Hello! And welcome to our Friday column, Worst of the Week. There’s a lot of nutty stuff that goes on in this industry, so this column is a chance for us at RCRWireless.com to rant and rave about whatever rubs us the wrong way. We hope you enjoy it!
And without further ado:
The Yankee Group recently released a report citing what it termed leaders and followers in the 4G space that attempted to put into context which operators around the world have taken the leadership position when it comes to their 4G plans. It’s a pretty interesting read with lots of details on international carriers that would be enlightening to just about anyone.
While the topic of the report was in showing which operators were ahead and which were behind in terms of 4G, one of the more interesting aspects of the report was the reference to a consumer survey conducted by Yankee Group that tried to determine awareness for the term “3G.” Not 4G, but 3G. A term that has all but been forgotten by marketing departments and, according to the Yankee Group, survey still not really understood by consumers.
The survey found that 41% of those surveyed have heard the term 3G, but don’t understand it, 12% have never heard of the term and 2% were “anxiously awaiting 3G products,” which I could only translate as they have no idea what 3G means. Doing some simple math, and also using a powerful solar-powered supercomputer, I figured this represented more than half of those surveyed not really having an understanding of what the hell 3G is. Expanding those results further using solar-powred black magic, I figured that represents about 125 million or so of current mobile phone customers in the United States not understanding the term 3G that carriers and their marketing departments have I can only assume spent trillions of trillions of dollars over the past 10 years trying to explain. Well done marketing departments.
While I appreciate all the effort being aimed at marketing of the term “4G,” isn’t it odd that with more than half of consumer that have access to 3G, and many of which are probably using 3G, still not getting “it” that marketing departments are already moving onto the next “G?” Maybe it doesn’t matter. Maybe that 50+% of mobile customers don’t really need to know what 3G even means. And maybe that is true for 4G as well.
But, if that is the case, then why don’t these Wiz Kids crank up their B.S.-o’meters and get bizzy coming up with new ways to describe the awesomeness of mobile broadband that consumers will understand.
Sprint Nextel, which is neck-deep into branding its WiMAX service as 4G, should get some credit for at least attempting to break out of the number/letter mold when it initially launched its WiMAX service under the ill-fated Xohm name. That name was awesome because it both meant nothing, like all good brands should, and it started with an “X,” which we all know is the most bad-ass letter in the alphabet.
Not that the automotive industry has done much in recent years to elicit emulation, but back in the day they knew how to connect with customers with their ability to come up with car names that stuck in the minds of consumers. (Heck, I have heard that some people even name their children after cars, and that those children in turn have a high likely hood of finding ample employment in the dancing with poles industry. So that has to be a positive.)
So instead of all this “4G” or “4G-like” talk, why not brand the service “Diablo,” or “Spitfire,” or “Every Joy Pop Turbo.” Those are all more memorable than any number/letter combination imaginable.
And since none of these 4G services are really 4G anyways, the marketing departments have that much more freedom to come up with brand names for these services that consumers may actually understand. What a novel concept.
OK, enough of that.
Thanks for checking out this week’s Worst of the Week column. And now for some extras:
–Wait! Robots are celebrating birthdays now!?! It’s only a matter of time before we are here:
You’ve been warned … again.
–I am sure most of you have seen this, but any guess as to what this really is would be welcomed:
–For your viewing pleasure on this fine Friday. Make sure to crank that volume and take notes:
I welcome your comments. Please send me an e-mail at dmeyer@ardenmedia.com.
