What Would Alex Bosika Do?

Got to love BI for breaking it down for us.  Look at that small “blip” on the chart for the FREE FOOD!  Woo Hoo…! LOL

Bottom-line: Yahoo has an uphill battle to do whatever they think they can do with their content and mobile.  It is a very, VERY busy world out there and right now, all the products (remaining/existing) are a mess. 

Ask yourself when was the LAST time you used ANYTHING from Yahoo!  I can’t even remember — it’s been at least 5 years.  “Content” is a commodity and even if unique in the realm of the Economist and the Wall Street Journal, that is a world of the lucky few when it comes to digital monetization. 

I certainly don’t have all the answers because content is an old paradigm and its value prop is way past DOA (are we still talking “content” in the old school world view of digital and media channels of the dot-com era?  Yes, there is “content strategy” today - agreed. But “content” built in dot-com era under a media brand is really, really tired and the transition to mobile is NOT certain for monetization given the fragmented universe of apps, experiences, and mind share.  People have even less time to retain any mind share on the device deck.

Media should spend less time fantasizing here on what “could be” and more time on “where’s the beef?” because at the moment, it’s a lot of buzz and a lot of talk and at least BlackBerry has DELIVERED a product (albeit late for many, many reasons) compared to Yahoo! that has failed to deliver “something” for eons.

A.

I like Wind Mobile. But really folks, a network outage due to an weather or a network upgrade should be communicated as such via twitter or your main page.  Something like, “Some customers could be experiencing network outages due to bad weather or network upgrade.” What’s the harm in that? No harm, no foul. 

I’ve seen this countless times from other major brands.

Instead, some companies feel that I need to make a call to the call centre that is overseas and when I tell them this would be helpful to customers, I hear the standard “I’ll let my manager know” which translates to…nothing is going to happen. 

It’s too bad.

Seriously, when you offshore your customer base support, we’re talking about thousands of miles of separation to have something register with staff there when something is a really important customer service function.  Why do companies do this? Yeah, I get it.  Costs and “leveraged assets” - but it is bunk.

Loyalty is built by how you think about your customer.  I will admit, I went to WIND for competitive pricing but also because I wanted to see some innovative but solid competition — and thanks to WIND, this has occurred and has forced the rest of the competition to follow suit.  Everyone now has a “Tab Offer” or an “unlimited Canada call and text” plan.  That kind of goodness didn’t exist before WIND’s entry and we only had things like My5 and My10 programs which are extinct now.

Wind Mobile forced people to think about the phone bill — a $100/month wireless phone bill translates into $1200 per year — really, that is an insane service cost for communications (and data access) and continues to annoy Canadians.

Wind, I can handle the occasional outage.  Trust me, you have offered a great service for the price point.  But be brave and do more to report about the outages through accessible channels.  Really, we should NOT have to make the call centre tell us about an operational issue.

To add some balanced comfort, I can assure you that my 3G data service which I pay a pretty coin for at Rogers doesn’t feel 3GS and even worse, has so many dead pockets across the GTA to Burlington, I am stunned at how badly covered we are on a main corridor where people travel most by car or train.

BTW, a little bird told me that something big is happening between WIND and Mobilicity soon. ;-)  Within a 6-week time-frame.  You heard it hear first!

Folks, lots and lots of momentum with Team Blackberry.  Why not take a look at some of the big new items from the land of the Blackberry.

BlackBerry Enterprise Service 10:

• Launch of BES 10: http://blck.by/U4f14e
• License Trade Up Program: http://blck.by/Wigh2A
• Application management : http://blck.by/YHffQ8
• What’s happening with BES Express: http://blck.by/Xpgpeh

BlackBerry 10:

• Intro to BlackBerry Z10 and BlackBerry Q10: http://blck.by/WE6RLo
• BlackBerry 10 Pricing and Availability: http://blck.by/ThJ0UN
• BlackBerry Balance: http://blck.by/WVGtxE
• BBM video chat and BBM screen sharing: http://blck.by/Vxk7mD
• Business Apps: http://blck.by/UHbeaR
• BlackBerry 10 Security: http://blck.by/UHbqaf
• Box on BlackBerry 10 Offer: http://blck.by/UHbwOW

Transitions to BES10 and BB10?

Go to BlackBerry 10 Readiness Services: http://blck.by/WE2m69

Don’t forget to join the:

• Blackberry Experience Forum: http://blck.by/VLrZkl
• BlackBerry Live http://blck.by/VqL2i9

Live will provides hands-on time with Blackberry 10 and an opportunity for deeper insights on technology and mobile strategies.

Have a great weekend!