow running Vista!
And fuggetabout Office 2007. Somebody should be shot over the UI. Shot, buried, dug up, burned and their ashes scattered over Puget Sound.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-8IufkbuD0
If MS has the money to spend on "consumer excitement" they could invest in a solid product and let viral marketing do the job.
Marketing the Yugo might have produced some number of extra sales, but once word got out that it was a POS - no amount of marketing could overcome the negative word of mouth.
As an aside, I simply do not see a dramatic shift away from Windows - whether it be XP or Vista by force. IF Apple or the flav du jour of Linux were to make ANY dent in the armor of Microsoft, MS has given them COUNTLESS opportunities to take a significant market share. This whether fortunately or unfortunately, has not occurred.
Now, now people. Yes Apple only has like an 8% share of computers in the US and 4% world wide, but consider that given the conversion rate and that once people switch to Mac they usually do not go back, every switcher is one less windows user.
And 25% of laptop sales this last 2 quarters went to Apple. Many colleges have surging Apple sales amoung their students, which will continue to buy after college.
The choice for Apple is not like a choice between Hp or Dell or Lenavo. There you swap back and forth year after year. A choice for Apple means leaving windows behind.
Also consider that Apple is not looking for the low price option. Apple stays at the mid level where the profit is. You can be the low price leader big time and go broke (loosing money on each machine :-)).
Just a thought.
"Windows <insert version> is the most secure and dependable
operating system we have ever produced."
So even longer product time periods would be what one new version a decade? As far as updates at a quick pace with no performance effects (because they are all just new hats for Linux) look for OS's out of Cupertino. Now there's a product with PLENTY of marketing...
--
I still happily run OSX 10.3 on my Mac at home, no sweat... and I can still happily get new apps and tools for it. I have a Leopard-based Hackintosh that still runs old 2000-era early OSX apps.
I have servers that still happily run Linux RedHat 9 , and there I can get, build, and run (as example) MySQL 5.1 on it, no sweat. OTOH, I can run pretty much any early Linux app on my Fedora Core 8 install... again, no sweat.
OTOH, There are HUGE groups of commonly used Windows apps out there that simply will not run in Vista. There are also a lot of latest-release Windows-based apps that will not run on Windows 2000 or earlier.
--
...see the diff? I think that was sort of what you were angling at, but I'm not sure so it remains a guess. :)
/P
Make stuff that works.. Listen to the needs of the community.. Be responsible for your actions..
just a thought..
So far when I compare Vista to Ubuntu all I see is ownage on every front from bling to resiource consumption to --and I'm serious-- hardware compatibility.
Our grassroots marketing can kick the butt of whatever money you waste on TV. Within two years someone will make the observation 'hey, all the smart people i know use linux; what is it?'
As for Apple, I'm glad there's competition, and more Apple market share would be a good thing, but really, I think the threat Ballmy fears is Google and the iPhone.
What's to get excited about? Ballmer running through the aisles at Best Buy head butting customers and biting people, threatening them if they don't buy a Vista box? Ballmer could show up on everyone's lawn in America throwing chairs through the windows and eating people's pets and still no one could care, any more than they could care about the brand of transmission fluid they dump into their cars.
I hope the analysts didn't spray him busting out into laughter when he started babbling about 'marketing' as if there was anything to sell.
Unfortunately, Microsoft is infamous worldwide. We're doing all we can to see that those poor people don't actually have to use microsoft products themselves, by putting a better kernel in such devices as the OLPC. Hopefully in ten years people won't have to know about microsoft unless they regularly hang out with the old timers to reminisce.
Reiser, ext3, and now with xfs on the horizon... I'm afraid that WinFS simply won't be able to catch up in performance or stability, let alone keep up.
[i]"As it stands, what will additional marketing do with nothing real to market?"[/i]
That's how Vista got into this mess in the first place. ;)
/P
Yet again, Ballmer proves that MS just doesn't get it.
Produce something worth buying and using, then market it.
You will drastically different results then the current model of releasing poorly though out, half-assed product and trying to force it down peoples throats.
So, while you and I slowly stroll down from the peak of MSFT's dominance (along with the rest of the tech industry)... I wonder just how ugly it'll get in Redmond, once we reach the point where even the most tech-ignorant user knows that MSFT is on the decline?
Cheers!
/P
better. Vista really doesn't do a great deal more than XP, except
require a lot of people to buy new hardware.
It is also a lot more restrictive when it comes to DRM stuff.
There is probably nobody on the whole planet that hasn't heard
of Windows and Microsoft. More advertising won't change that.
Maybe making something that is actually worth the money
would be a better idea.
/P
- Marketing?
- by SeizeCTRL February 5, 2008 5:15 PM PST
- How about fixing Vista first? It's pretty damn when Microsoft's own hardware lacks drivers for Vista. I have a MS Fingerprint Reader and after a year of Vista being on the market, there is still no Vista 64 driver for the fingerprint reader... you can't even trick it into installing by OS Compatibility.
- Reply to this comment
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(37 Comments)XP 64 is in far worse shape!
If Microsoft is going to release 64bit versions of their OS, at least make sure that it can detect and use hardware. You wouldn't believe the crap I had to go through to get an XP 64 driver for my WiFi card, and it only works for awhile before it has a memory error.
Granted it's not Microsoft's job to write drivers for hardware, but I would at least expect them to write drivers for their own crap.
I hope there is a completely different team working on Windows7... and I hope SP1 solves a lot of the issues we are having with Vista.