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For Google, iCloud Is Annoying; For Microsoft, It's A Humiliation

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Re: For Google, iCloud Is Annoying; For Microsoft, It's A Humiliation

#21

Post by microtonal »

Kylekramer wrote: post #15
jasonkolb wrote: post #5

I don't know that anything Apple is doing is that revolutionary, the difference is that Apple and Jobs are phenomenal at presenting the idea so that people actually get it. I'm sure there are a lot of Microsoft execs right now that are saying "we already do that with product X" and pretty pissed off that they were never able to sell product X over 5 years the way Apple did in an hour. The bottom line is that Apple kn…

Apple is indeed good at marketing, but how do we know they going to succeed at marketing iCloud? We haven't even really seen any marketing about iCloud beyond the keynote, which is them preaching to the choir and frankly anyone watching already "got it". After all, Apple pretty much never pitches software, and the idea of an iPhone/iPad/Mac commercial saying we keep everything in sync is fairly weak (most consumers a…

Apple is indeed good at marketing, but how do we know they going to succeed at marketing iCloud? [...] iCloud after all is in part a rebranding of a product that has already failed multiple times already.

Good question. But from a user perspective MobileMe syncing already works very well. When I buy a new Mac or iOS device, I simply configure my MobileMe account and automatically have my contacts, calendars, notes, and on the Mac preferences, dock items, etc.

They could have made the synchronization functionality of MobileMe free, and slowly add the features announced for iCloud. But announcing it as a new product is a far smarter marketing move. iCloud has dominated deadlines for days now, and people see it as something different from MobileMe.

Re: For Google, iCloud Is Annoying; For Microsoft, It's A Humiliation

#22

Post by Wilya »

dstein wrote: post #7
recoiledsnake wrote: post #4

Microsoft has a marketing problem, they have a lot of cloud services like Skydrive, Live Mesh etc. but are not able to grab the attention of consumers or media like Jobs is able to, on stage. However, Windows 8 seems to be coming with a ton of integrated cloud features so I don't know about the humiliation part.I just don't see that their marketshare is affected more than 1% specifically due to the cloud services in…

How do you market MS-only products when all the early adopters are using Macbooks?

What does MS-only mean ? They actually provide client apps for macs, if that's what you meant.

Re: For Google, iCloud Is Annoying; For Microsoft, It's A Humiliation

#23

Post by nolok »

Pewpewarrows wrote: post #18
jasonkolb wrote: post #5

I don't know that anything Apple is doing is that revolutionary, the difference is that Apple and Jobs are phenomenal at presenting the idea so that people actually get it. I'm sure there are a lot of Microsoft execs right now that are saying "we already do that with product X" and pretty pissed off that they were never able to sell product X over 5 years the way Apple did in an hour. The bottom line is that Apple kn…

> Microsoft and Google both suffer from the same disease, they try to sell a product, not address a need. Actually, Chrome and Nexus-branded Android phones are the only Google products that I've seen advertised, ever. Of their hundreds of products, those 2 are the only ones that they're trying to "sell". In fact, Wave was pretty much their only product that comes to mind that didn't address a need (or at least that w…

There is A LOT of ads for google chrome in France. By a lot I mean that there were entire metro stations with every single ad spots paid by google for chrome in Paris.

Re: For Google, iCloud Is Annoying; For Microsoft, It's A Humiliation

#24

Post by microtonal »

recoiledsnake wrote: post #4

Microsoft has a marketing problem, they have a lot of cloud services like Skydrive, Live Mesh etc. but are not able to grab the attention of consumers or media like Jobs is able to, on stage. However, Windows 8 seems to be coming with a ton of integrated cloud features so I don't know about the humiliation part.I just don't see that their marketshare is affected more than 1% specifically due to the cloud services in…

Taking all Apple's emphasis on design, marketing, etc., aside. It starts very simple: Steve Jobs looks like a sympathetic guy on stage that we could easily emphasize with. Steve Ballmer looks, let's put it bluntly, unsympathetic and rude.

This difference is clearly visible in every fiber of marketing material from both companies. Apple marketing feels friendly and fresh, while Microsoft's tends to feel aggressive. Sometimes Microsoft attempts to copy Apple's marketing style, but it feels faked or superficial.

Don't underestimate company's 'soul'.

Re: For Google, iCloud Is Annoying; For Microsoft, It's A Humiliation

#25

Post by schrototo »

brown9-2 wrote: post #17
peterb wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difference is more nuanced than sales. At Apple designers rule, and because Steve understands design, they higher excellent designers. At Microsoft program manager's rule, and a PM is neither a technologist nor a designer. They represent "the user". As a result Microsoft is great at feature-rich products that solve many problems. At Apple, they focus on the human side of technology. They try to make things easier…

Don't designers represent "the user" also? Maybe a closer analogy would have the program managers representing "the business".

I think the difference is that designers have a vision of what the users really want, as opposed to what they say (or even think) they want. Whereas the PMs (in that example) are more the focus-group types.

Re: For Google, iCloud Is Annoying; For Microsoft, It's A Humiliation

#26

Post by rimantas »

brown9-2 wrote: post #16
jasonkolb wrote: post #5

I don't know that anything Apple is doing is that revolutionary, the difference is that Apple and Jobs are phenomenal at presenting the idea so that people actually get it. I'm sure there are a lot of Microsoft execs right now that are saying "we already do that with product X" and pretty pissed off that they were never able to sell product X over 5 years the way Apple did in an hour. The bottom line is that Apple kn…

The difference might be that on a new OS X install in the near future, pressing Save on a document open in even a simple text editor will automatically sync that document to "the cloud" and all my devices. No desktop app that I'm aware of from Microsoft does that today out of the box, as the default action. Sure you can easily sync stuff with Dropbox or whatever Microsoft's product is, or you can do word processing i…

> pressing Save on a document open

You will not need to even do that. It's autosaved. Coming to Lion next month.

Re: For Google, iCloud Is Annoying; For Microsoft, It's A Humiliation

#27

Post by stanleydrew »

sandipc wrote: post #11
flamingbuffalo wrote: post #3

Seems like this just is echoing Gruber from earlier this week: "But Google’s vision is about software you run in a web browser. Apple’s is about native apps you run on devices. Apple is as committed to native apps — on the desktop, tablet, and handheld — as it has ever been." http://daringfireball.net/2011/06/demoted

Interesting, I must have missed that earlier this week. Great concise summary of the long term philosophies of the two companies. Thanks.

if you haven't read this post from Paul Buchheit it sheds a lot of light on how the two philosophies might not be all that different: http://paulbuchheit.blogspot.com/2010/12/cloud-os.html

Re: For Google, iCloud Is Annoying; For Microsoft, It's A Humiliation

#29

Post by Androsynth »

jasonkolb wrote: post #5

I don't know that anything Apple is doing is that revolutionary, the difference is that Apple and Jobs are phenomenal at presenting the idea so that people actually get it. I'm sure there are a lot of Microsoft execs right now that are saying "we already do that with product X" and pretty pissed off that they were never able to sell product X over 5 years the way Apple did in an hour. The bottom line is that Apple kn…

Thats not true about Google. They consistently develop products that address needs I didn't even know I had: Chrome, Docs, Maps, all the way back to gmail. Hell, their business is based on search, which embodies this concept.

Re: For Google, iCloud Is Annoying; For Microsoft, It's A Humiliation

#30

Post by tjogin »

raganwald wrote: post #20
jasonkolb wrote: post #5

I don't know that anything Apple is doing is that revolutionary, the difference is that Apple and Jobs are phenomenal at presenting the idea so that people actually get it. I'm sure there are a lot of Microsoft execs right now that are saying "we already do that with product X" and pretty pissed off that they were never able to sell product X over 5 years the way Apple did in an hour. The bottom line is that Apple kn…

I don't agree that this is about "getting" marketing. You may not mean it this way, but when people describe Apple as being a marketing company, the implication is that given the exact same product, Apple would succeed where Microsoft would fail. The truth is, Apple doesn't build the exact same products as Microsoft. What Apple does is what Dropbox did: They take a product and build what people actually want. People…

Agreed. An obvious example from the real world is the tablet.

Prior to the introduction of the iPad, Microsoft and its partners had shipped lots of models of tablets for over a decade and they were all failures.

Then came the iPad. The iPad didn't succeed because Apple presented it well. It succeeded because unlike all of its predecessors it didn't suck.

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