Zune: money can’t buy Microsoft an iPod killer
Microsoft just doesn’t have the right kind of cool, does it? Sure, it can do video games, but when it comes to wearable devices, such as media players, Microsoft doesn’t have the same kind of street credibility, as say, um, Apple.
Zune: just not cool
When I think of Microsoft, I think of a middle-aged nerd wearing horn-rimmed glasses and a comfortable sweater in front of a computer circa 1987. But when I think of Apple, I think of cool, impossibly good-looking twenty-somethings hanging out in hip bars and cafes. Damn that Apple and its slick marketing!
A recent survey of retail clerks at 40 big-box retailers by Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster revealed that only 8% recommened the Zuner over the iPod, while 75% recommended the iPod over the zune. What’s most tragic is that some retail clerks had never heard of the Zune, despite it being available in their stores. One clerk was quoted as saying “I have never heard of the Zune”. As you’d expect, the official word from Microsoft’s Zune Director Jason Reindorp is that sales are ”on track to meet our internal business projections
The situation is so bad that Munster does not expect the Zune materially affect iPod sales. At the time of writing, the Zune was listed 15th on Amazon’s list of best-selling MP3 players, behind brands such as Creative and SanDisk, and of course Apple (which accounted for 10 of the top 15 products).
Mircosoft threw its product development and marketing resources behind the Zune media player, no doubt expecting to being able to leverage its widely known (loved and hated) brand into a new market category, and what happened, no one seems to care very much. Generally, reviewers seemed to have been under whelmed by the Zune, and given that some of the people selling the Zune, don’t even know what it is, things are not looking so bright.
Munster also made the observation that Zune advertising had been placed much more “selectively” than iPod advertising, which suggests to me that Microsoft was either being tight, or was expecting its PR activity to generate enough buzz.
Sure it’s easy to criticize Zune, and perhaps over time, it may that Microsoft can claw some market share from iPod and the other portable media brands.
Zune shows that simply have access to resources is not enough to guarantee a hit. To be able to achieve the same iconic status as iPod, Zune would also need “cool”, and as we all know, that’s something that money can’t buy.
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