Smoked by Windows Phone, PR fail. Ben the PC guy to the rescue.
Something bad went down today regarding the Smoked by Windows Phone campaign. If you’re not familiar with that campaign, that was where a Windows Phone would challenge another phone to do a certain task. If that was completed faster than the Windows Phone, you win money/prize. If not, you can get your phone swapped for a Windows Phone.
Ali actually tried this challenge at MWC with a Nokia 808 and beat a WP, subsequently getting money which he used to get a Nokia N9 
.
It’s been working quite well. WP hasn’t been winning all and has been awarding prizes to winners. Most of the time, it has won, because the challenges are set to show off Windows Phone’s strengths. e.g. facebook integration so quick snap of a picture and upload.
That’s really the aim of this campaign (at least how I perceived it) rather than a whiny my phone is better than yours thing.
It’s just for fun. But apparenly Microsoft had got a little carried away, raised the stakes where challengers were a little bit more prepared than normal. One such had disabled the lock screen from appearing on his Android, such that in a test to show weather in two cities, the Android had won. Let’s not get into whether disabling the lock screen is a normal activity. That’s what the guy had set up. If MS didn’t think of that ahead and prevent in the rules, it’s their own fault. The test in itself was rather silly. I had hoped it would be one of the more realistic tests, real life tests we’ve seen before.
Official Rules:
http://content.microsoftstore.com/store/smokedbywindowsphone/rules
This is a skill-based Contest. The object of this Contest is for You to come into the Microsoft Store and try to beat the Microsoft Windows Phone in a series of five (5) “Smoked by Windows Phone” challenge scenarios selected by Microsoft at its sole discretion including: (1) Pocket-to-Picture-to-Post, (2) Real-Time Information with Live Tiles, (3) Using the People Hub to Stay in Touch with the People You Care About Most, (4) Updating Your Status Across Multiple Social Networks, and (5) Local Scout (“Challenge”). For purposes of this Contest, each entrant who participates in the Challenge with their own personal smartphone will be called an “entry.” All eligible entries received will be judged using the criteria described below to determine the winners of the prizes described below.
Stupidly, rather than give the prize of a laptop and congratulate the guy, the MS retail staff at the store decided not to award the guy. Oh come on now guys! You’re giving away a Windows laptop. It’s better that it’s out there in the hands of a user than in your store (even if he does go on to sell it, it will be out there eventually in use).
It doesn’t matter if the score sheet isn’t 100% in your favour. It never was. That’s what I liked about it. We could also see where WP could improve. No, not in features it doesn’t actually have as that’s silly.
This could have been so easily swept under the carpet. But no. This blew up across the blogosphere and you know it’s gone bad when it’s on Reddit’s front page!
http://www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/rdgtz/i_won_the_windows_phone_challenge_but_lost_just/
.
A win is a win and loss is a loss. Rules should all be clear BEFORE the test to make sure no party backs out or cheats. At the very least, it’s getting people to walk into MS stores or even see a WP phone, which to most people, doesn’t even exist.
A rematch was offered quite late (it should have been at the time if at all) but that has thankfully been dismissed.
Fortunately since the time this was first reported, this has been sorted out.
Ben the PC guy wants to make it right with a laptop, a phone and an apology. Some nice swag, eh? I also read from Reddit that a few people there are purposely coming in with crappy Androids to lose and get a Windows Phone. That is actually a pretty good idea. It’s a win either way and they can go sell the phone if they don’t actually want it (though I hope at least they give it a try).
It’s blunders like this we don’t really want to hear about. So much hard work can be made to build up a campaign or even a brand to be wrecked by something so petty as this.
This could have simply been a ‘I won a Windows laptop!” blog post to which no one would really have cared that much, congrats to the guy. Some folks might have been envious at that HP laptop. Perhaps some might have goaded but it would never have exploded into such a crud storm as this. Either way, it would be an overall positive outcome for all. But no. A mistake happened and one that won’t be forgotten.
I hope this teaches Microsoft to be more careful about overstepping their mark. Consistency is absolutely paramount. Don’t make a campaign bigger than what you can handle.
You can’t just have great results from some challenges (wins and loses doesn’t matter) and then something terrible like this coming out! It sort of reminds me of the Amazing Everyday thing and the inconsistency by those silly promos by Nokia Australia. That of course was not to the same level of ‘zomg they didn’t’ fails, but the point remains the same that good consistent marketing is mandatory.
[Look at this awful video. It's out of focus. It doesn't really make sense. And what's worse is that they kept uploading random out of focus videos again and again!
http://mynokiablog.com/2012/03/16/videos-the-amazing-everyday-lame-try-again-nokia-australia/]
Hopefully it also makes MS and Nokia pull their finger out and work faster to continue making WP Lumia a better experience for everyone. At the same time, perhaps they should focus LESS on what other products are doing, focus LESS on giving other phones more air time than they already have and actually just show their devices as being great for doing X, Y, Z etc. Hopefully XYZ will be features they know consumers care about the most and can leave a strong, positive impression upon them that if that’s what they’re looking for, a that Lumia could be something they should go for. The moment you introduce another competitor into the mix, it complicates things.
Just focus on being good.
Ah well. Let’s thing of some positive out of this, I don’t want to leave it on a complete downer.
As Oscar Wilde said, “The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about.”. I kind of miss it that our the likes of Stephen Fry doesn’t even mention Nokia any more after his time with the N97. Meh.
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Oh looking at that last link again shocks me.
Oh man, I just started reading that and my blood began to boil at how long it was taking them to fix Symbian (and still didn’t by the time the N8 appeared in 2010!). For those of you that accuse me of instantly changing my mind on S60 once WP came out, well no that wasn’t the case. I’ve always been looking out for what Nokia needed and I knew that crud clearly wasn’t it.
This was before we had seen N900, which I had hoped it would be our saviour and it could have been were it not strangled by Nokia themselves in Symbian’s favour. Karma has a way of sadly going back to sort that out to the detriment of us all.
Category: Nokia, Rant, Windows Phone
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I hope this won’t be blown out of proportion again. Especially here. But s9mehow I think some people would just bitch.
I think it has already been blown out of proportion and will be used magnificently as ammunition.
I am saddened equally by certain sites sensationalising it for clicks but hey, that’s how they make a living.
Engadget says “The world demands justice…” like Microsoft killed somebody.
Well, you can consider efforts against Nokia N9 to become worldwide bestseller hit if you need an example, including market discriminations etc.
Sure… except, for about the tenth time, the Lumia sold better in the markets where both were available.
If you can only afford one horse then you back the one that’s got a better chance of winning. Basic economics that.
something like this is obvious fuel to speak ill of msft/wp the people handling the contest really should have had the foresight of what was to come by denying the prize
This isn’t out of proportion, if you think about it.
You are a huge company, MSFT, you publicize a contest heavily and offer big prizes.
This means that you are immediately under the scrutiny of millions of people. This means you should be prepared to face criticism for any and all mistakes – you asked for the attention and you got it.
This also means that to avoid unnecessary criticism you should be looking at yourself – are you doing everything necessary, hiring the right people, etc etc. Not expecting everyone to shut up.
What happened in this instance was unfair, and a case of blatant trickery by the people in charge of that particular booth. They should be sacked or reprimanded, but once again, it’s not for anyone to complain about the storm that ensued – that was a logical result of the media attention MSFT brought upon itself regarding this contest.
The same thing as being vocal on the “internets” and expecting to not get trolled. Doesn’t happen, sorry.
Microsoft’s “history” doesn’t help them either..
But what about credit where credit is due? Sure, you can expect scrutiny and criticism over mistakes – but in this case they fixed the mistake very speedily. As far as I can tell, they even added an extra phone set to sweeten the deal. Along with a public apology.
You really want those store clerks to be fired over this? Really?
So yes, I’d say Microsoft history (and Nokia sites the Feb11 outrage) and reputation is more at play on this one, than actually what they did or did not do. It was a mistake, it was promptly fixed and compensated for. That would be the end of story normally, but not now.
Now we won’t hear the end of it… Nothing to do with fair, or right. Just the cruelty of the spectators, like any media showdown these days.
It’s sad, but hey, you got to take the good with the bad. It was lightning in a bottle for MS after all.
This is all because of one MS employee, ive personally seen them payup even when theg obviously won as long as the opponent is stubborn enough, there’s even one on their youtube channel where its a clear win against an iPhone but they pay… Anyways MS guy should be fired (not really) but kudos to ben being so awesome about it
Going off-topic,
I consider the ‘Angry Birds Space not coming to Windows Phone’ scenario a ‘Strategic One’
I take it as this,
Before !!!
1st User to 2nd User – Hey I am looking for a new phone .. which one shall I ?
2nd User to 1st User – Samsung, iPhone bla bla bla !!
After !!!
1st User to 2nd User – Hey I am looking for a new phone .. which one shall I ?
2nd User to 1st User – Now you can buy Windows Phone also as Angry Birds Space is also coming to it.
(It may seem childish but I am serious)
Negative Publicity is also a ‘Publicity’ & Windows Phone was able to achieve it with Angry Birds Space. I consider it as Positive for Nokia !!
sorry for being off topic.
I don’t think so. People don’t always keep up with the news. Once they hear something negative, they continue to believe it.
I think it’s really hard to run the contest though. Once you know what you have to do, there are just too many ways to cheat. e.g. I can use Nokia Weather Widget and Accu Weather Widget to display weathers from 2 cities on my N8; or open some applications already and leave them running in the background etc.
Isn’t the whole point of the ‘Smoked by WP’ campaign that the WP can do certain things better, faster or more convenient than the competition, in real life at that? Having a widget, an open app in the background, customized screens, background daemons or what-have-you is not cheating – those are the strengths of competition you are claiming of surpassing. If you want to compete with the sharks, you can’t whine for them having teeth.
Exactly.
Surprise. If you carefully set up your phone to perform specific tasks very quickly, you can perform specific tasks very quickly. Any widgetized OS should be highly capable in this regard.
Microsoft’s contest involves highly-practiced people performing contrived and often unrealistic tasks on specially prepared phones. They set themselves up to win instead of creating a fair contest. It’s got nothing to do with how fast Windows Phone may or may not be – they’d beat 99% of people who brought Windows Phones to the contest too.
They should expect to have people come to play with the same tactics, although in this case it was apparently a total coincidence that the contestant had everything set up just so.
Precisely. The contest is basically a publicity stunt with very few expenses and extremely low risks.
Silly move but it’s a seven day wonder. Don’t think it’ll have any lasting impact judging by the reactions to the apology post.
Nokia deserved bad sail percentages with bad decisions and politics, but what I cant understand is that after few fatal years of business, they managed to present their windows “flag phone” with such lousy, out of focus video, and admit it was filmed with Lumia device and and that should persuade people to buy it???
loln i agree
Circle jerk x10.
what phone & laptop are they giving to him?
I think it’s the limited edition Hunger Games one they run on all their contests for the time being.
From what I’ve read, the guy was asked to tell the weather of 2 different cities. What he did was have 2 different weather widgets from 2 different cities. He then disabled his start screen. So all he had to do was turn on (awaken) his device. He clearly won. But on WP, they could have pinned 2 different cities to the homepage and gotten the same thing. As someone said above, you can set your device up to “game” it so you win. These type of “challenges” are kind of stupid. But if they want to highlight the ease and speed of use of the WP platform I guess good for them.
It’s good that they made this thing right. MS came off as a sore loser in this one. This certain metric (weather) is kind of dumb though. I do like the one where you find the closest establishment (eatery, shopping, movies, etc) using the Local Scout feature.
As I’ve said when they first announced it, if I had nothing better to do I’d customize my N9 (or rather N900, more possibilities to tweak) to do all the things they did in those contests and as a prime example of irony, if asked what I’d do with my won laptop, would say – install Linux on it, of course. *trollface*
However, it appears that one does not have to stab them, they are pretty good at doing that to themselves. It is to be expected from Microsoft, tho, it’s not as if that is their first time to promise something and then act like children crying ‘not fair’. I remember their campaign trying to convert Flash developers to their (then) newly-born Silverlight, they were offering quite notable incentive to develop a `killer` web gizmo in Silverlight instead of Flash. So, one guy did (I think it was a head tracking and face recogniton algorithm, can’t remember now) but they refused to pay him as he also made it in Flash as well, and to their horror the Flash version worked tenfold better.
So, this is just another case of Microsoft being Microsoft. At least this time they’ve apologized.
Come on, incognito, than join the Microsoft conspiracy/hater people.
Hey, I call them as I see them. Microsoft does have a long history of pulling such things, didn’t do them too much damage in the past for them to rethink how they approach the public but I think they should be far more careful when it comes to their mobile lineage as they are barely relevant in that arena and they have far less wiggle room to act as if they are dominant.
Conspiracy – not my cup of tea – it would certainly explain a lot batshit crazy things that have happened, tho, but wouldn’t explain why a company with more than $60B+ liquid in their coffers would go down such uncertain route that could end up in a serious jail time for anyone involved, when they could’ve just flat-out bought Nokia (if they believed they can succeed in the mobile arena, of course).
Hatred – heavens no, having strong emotions towards a company (or other entities that are everything but living beings) is, IMHO, pretty childish and a bit like a broken pencil – pointless. All companies are in it for the money, and they will do anything they can to get it from you, so why would one have any emotions for them? Sure, I can be particularly disgusted by some moves of a given company as they can have an impact on me, or the things I care about, or the world in general – and Microsoft has made too much of those to be considered as one of `the good guys` – but that just means that I’ll avoid products/services of such a company (i.e. voting with my wallet), your-favorite-deity-forbid to spend emotions on them. That being said, I do use Windows 7 quite a bit as it is a good product… despite coming from Microsoft *grin*
I know the history – good, bad and really bad – of Microsoft well. I don’t disagree with the past, though I’d argue they have changed somewhat.
What I thought was over the top in this case, was calling this “Microsoft being Microsoft” when retail staff somewhere just made a mistake. Some clerk pulled the wrong plug and when the learned of it, Microsoft made it right. As they should of course.
I mean, I’d better agree with you if Ballmer had denied the guy his laptop.
Retail staff don’t just make arbitrary decisions like that unless they have strong incentive to do so.
I would imagine that the staff was told that they aren’t supposed to allow too many losses or that they would pay a part of it from their salary/bonuses. This is the kind of “incentive” companies use these days to force employees to do what they want.
The employee panicked and denied the customer his prize.
This does NOT exonerate MS for their arrogance in a) thinking they are unbeatable when they have barely touched the market and b) not training their staff in customer service. So yes, ultimately it’s not just the one guy at the counter, it’s more than that.
Yes, they may have incentives tied to them winning. Sure. So that they are motivated to do the task properly. Sales is often based on incentives and it affects how staff works.
But that is no excuse for somebody not to do their job properly. I think it is perfectly OK – and certainly *not* “Microsoft being Microsoft” – that they correct something after a complaint.
What did you expect? All the people in an organization being perfect 100% of the time? The employee made a mistake. His employer corrected the mistake. Is that not enough?
I’d be willing to cry foul if Microsoft had not stepped up and done the right thing. (And it is known from previous examples that they do pay out when they are smoked, so it is not some scam where nobody ever gets anything.) But they did, so I don’t see what is the problem.
Especially, I don’t see this as an example of “Microsoft just being Microsoft”. If they were being the way incognito says, they would be denying the prize. Which they are not.
Or… now I get it. Microsoft being Microsoft means they correct their mistakes and are all-around nice guys?
“uncertain route that could end up in a serious jail time for anyone involved, when they could’ve just flat-out bought Nokia”
Jail time? Who would jail them? Americans never jail their own in practice, when the crime is against other nations or economies. Further still, Americans are (in practice) never jailed abroad because of the influence U.S. wields politically and economically over the rest of the world, especially Europe. They reason MSFT, Apple etc are all so arrogant is precisely because they feel that they are invulnerable and untouchable.
As for buying Nokia.. The assets are not just some money to be spent. Technically they are the property of the shareholders and nobody in their right mind would throw money around just because. Nokia would cost a few dozens of billions to outright buy it, and it’s not worth it because the same identical effect can be achieved through just paying ten times less to a few key people in the BoD (or threatening them with removal, loss of jobs etc which works just as well since major shareholders are American too). And it’s a safe bet to do that because: American companies are untouchable legally (in effect, don’t start quoting some law paragraphs because they never apply in practice to American citizens) and also because this makes it look like Nokia dug their own grave (which they did by accepting the bribe and being stupid, but the bullet came from MSFT all the same).
Just to add:
In case you were suggesting jail time for the Finnish participants of this crime, they are very safe in any case. Execs at large Finnish companies are in 99% of cases either former MP’s and thus with strong links to their political parties and other sources of influence or then they are financially supporting said parties with the immunity that entails.
There is no way any important names can be jailed for any economical crimes here in Finland simply because such crimes are not brought out into the public/media in the first place. We have only one case of corruption investigation and that has been stalled for two years now because the guy has influential enough friends to do that (same that has been involved in many indecent scandals in the past which in any other normal country would get him kicked out of parliament – but not in Finland!).
Politics and business is much more intertwined here because the country is so small, so basically the guys at the top in Nokia have free hand no matter what they do.
Oh wow. Now the conspiracy theories take it to a completely new level. Even if some of what you said might be true in some cases, your statement is a gross over-simplification.
There are many examples of white-collar criminals being prosecuted and sentenced in Finland. Even hunted internationally when they left the country. And in the current atmosphere the media goes after anything suspect…
There definitely is a huge risk of a price to pay for shady business activities in Finland. Saying that business leaders are very safe doesn’t ring true to me.
As for the US, I’d say many things are different there too after ENRON and the like.
The ones that have been prosecuted you’ll find had little to no connection to politicians. And as such, were “vapaata riistaa”.
Also, the media doesn’t just publish stories. There’s a lot of censorship in Finland, even though you may not be aware of it.
Oh I’m sure many crooks get away with things, but I don’t think things are as black and white as you make them out to be either.
If they’d let that guy win and changed the rules after, it might have been better.
But at least it’s getting talked about. WP being on the Reddit front page at least raises it’s awareness.
Most of my friends haven’t even heard of WP… Well until I show them my new phone anyway
I was just reading that old rant, and if they made the N900 they’re flagship, and never even gave the N97 such a high profile, people might have given Nokia a better chance. Maemo had a much better touch interface, and if they could have got app developers more interested, it would have been a much better match for the iPhone.
The N900 is still a very capable phone today for many tasks.
But as usual they were too risk-averse and stuck with S60…
+1
Even better, if they’d spent the money they spent on the N97 slimming down the N900 and giving it a capacitive touchscreen whilst building apps for it then things may have been very different to what they are now.
MS really should have made the rules clearer. Basically I could optimize a linux phone to do the 5 things they are competing in really fast, but it would propably be useless in everything else.
So we – the Nokia customers – are here only „unwanted MeeGo trolls”? This is our money paid for Symbian, SXX and MeeGo which have built you dear Nokia, and pay all your expences, including paychecks.
Are competitions far from partneships? Not so far I think.
Microsoft don’t play fully fair game, it’s game is only „fair enough”. There is no good will, there is only to collect as much as possible will, then everybody and everything else. Big waste of monesy for marketing shows „the best Windows” Lumias, as something outstanding. Do you know how many such phone exists? Count here http://www.microsoft.com/windowsphone/en-us/buy/7/default.aspx Today I have found only 15 already. They ALL seems to be the same, almost identical.
Then WHY Lumia is to be anything superior or anything extra oridinary?
Seems none of them is/was interesting enough to make a market shaking. But what is WP? WP is (please correct me Windsfanboys) in my limited knowledge a Windows CE / Windows Mobile with license allowing some changes – the 3 home screens taken from (pretending?) Nokia N9 MeeGo confirms those „some changes”. But how many such devices with Windows were? From Nokia Lumia marketing seems Windows Phone is superduperthemostimportant revolution in mobiles. How many phones have been using Windows already? Count here: http://www.windowsfordevices.com/c/a/Windows-For-Devices-Articles/The-Windows-Mobile-Phones-Showcase/ 20? 40? No, around 200 (two hundreds) mobile devices! And Windows share in mobile market? 0.68% worldwide acording to statcounter!
Then WHY Lumia with Windows is to reach any bigger success?
Users of those hundreds already devices with Windows haven’t made any bigger share? And Nokia want to resign ALL OTHER PROFITABLE models and be hanged only on Windows? Hanged already behind, not just before, the edge?
(from here: http://macdailynews.com/2011/02/11/in-memoriam-microsoft%E2%80%99s-former-strategic-mobile-partners/ ) >> MacDailyNews Take: While we’re on the subject, in a related area, let’s also pause for a moment of silence for all of the “PlaysForSure” portable devices and content services “strategic partners” that Microsoft dicked over, too:
• AOL MusicNow
• Archos
• BearShare
• Cingular
• Cowon
• Creative Labs
• Denon
• Digitrex
• D-Link
• Ericsson
• iMesh
• Insignia
• iriver
• Kyocera
• MSN Music
• MTV URGE
• Motorola
• Musicmatch Jukebox
• Nokia
• Palm
• PassAlong Networks
• Pioneer
• Philips
• Rhapsody
• Roku
• RCA
• Ruckus Network
• Samsung
• SanDisk
• Sonos
• Sony
• Spiralfrog
• Toshiba
• Wal-Mart Music Downloads
• Yahoo! Music Unlimited
Good luck, Nokia. You’re going to need it. <<
O yes, really, good luck Nokia!
I’m sorry but your English is horrible. I don’t understand alot of it.