Windows Phone: Time for Microsoft to Put the Pedal to the Metal

By Lance Ulanoff14 hours ago

Greg Sullivan, Microsoft's Windows Phone marketing lead, was grinning from ear to ear when we sat down for an interview earlier this week. Market research firm IDC had just anointed his phone platform a solid Number 3, beating the once-dominant Blackberry platform for the first time.
"It’s very refreshing," Sullivan told me.
Granted, Windows Phone and Blackberry are fighting over scraps. That same report indicated that 92% of all shipping smartphones are on the Android and iOS platforms. Still, for Microsoft it's a victory of sorts — maybe even a sign of momentum.

Slow But Steady Wins?

Sullivan said Microsoft thinks of this progress in the way one would a flywheel. "It takes a lot of energy to start it and get it going and you see the progress and it feels like it's very slow progress. It's the tipping point; you get to critical mass or momentum that's self-sustaining."
The analogy is true of platforms as well, Sullivan told me. Microsoft knows, he said, that it's still shy of that "critical mass," and that things are "panning out, maybe a little bit slower than we hoped." But the company's convinced it's making the necessary progress. "Today's IDC report is evidence," he added.
While this argument makes sense when you look at Android — which took a solid year to achieve the trajectory that eventually made it the most widely-used mobile OS in the world — it doesn’t really hold up when you look at Apple and iOS, which seemed to enjoy remarkable success almost from the day the first iPhone launched.
Even so, there are signs that a new Windows Phone marketing strategy is emerging and, as with so many things, timing may be everything.

Window of Opportunity

It is fairly clear now that Apple will not be delivering an iPhone update this summer, which means Microsoft may have a three-to-four-month window to snap up just a bit more market share from those who are not interested in an Android phone. It's also likely that Microsoft will continue to gobble up more Blackberry refugees.
Is Microsoft taking advantage of that opportunity and getting more aggressive? Sullivan says the evidence is already there, starting with the cheeky Windows Phone "Wedding Ad." If you haven't seen this commercial (embedded below), it depicts a wedding where guest are using iPhones, Samsung Galaxy phones and other devices to capture the magic moments. Soon, however, the guests are arguing and then beating the heck out of each other.