July 9, 2005
how to lose x-hundred million dollars for no good reason
Jeff Jarvis, one of my heroes and favorite bloggers has been having quite a run-in with Dell.
And the mainstream media has picked up on it.
When I first read how Dell responded to it, the first two words that came to mind were “Oh, Dear.”
“Dell is dead,” a friend told me today. “I first sensed that four years ago, when they stopped being a technology company and started being a marketing company.”
PS: when I say “Branding Is Dead”, that’s what I’m talking about. Getting too metaphorical about one’s product kills companies.
Um, Hugh, that points to an entirely unrelated article on tagging.
Ooops.… Fixed.
Hey Hugh, Great blog.
I agree that Dell is suffering from myopia, and unprofessional communications and customer relations folks.
But the fact that someone once preceived Dell as a “technology” company is really a bit misinformed… and never an outright goal of Dell. From day one Dell has been nothing but a firm hell-bent on operational efficiency. In fact, they’ve been constructing one of the best marketing mechanisms for now 20 years. What they market (and to a lesser and lesser degree manufacture) are the wares of the PC industrial ecosystem. And have proven time and again, when it comes to consistent bottom-line performance, they have created an exceptional marketing platform for PC-based hardware and it’s complementary products.
I admit they have the tendency to be crude and blunt, with a Texas-style over-confidence, and seem to be demonstrating a lack of respect to the burgeoning power of the blogospere, but this is typical of them. Never and early adoptor, but always a fast and damn cheap follower.
They must figure this out (I suspect they will), or they will pay in the marketplace. As this company tries to extend more and more into the consumer space, they will need to ensure they don’t tarnish their image via word of mouth. As if “Dell” didn’t suffer from an extreme case of the not-cools already.