OEMs Showdown: Performance report of Nokia and Local Windows Phone OEMs

It was just a few days back when we took an overview of the state of Windows Phone in India. Now I am back again but this is ultimate showdown time. So, I got my boots on and surveyed the market again. This time the reason was different. This time I collected some vital information about all the OEMs working in India for Microsoft. The result is again categorized into different aspects and we recommend you to grab a coffee and a chair because this one is going to shock you.

 Advertisement Policies:

This is one of the foremost point when it comes to the performance of a company. Regarding the performance of local OEMs, I never saw them promoting their Windows Phone devices. This resulted in less demand of Indian devices. Recently, iBall launched their first Windows Phone device but it didn’t get good media coverage. XOLO launched the lightest Windows Phone but didn’t sell much of the units.

On the other hand Nokia is working hard with its devices to sustain in the market but I must say that the advertisement policy Nokia is using is not up to the mark and the recent ads from them are really bad. It took me almost 2 days to understand what actually those ads from Nokia are trying to say. As far as the advertisement is concerned, none of them are working to get customers in line with Windows Phone platform.

Promotion Policies:

Selling policies is also a point which influence a buyer. What policies a seller opts will reflect in the final stats of sales. This is going to be rather a short one because neither Nokia nor Local OEMs have been able to give some good deals on their devices. Microsoft introduced a buyback offer few weeks ago but it wasn’t implemented completely. After this they tried to offer GOQii Band with the purchase of Nokia Lumia 830 and Nokia Lumia 930 in selected cities. Again it failed to cover the whole country and we already told you about the shortage of Lumia 930 in India.

So it won’t be wrong to say that both Microsoft/Nokia and Local OEMs didn’t worked on bringing some lucrative deals for the Indian customers.

Customer Support:

This is another area which will give a direct influence on the final performance of the company. A customer always needs security and trust from the seller because he is the one who is spending money on the device. Bad or no support will make the company less trustworthy. In this department Nokia has the best score. It has customer support even in remote villages of India.

Now if we move towards Local OEMs then the situation turns into pathetic. No one is going to help you after you buy a device from them. Even there are chances that your seller will refuse to give you support. In this way this part is completely in the control of Nokia and the local ones need to work hard on it.

 Personal Selling Techniques:

Personal selling means the face to face talk we have while buying the device. This is one of the most important factor as the behavior of the salesman will decide that will the customer buy a device or not. And this is the part which was unfortunately very shocking for me. To understand how salesmen are working, I headed to a Store in a mall which sold all types of devices under one roof. One thing I want to note before sharing is that I don’t buy phones from malls. I get them from the authorized retailers so this was my first time. Also this was my personal experience and it may or may not happen with someone else. I won’t argue with anyone on this ground. So below is what actually happened.

 I went to the store and directly went to a LAVA salesman. I asked him to show Lava Iris Win 1. He instantly replied me asking my budget. I told him to give the device as I wanted that one only. He pressurized me to tell the budget. I told him that I want a phone under 5,000 INR. He quickly started showing me Lava phones running Android under my budget. I rejected all and asked for Win 1. I asked that whether he has the device or not else I will move to another store. Finally after arguing for about 20 minutes, he told me that I have to book the device via any E-Commerce website.

I quoted this experience just to show how these salesmen are working. They are just trying to keep off customers from Windows Phone (I don’t know the reason). I tried to ask but he changed the topic so I couldn’t know the reason.

Whatever may be the reason, I think this behavior will only discourage customers from Windows Phone especially the ones who want Local OEMs.

Android is the key for local OEMs:

One of the biggest problem I felt is the hype of Android among the local brands. They are absolutely busy in promotion of their Android handsets in the market with Windows Phone going out of the line. Windows Phone needs to be popularized by the local brands as a good percentage of Indians prefer local brands over Nokia or Samsung. Microsoft is also not taking the correct initiative with Indian brands to help grow the Windows Phone platform.

The local OEMs prefer to advertise and sell their Android devices and take no proper attention on Windows Phone. This kills Windows Phone and then we get reports like Windows Phone doesn’t sell much in the market. I say that if you don’t do proper advertisement and take proper measures how anyone is supposed to buy your device.

Android Marketing:

This might seem irrelevant to some of our reader but this has an indirect link with Windows Phone especially in India. As detailed before, Android leads the Indian market and hence if some brand want to survive in India then it has to provide Android devices. On the other hand, Nokia has a pretty good image in the market so it can sell whatsoever the conditions might be, but as far as local brands are concerned, they need heavy work to get along with Windows Phone. Hence, they go with low-cost Android devices instead of going with Windows Phone which rather proves to be an expensive deal.

Now when they go with the Android ecosystem, then they try to do everything to skip or ignore Windows Phone in any manner. Launching Windows Phone is not just enough. In today’s market, people buy whatever they see. They don’t believe on written text. People can buy even trash, it just needs to suit to their eyes. This case goes with every smartphone and every Operating System. Now if you show everyone Android and hope that they buy Windows Phone then it’s almost impossible. You need to come on the field and take the initiative to sell your Windows Phone devices.

Conclusion:

We saw the different aspects where we compared the local Indian OEMs with Nokia/Microsoft. It turns out that these local ones are not working on the perfect recipe of Marketing techniques to sell their Windows Phone in the market. The in hand result then goes against them and they end up complaining about the limitations of Windows Phone.

I finally just want to say that these device will not sell in India unless we get proper advertisements and the proper marketing techniques are used. The local brands have to put their best to get something out of Windows Phone. The platform has a lot of potential but it needs to be sorted out in a right manner.

As I complete this article, I just want to give light on one important thing. The experiences and views shared above are my own. You may or may not experience them. A healthy debate will be welcomed. I won’t entertain any invalid arguments on this.