Marketing After Crossing The Chasm

Okay, this is one of those posts where I have to remind everyone that this is MY PERSONAL OPINION, and I don't speak for Microsoft officially here. I don't work in the Windows group. I'm not all that technical. And of course I make no warrantees, expressed or implied (whatever that means).

One of my favorite bloggers, Halley Suitt, just posted a rant on Halley's Comment called "Upgrade = Downgrade Per Usual." She outlines her frustration with upgrading her Windows system, and it really struck a chord with me. She writes:

"I decided to risk it. I ran the upgrade thing and it told me there were 6 applications that needed updates. It also told me some COMPLETELY INDECIPHERABLE TECHNICAL-MARKETING-BLAH-BLAH thing about needing the "Exclusive Service Package" and of course that this must be done first.

I had no idea (NOR WANTED TO KNOW) what the hell their Exclusive Service Package (or whatever the obscure language was) did or why I needed it. Also the word "exclusive" was confusing to me -- what's exclusive about it -- do I have to pay for it? Is it exclusive to only certain customers? What the hell is "exclusive service" -- an 800 number with a non-Bangalorean person on the other end?

It also had that anti-customer tone of "you know you have to do this before you do that, of course" except I had no idea WHAT applications were being upgraded (there was a spagetti pile of words I couldn't make heads nor tails of) and why I might have to do one first or not. Shouldn't the software guys who are so keen on these being done in some order, SIMPLY DO THEM IN ORDER, ALL ON THEIR OWN. Why are they asking me to do that? Oh, yeah, I forgot, because I'm a PhD in Computer Science with nothing to do for the next 5 hours -- NOT!!!!!"

The ironic thing is, the whole "Windows Update" thing is supposed to make it easier to keep things updated, not harder.

I'm hopeful that future versions of Windows (including the periodic Service Packs like SP2) will make the whole user experience more intuitive, for both advanced and beginning users. The newest SP2 (now in beta) does make some progress in making Windows Update easier--though there's always room for improvement when it comes to making things elegant.

Something I've found interesting (culturally speaking) about marketing is that I'm finding some people in this industry struggling with the fact that we're marketing to a different audience now. When a lot of our most senior marketers were hired, Operating Systems (and PC's) were sold to early adopters, technically-savvy "end users", systems admins, corporate IT groups, people who wanted us to talk in bits and bytes and speeds and feeds. Now that 80% of households have PCs, and nearly everyone has a PC on their desk at work, our customers are very, very different than they were just a few years ago.

From Geoffrey Moore's "Crossing the Chasm" model, PC's (and operating systems and applications) have moved past the top of the adoption curve, and even to the tail, where a significant (thank goodness not a majority) of users are pragmatics and reluctants. They want to see things work in a very different way than early adopters, even the early majority. (I joke with Halley and put her at the end of the tail--she writes about it in Worthwhile).

Music is a great example for me. Don't make me fill out preferences and click boxes and save files and choose bit rates. I want a freaking jukebox that plays a CD when I pop it in.

Media Player 9 is very, very cool. And a lot better than version 8. If you haven't downloaded it, I highly recommend it. It should do what Halley was asking. But how can we make the whole experience better for those who aren't enthusiasts or geeks? In case you haven't noticed, Windows XP is a whole lot easier to use than Windows 95 is. And I hope Longhorn will take us even further.

In the meantime, I want to say THANKS for the rant. I hope it furthers the cause of those of us reminding people to remember we have a lot of different customers, not just geeks.

FWIW, I don't know what COMPLETELY INDECIPHERABLE TECHNICAL-MARKETING-BLAH-BLAH means most of the time either.

Oh, ya. When you get stuck, ask your kids. Chances are, they'll know what to do...