Blackberry's Marketing Warfare Options

Geoff Anderson, checking in for the  Technology Marketing Center and the next installment of Smartphone Theater.  Last time I blogged about the smartphone market was this post from November 22, 2010.  There I was speculating on the rise of Android based phones, and the impact on Apple.  One of the conclusions was that Apple’s sales volume have been rising, but the sheer number of phones offered by different carriers with Android underpinnings, was driving that phone OS into the lead.  The growth of the Smartphone market was (and is still) phenomenal, but the one player who struggled was RIM with the veritable Blackberry.

In this installment, we will be looking at the actions and response from the market around the Blackberry phones.  First, a little pedantic review.  From the first phones that were also Blackberry email devices until the introduction of the iPhone in 2007, RIM had enjoyed a pretty wide open market.  They had the lock on enterprise and government space with impeccable credentials in security, and fine granular control.

Much ink has been spilled on the woes of RIM, but let’s look at it from how they might respond with a marketing hat on.  From the MTP course review of Ries & Trout, you learn how marketing is analogous to warfare, and that competitive tactics often align with battlefield tactics.  Instead of in famous locations (i.e. Battle of the Bulge), marketing battles take place in the minds of the consumer.

Like in a pre battle plan, the top companies are mapped and ranked by position, and each firm has well defined goals:

• Number 1 – Market leader – goal: market domination
• Number 2 – Follower – goal: increased market share
• Number 3 – Also ran – goal: profitable survival
• Number 4 (and beyond) – goal: survival

The chief problem facing RIM today is that they used to be the top firm, with market domination, and amazing mindshare of the customer base.  However, today, while they are still profitable, they have dropped to a dismal third in the market share, and have yet to really grasp that they can no longer behave like the market leader.

The only real path forward for them is the flanking tactic, or segmentation strategy, attempting to redefine the battle in a way that they can be successful.  The time for them to behave defensively, or offensively have irretrievably gone by.

There are three principles of an effective flanking effort:

1. A flanking maneuver is best made in an uncontested area.  This means moving the product into a new category, one that doesn’t compete with the market leader.  Unfortunately, the RIM response was the Playbook tablet, another “me too” product offering, and one where the leader in the space has uncontested dominance.
2. A flanking move should have an element of surprise.  Perhaps RIM is working on a tectonic shift, under cover, but they have been quite vocal about their plans and strategies (new OS’s, acquisition of technology to help bridge the gaps, and the usual pre release announcements.  To be fair, for a large privately held company, this is a very difficult criteria to adhere to.
3. Follow-through is equally as important as the attack itself.  Here is another core principle of the flanking maneuver that RIM has just not executed on.  They have released lots of different handsets, and OS upgrades, but the pattern appears to be more of a scatter gun approach, rather than a coordinated,  all hands stage left culture shift.

RIM will not disappear from the market, and Blackberry will retain some crucial segments (finance, government being the two largest), but it seems pretty clear that they will never be able to reset the clock to early 2007 where they were incontrovertibly the dominant player.  All their responses have been slow, and, more importantly, have failed to recapture the mindshare they once enjoyed.  

Until next time, happy marketing!