I have been enjoying seeing the tidal wave of articles on Microsoft’s beta operating system Windows 7: firstly reading about what the system has to offer, but secondly for following the hugely positive PR Microsoft has had with the system.
Good press
For those who don’t know, Microsoft is giving away beta (test) copies of the Windows 7 system (a replacement for good old XP and the much-maligned Vista) to anyone who wants to download it from their website. Thousands of people have done this, and hundreds of people have written about it after they have trialed it.
The news has been largely very positive; and scores of lengthy, detailed and positive articles have been written about Microsoft and Windows 7 and appeared in media around the world. Here’s just one recent example from the New Zealand Herald.
The system is not even due to hit the shops for another year but they have managed to build up a powerful sense of anticipation around their flagship product. Even the criticism can be viewed as a positive thing because Microsoft has all this year to continue developing and refining the product based on customer feedback, which it has been doing.
Responsive to customers
It is also getting tons of love for being seen to be receptive and responsive to customer critiques. Something the generally prickly and defensive company can not really claim to have been in the past.
The change in approach is a massive ground-shift for the company, who, in allowing any-one who wants to test-run Windows 7, is playing the marketing game more like young online upstarts than the cumbersome and slow-moving giant it has so often been portrayed as previously. Microsoft, has in the past, been highly secretive around their new products.
Giving away stuff to make friends
The strategy is also further vindication of the increasingly popular, online business strategy of giving away stuff to get people to buy more. There’s more about that strategy here.
Microsoft is feeling and sharing the software love and making friends everywhere. What a difference a clean Window makes.
You’d think big firms would have cottoned on to online etiquette in the 21st century. Here’s a global clothing retailer that may have used a Kiwi designer’s online work without permission on their t-shirts (as covered on TVNZ’s Close-Up show). If that’s the case, shame on you, H&M!
The beauty of the internet is that it is easy to find great work online; and it’s just as easy to get in touch with the owner of the work and collaborate with them with beneficial results for everyone. Not in this case, it would appear.
With some mildly, soft-core bedroom scenes, including one with her gay male friend from New Zealand, the thinly disguised auto-biographical (reportedly), online novel by Moscow expat, American lawyer Deirdre Dare, and her see-through lingerie photos, have taken Ms Dare to centre stage in the world’s mainstream media. Personal branding sent viral to the max.
Here’s her website. Good luck, Ms Dare.
The government’s ‘tough guys’ image seen in John Key’s handshaking with a broken hand of 120 rugby league players (see yesterday’s post) has been boosted by social development minister Paula Bennett’s successful intervention recently in a teenaged girls’ street brawl.
Whether this impromptu ‘street-wise’ branding will serve them well going forward remains to be seen. But it’s certainly a positive look in what it says about the minister as a person and perhaps a signpost towards the government’s intentions towards its proposed ‘boot camp’ youth policies.
Merry Christmas, everyone. Have a relaxing break and see you in 2009. Facttactic will be back in action in early January, and I look forward to seeing you then.
Adam
