[crackberry_geek]

This sounds a lot like we are too small to compete so we give up.......bull****!!
In the company I work we have just over 100 BlackBerrys from Z10s to Classics to Passports. When new employees get handed a new Classic their 1st reaction is almost always "does BlackBerry still exist"??? Know what their next comment after using it for a few hours is??? " I would actually buy this as a personal phone if I knew it exists "
How is that selling to corporate clients looking now???
Most of the executives here think BlackBerry is dead so the ones that are saying Chen is targeting corporate clients are only making excuses out of their ***.
It is 2015 & you need not spend any where near $1B to have a targeted effective marketing campaign........stop talking nonsense!!!

Posted via CB10

You are so spot on. I constantly get the same reactions from people who simply think BlackBerry no longer exists.

And the fault for that lies squarely with BlackBerry!

Posted via CB10

[MarsupilamiX]

Interesting. I was out at dinner the other day and saw at least six commercials for the Classic on tv.

I do have to ask, where do you live?

I haven't seen a BlackBerry ad in the german speaking countries I usually reside in, since the Z10 launch.
Even in Switzerland with a lot of people being in positions to have a BlackBerry, I would lie if I'd say that I remember a commercial (or the fact that they played commercials) having played on the TV channels.

[donnation]

People need to separate the reality from their personal subjective views on how things should be done.

Saying Chen doesn't "Do any advertising" is false. It's an exaggeration (a CrackBerry user speciality) not a truth. I opened up newspapers and saw full page ads for the Passport. I watched one of the Sports networks and saw tv commercials for the classic.

Just because you don't personally see these things; or they aren't being shown with the frequency to your personal liking doesn't mean it doesn't get done.

I seriously doubt when you open their financial report for FY2015 that you're going to see the number "0" beside marketing expenses.

Plain and simple.

Gawd there are a lot of armchair executives on CrackBerry ...

I'm sure they do some advertising. How effective or often they do advertise is debatable. I've never seen one single ad besides the original Z10 ads here in the states for a Blackberry 10 device. If you think they market enough or effectively enough then I would heartily disagree. But you are entitled to your own armchair exec opinion as well.

[MarsupilamiX]

This sounds a lot like we are too small to compete so we give up.......bull****!!
In the company I work we have just over 100 BlackBerrys from Z10s to Classics to Passports. When new employees get handed a new Classic their 1st reaction is almost always "does BlackBerry still exist"??? Know what their next comment after using it for a few hours is??? " I would actually buy this as a personal phone if I knew it exists "
How is that selling to corporate clients looking now???
Most of the executives here think BlackBerry is dead so the ones that are saying Chen is targeting corporate clients are only making excuses out of their ***.
It is 2015 & you need not spend any where near $1B to have a targeted effective marketing campaign........stop talking nonsense!!!

Posted via CB10

The reactions I usually see when you give them a BB10 keyboard phone is a:
"It's actually pretty nice for a BlackBerry. Would never pay for that as my personal phone, but definitely one of the best enterprise phones I had. Is there a version without a keyboard?"

I tend to agree with Troy.
Why advertise, if all the advertising will accomplish, is that you paid another 100 million without having sold a single phone more?

BlackBerry had under 1% marketshare at the end of 2014.
"We" are already too small to compete for quite some time.
And since BlackBerry is too dumb to have a strategy like all of those 1000%+ YoY growth manufacturers in emerging markets, who operate on basically inexistant marketing, compared to giants like Samsung, it's not like I have a lot of hope of BlackBerry getting it.

Where I disagree with Troy (as usual, the one point), are emerging markets.
I think that advertising a fairly priced BB10 device (it already starts there, I know. As if BlackBerry would price their phones normally even once...) in emerging markets, with some special USPs for emerging markets could bring in some heavily needed growth.

[massiepas68]

Could it be that bb is � dead end? Hopefully not, but.......

[thymaster]

BlackBerry isn't as big as before. It's not in their budget to do big marketing campaign. The good news is that Chen did say any hardware sale is a profit going forward now. Congrats to him on the success.

Personally I think it's pointless right now for Chen to advertise in the consumer space when he doesn't have a lot of money work with. I think however, BB10 and the list of new hardware portfolio will sell for themselves through words of mouth and increase interest.

The only thing BlackBerry need to invest in is a new marketing champaign to change the perception of the company. Inform the public that BlackBerry is not a dead company.

[birdman_38]

If BlackBerry does any advertising, it's targeted. I've seen ads for the Passport on Toronto Raptors games. That's likely not cheap. BlackBerry will advertise to markets where they're still relevant, especially to the business crowd. The only way they could see an uptick in consumer sales is with a $1 billion ad spend, which may never come to fruition now.

[BB_Junky]

I just got an email from Telus with nothing on the page but a Passport and a Classic.... if every telus customer got one that's advertising right there .

[RubberChicken76]

I'm sure they do some advertising. How effective or often they do advertise is debatable. I've never seen one single ad besides the original Z10 ads here in the states for a Blackberry 10 device. If you think they market enough or effectively enough then I would heartily disagree. But you are entitled to your own armchair exec opinion as well.

Actually - I didn't comment on whether or not they advertise enough or correctly. To be honest, I'd hate the job purely because of how much money Apple has to spend. If people are expecting them to rival Samsung or Apple, that's crazy.

But I like facts. Saying "they never advertise" is ridiculous and not based in fact. I totally get you've not seen a Z10 commercial. I saw tons, along with other marketing. Yes, it was in Canada, but they advertised in the U.S. too

Apple Closes U.S. Ad-Spending Gap With Samsung - Digits - WSJ

[RubberChicken76]

I do have to ask, where do you live?

Canada, so it will be skewed for sure. And I'm in Greater Toronto, not far from the financial district. So core to where people are likely to still use BlackBerrys. Makes sense in this market. As Birdman says, it's targeted advertising. When Apple spends a billion+ dollars a year and Samsung $4 billion, ya gotta target.

[Tatwi]

BlackBerry still sponsors TVO Kids and their name is shown in the credits of several shows. And I hardly think it's a coincidence that BlackBerry devices often show up in product placement type situations on the CBC network. It has to be often too, because I rarely watch TV yet I see them.

Also, BlackBerry devices are still thought of as powerful by many. The producers of Once Upon a Time put a BlackBerry in the hands of Regina, who is the second most powerful magic user in the show. The most powerful character uses a flip phone though.... Features of one's phone are inversely proportional to one's skill with magic!

Anyhow, BlackBerry has to be smart with its money and the ad industry is full of sharks that gobble it, only offering hollow promises in return. It's an extremely complex problem to solve, especially with the negativity surrounding the BlackBerry brand. Simply throwing money at it would be a waste.

Look at it this way, Psi simply posted a video of his song Gangnam Style on Youtube and within a month it was a world wide household name. That didn't cost him anything and really it became popular based upon its own merits rather than an ad campaign. Looking at the world from that perspective, I think there are a lot of "little things" that BlackBerry can do to increase their "mind share" in a positive way.

Posted via CB10

[Troy Tiscareno]

Look at it this way, Psi simply posted a video of his song Gangnam Style on Youtube and within a month it was a world wide household name.

Except for the $100,000 or more that was spent actually making the video. And he got very, VERY lucky that his song/video was picked up and went viral. For every one of those that exists, millions get uploaded to the sound of crickets.

[Tatwi]

Except for the $100,000 or more that was spent actually making the video. And he got very, VERY lucky that his song/video was picked up and went viral. For every one of those that exists, millions get uploaded to the sound of crickets.

It's safe to say that you missed the point. Everything costs money to make, so that is a non-factor. My point was that Psi made something he was proud of, he then put it out there for the world to see, and the world liked it too. Simple as that.

BlackBerry would do well to just keep making products that "do what they do" with uncompromising quality and efficiency. They don't need billions of handheld users to have a profitable company. They don't need to be "the cool kid" to have a profitable company.

I respect BlackBerry/RIM for supporting childhood education and the many other events and foundations BlackBerry spends its money on. Search "sponsored by BlackBerry" some time. That sort of social responsibility and activity matters to me, where as advertising in general doesn't impress me.

That said, one has to think about these things with a critical mind. Take dish soap for example. I saw a bottle state, "helps wildlife" and it had a cute picture of a duck, without any further explanation. Sure, it helps wildlife by removing petroleum from them after they have been effected by an oil spill, so they don't immediately die. However, the reality is that dish soap is toxic as hell and can kill you if consumed in even small quantities, especially for small animals (like children and ducks). This one small case in no way make dish soap "good for the environment" or really even something we should feel good about using - chemical pollutants are chemical pollutants folks, they all build up in the soil and contaminate our water supplies. So, we have to put these shows of support in context so we can discern their level of sincerity.

Incidentally, laundry detergent is bloody awful for the environment, where dish soap is just bad for the environment. But... we use it anyway, because "it works" and things need to be clean.

Posted via CB10

[Killjoyhere]

Google is an advertising company first and and search provider second.

Posted via CB10

[jdcfinisher]

Of course BlackBerry 's ad budget isn't O they have a CAO on permanent vacation who gets paid a lot to do nothing. Having a CAO position is the way BlackBerry cuts down on the number of employees who get it in their misguided heads that advertising is a good idea and make up ads on their own . After all just look at apple and Samsung , those fools waste huge amounts of money for O return. Where as BlackBerry spends next to nothing and dominates the market. Why waste money just to let people know BlackBerry is still alive and didn't die years ago like " everyone knows" happened .

Posted via CB10

[birdman_38]

But I like facts. Saying "they never advertise" is ridiculous and not based in fact. I totally get you've not seen a Z10 commercial. I saw tons, along with other marketing. Yes, it was in Canada, but they advertised in the U.S. too

Apple Closes U.S. Ad-Spending Gap With Samsung - Digits - WSJ

The article points to two years ago, but still a great find. Interesting that BlackBerry's 2013 US ad spend was $90 million (and not nearly enough). And $4 million of that was on one single 30 second ad airing.

[anon(4275744)]

Because they don't know how. Advertising was never their thing.

Have you ever seen an add for an MRI? Not likely. I haven't.
Doesn't mean GE doesn't know how to advertise. It means they target their market.
Blackberry market is corporate (enterprise) etc. I am sure enterprise and TP providers are aware of Blackberry's new products .

Z30-Z30-Z10-Q10-9900-9900-Playbook-x3

[white shirt only]

There is currently an advertised BlackBerry article on BGR.

Posted via CB10

[Killjoyhere]

The article points to two years ago, but still a great find. Interesting that BlackBerry's 2013 US ad spend was $90 million (and not nearly enough). And $4 million of that was on one single 30 second ad airing.

They were not spending that Monday very wisely I can tell you.

Posted via CB10

[Craigash]

It does Advertise, just not to the consumer market.

Posted via CB10

[stivo11]

Advertising most of the time more than pays off, or else nobody would do it... "a man who stops advertising to save money is like a man who stops a clock to save time." Henry Ford

[Hende Nicolas]

Because they don't know how. Advertising was never their thing.

I agree. Part of me has been puzzled and frustrated by the lack of advertising, but the other part is grateful we haven't seen bad advertising multiplied and blown up on a large scale.

Posted via CB10

[Hende Nicolas]

Advertising most of the time more than pays off, or else nobody would do it... "a man who stops advertising to save money is like a man who stops a clock to save time." Henry Ford

Brilliant quotation. As true now as it was before. BlackBerry are paying for the lack of advertising in a continued struggle for relevance and attention. Passport has been out for at least nine months and I still have people asking me what it is, and saying they didn't know BlackBerry 10 even existed.

Posted via CB10

[Killjoyhere]

Brilliant quotation. As true now as it was before. BlackBerry are paying for the lack of advertising in a continued struggle for relevance and attention. Passport has been out for at least nine months and I still have people asking me what it is, and saying they didn't know BlackBerry 10 even existed.

Posted via CB10

I'm so disappointed in BlackBerry right now.

Posted via CB10

[93Aero]

Send out a BlackBerry T-shirt with every phone order/ purchase, when you order the phone online it should prompt you for your shirt size.
Wouldn't mind at all if they added 10 bucks to the cost.
Or better yet put a sheet of BlackBerry stickers in every box.

PassportSQW100-1/10.3.2.2339 Q10SQN100-5/10.3.1.2576 Posted via CB