About those market share numbers ...

Windows phone definitely needs to do more and more marketing.

It seems this has everything to do with marketing and not quality. I talk to a lot of people that aren't even aware of what windows phone or Microsoft mobile is. And that is a shame.

I think the marketing (v/s absolutely ZERO marketing . . . relatively speaking) that they were doing previously will help more than people expect. They'd allowed the platform to become little more than a whitebox commodity that people didn't actively seek out in the space (i.e, they'd become the Audiovox of smartphone platforms.) Now they're trying to create awareness and build it into a brand. So when a person's at the store and thumbing through the devices they'll eventually no longer go "what's this" - they'll instead say, "oh it's a windows phone." It may still not sway the decision everytime, but it'll at least help minimize some of the bleeding.

They did the exact same thing with Windows proper (i.e., not really advertising it in any meaningful way for more than a decade.) Now over the last year they've finally woken up to it. It was a transition year for the main OS so the numbers were naturally going to reflect that for most of the year as people waited for Windows 7 before upgrading. But when viewed in response to their competition, the first time they started advertising with the 'I'm a PC' campaign Mac marketshare saw its first notable hit in growth in years.

The biggest thing that surprises me in all of this is the continued growth of RIM. While the platform itself is laregly meh IMO, they've built a sold brand of hardcore users with decent crossover into the consumer space (in spite of the iPhone.) They have numbers developers SHOULD be flocking to in a similar fashion to the iPhone (but haven't embraced in the same way they've embraced even the much less entrenched Android.)

Well, long term might save MS/WM in the business market, where people usually don't quite jump the gun. So companies might just sit and wait and hope to combine the benefits WM already has for them (Exchange, ActiveSync, restrictions like only to allow signed apps, ...) with whatever miracles WM7 might bring in almost a year.

But in consumer market? People won't be fooled by the few changes in WM6.5 while all competitors already offer pretty good systems, which sure as hell will have a major update or two before WM7 finally hits stores.
Not to mention the image damage already done. WM has an image of being slow (OK, partly because of bad devices, but that doesn't change anything about the image), cumbersome to use things which need a stylus. Or which are bad S60 ripoffs with very few apps, in case of "Standard" edition, which is quite unknown anyway. I wonder if marketing alone can change that much about it. Maybe it would even be wiser not to do marketing for 6.5 and let WM7 be something totally new and surprisingly cool to those who never cared and heard about WM before.

But even with that in mind, WM has some seriously drawbacks in app development. Just to start development costs hundreds $$$ more than with the competitors, even if you include buying a Mac for iPhone development. Then you get an SDK and APIs which are optimized for a desktop system from about 20 years ago, whith some more or less working and often badly documented limitations and extensions. And finally there are good chances the app doesn't fullfill Marketplace limitations or you'll have to pay several hundred $$$ again until it's accepted - for a single locale... And who's to buy a smart phone with only a few hundred apps in its store when even Android, which was more of a nerd beta in 1.0, has more than 10,000 apps already?

phones are personal statements. like shoes or handbags or electric guitars. when you buy a phone, you're buying into an expectation and and vision of who you are with that phone.

what is the expectation or vision of yourself that you have owning a windows phone?

this is what branding tries to fill in. it outlinesthe attributes that the product is claiming to bring its owner.

right now apple is filling in the attributes for msft fot the pc. and msft is not doing much of anything to counter the claims made. and this lack of attention is actually carrying over to windows phones, increasingly suffering from the weakening pc brand. "windows is not cool, let me get something cool. let me try the apple phone, cos i'm stuck with my pc for now...." and then the cool iphone experience is dragging people to macs and os x.

htc is starting to outline attributes that their products claim to bring its owners.

i don't think msft will ever understand this. and as such, it will never do much more than tread water.

remember, lack of technical capabilities has not held back iphone sales.
its all about the image, and windows phones have no image except the negative ones painted by competitors and the blogesphere.

so, i don't think windows 7 will do much of anything to change things actually. unless there is iphone level advirtising to support it. otherwise 7 will arrive and receive a few praises and nods, and everyone will continue to buy iphones and blckberries and androids because they'll have seen on tv what you can do with those phones.

I still have a hard time taking the iPhone seriously. So many fan boys telling me about all of these wonderful features that have been included in smartphones for years as if Apple invented them shows me that iPhone market share is not coming from other smartphones, but from dumb phones.

But I think the reason BlackBerry's market share is increasing while WM languishes is that RIM has been hard at work with major OS updates and new devices. WM 6.5 still requires a stinking stylus, lags badly (on my former HTC Pure), and doesn't even allow the user to customize the start screen! I *want* to like WM so badly, but it seems like Microsoft is just letting it fade away from neglect like Palm did with their OS.

So, my next device will be a BlackBerry. I will still keep an eye on WM. Perhaps a Touch HD2 with WM 7 (including Zune integration and a free SDK) will start getting people interested again.

The question is, without resorting to more boating metaphors (a WM favorite), what is Microsoft doing now or will be doing in the near future that is so different than what they've done in the past? We can immediately take hardware improvements out of the answer, everyone is benefiting from those and will continue to do so in the foreseeable future.

If we listen to Ballmer, apparently nothing, as his statements, mostly for the benefit of Wall Street, indicate Microsoft's past strategy will continue. Reading the transcripts of Steve's many public appearances leaves me to believe the a large part of Microsoft's problem is corporate myopathy.

Getting back to the data that led off this thread, the main takeaway is that Apple and RIM, two manufacturers where the OS is a feature of the phone, not the focus, have posted large gains. Is there something Microsoft can learn from that?

HTC and Samsung will remain bit players in the near future, and gains by either may be due to operating systems other than WM. Of course the data says nothing about Androids impact on Windows Mobile Market share.

So in the end I'm not sure what the above chart says about Windows Mobile.

As to the potential impact on WM 7 and it's marketing budget, don't we always seem to be waiting for the next big thing from Microsoft? And what about when it's not the next big thing?

The focus of WMExperts is technology, why else can you explain so many pointless screen shots of "leaked" builds of 6.5? I'm sure we'll see similar posts of 7 once Microsoft starts "leaking" again. (Sorry, those boat metaphors are drifting in again.) But what if the issue isn't fundamentally technological? Again I have to ask, what is Microsoft going to do differently when it comes to Windows Mobile?

Yea, these numbers don't surprise me at all.

I am optimistic on behalf of Microsoft, though. Think about it... they have an entire YEAR to catch up to the Android and the iPhone. Not to say that they will "beat" them, but they will recapture a lot of the smartphone marketshare.

HTC will certainly assist Windows Mobile in their success, as always :)