Windows Phones: A Strategic Statement

I have been a big fan and supporter of Windows Phones for over 3 years now. Not withstanding the perceived "app-gap", which to my mind is more hype than reality for most users (not counting nerdy tech-bloggers as representative of the general population), Windows phones were more usable than Android mish-mash that I tried for almost 3 years and more attractive than the dead-fish iPhone interface I am using for the last 1.5 years.

However between Nokia, Nokia as part of MSFT and then MSFT itself, Windows phones seemed to have lacked a clear executable strategy and the efforts seemed like "throw everything and the kitchen sink at the market and see what sticks" approach.

So, here's my unsolicited, unpaid 2 cents of strategy opinion.

Following the announcement of 3 categories of Lumia Windows 10 phones, MSFT should use a 5 prong strategy -

1. High End Phones - Target the enterprise crowd. Give it free to key CIOs and CEOs of any and all Fortune 500 companies. If I was in MSFT strategy team, I would make a list of all Enterprise customers with more than 5000 Windows licenses and send a sales/ marketing team to each customers IT heads and try to convert them to Windows smartphone environment. Offer "free" smartphone upgrades through enterprise Windows upgrade programs. Offer discounted docks and keyboards to lure in BYOD crowds and enterprise MS-Office users. Set a hard target of converting 100 Enterprise customers by end of 2017 and go after it.

2. Middle Tier Phones - Target the Students and young professionals. Advertise like crazy through all the cool channels - position the new phones as the NEW MUST HAVE for the younger generation - attractive back to school accessories, designer headphones and docks/ keyboards for Students and Young Professionals - get the buzz going - hire the best advertising/ marketing teams to push the message that this is the best phone for - X, Y and Z activities that the new generation is excited about.

3. Low End Phones - Target pre-paid customers and urban low-income families. Offer the phones with added benefits (free Office for a Windows machine if they keep using the phone). Emphasis on Latino and African-American communities. Make a partnership with Walmart if needed.

4. Other partners - Leave the family/ middle class moms-dads market and small business owners market segments open for key partners. HTC is in trouble selling Android phones. See if they can be incentivized to sell Windows Phones to key market segments. Same for Samsung or LG. Offer them specific EXCLUSIVE deals - maybe small business owners market segment for HTC? Middle class family market segment for Samsung/ LG? Again help them develop specific hardware unique to their Windows Phones. Offer unique Sync features for Samsung Laptops? Help LG with IoT device management through their unique Windows Phones? Help the partners differentiate among themselves and from their Android counterparts.

5. Unique Hardware and Software Value Proposition - Again to emphasize on this, MSFT needs to identify customer needs and interests of various target segments and develop unique Hardware and Software features to answer those needs/ interests. Create various "classes" of phones with clear advantages and value propositions - including through partner companies that address specific market segments. And keep doing it year over year with visible improvements. AND publicize this through marketing, co-marketing and attractive advertisements. Not rocket science, but smartphone science for sure.



At this point, Windows phone can only survive through market adoption, which can only happen by clear strategic differentiation and value proposition for distinct market segments.

Written by

Anirban Chatterjee, PhD MBA