Google worried about Samsung's dominance

Myshra · 26 Feb 2013 at 14:29

Forking will mean loss of the Android purchases through gMarket which will probably be pretty horrific for the less technical, I'd hate to be the shop employee trying to explain that one.

It's worth noting, more than Samsung pay Sales commission Nexus (although I don't doubt the spending) and they in particular have a lot more of the market to target - You need to sell volume low end/mid and make a decent return off your top - I would naturally expect them to spend more. While I am afraid I am not allowed to share market data, I can at least say Nokia had a very similar strat when it came to advertising until they... well.... I don't like to talk about it

Nexus18 · 26 Feb 2013 at 14:32

Interesting comments from people who "supposedly" work in phone/electronic shops:

My daughter used to work in a high street reseller in Australia. The Samsung sales reps used to bribe staff to sell Galaxies with gift cards, etc. Also, the store managers and area managers used to come down on staff who sold too many iPhones, because "they made no margin" on them.

If a customer came in asking for an iPhone, they HAD too attempt to cross sell to a Samsung, otherwise they were disciplined.

Also, when iPhones were in short supply (even if they had stock in the back room) staff told customers they were out of stock so that they didn't get told off for selling too many.

Having worked in electronics retail, selling (among others) Samsung cameras, I suspect a significant portion of this cost is going on Spivs - the award of cash and/or valuable prizes to sales people who achieve particular targets.

Often this would include large screen tvs, hifi components, gift vouchers etc.
Sales staff might receive $5-$20 in value for each camera sold (as long as they achieve a minimum price) and could earn hundreds a day over their base salary

You've come to look at camera x, do you ever take photos of kids?
Consider the value of this Samsung camera with a screen in the front (hands rub together in glee)

At the same time I observed my colleagues struggling to sell apple computers due to a lack of incentives

Amongst other comments like that :/

As to if that is exactly true or not is another question, however, I wouldn't be surprised if it were far from the truth as things like that do go on in the "background" unfortunately (not just with Samsung)

Freefaller · 26 Feb 2013 at 14:59

The s3 has a memory card and a removable battery, and is fast.

My nexus 7 is awesome, the android experience is even better than the s3. If it just had a bit more "tweaking" and add a MHL/HDMI adaptor for the Nexus 7 then I'd be all over it.

thep02 · 26 Feb 2013 at 15:01

Sounds like the Oz staff were giving good advice steering folk away from Apple puddings and getting bribed to do so.. win win

kona786 · 26 Feb 2013 at 15:05

Nexus18 said:
The reason they are so successful is largely due to their marketing/advertising

The thing is that you 'can't polish a turd'.

No matter how good advertising is if a product is carp it won't sell for long.

They make good products is why they are successful.

Shimmy · 26 Feb 2013 at 15:09

Nexus18 said:
Interesting comments from people who "supposedly" work in phone/electronic shops:

Amongst other comments like that :/

As to if that is exactly true or not is another question, however, I wouldn't be surprised if it were far from the truth as things like that do go on in the "background" unfortunately (not just with Samsung)

Yup, all of that definitely happens. All over the world and in this country too.

There are other companies with similar incentives but Samsung more so than the rest.

snapdragon · 26 Feb 2013 at 15:09

Nice to see a topic debated and discussed properly without any bashing.

Myshra · 26 Feb 2013 at 15:24

Nexus18 said:
As to if that is exactly true or not is another question, however, I wouldn't be surprised if it were far from the truth as things like that do go on in the "background" unfortunately (not just with Samsung)

Good news, I can confirm it's 100% true

ask any P4U/CPW employee how their incentives work if you dare

SE gave some lovely holidays IIRC, used to see promos all the time on the shop intranet at orange.

Nexus18 · 26 Feb 2013 at 17:49

thep02 said:
Sounds like the Oz staff were giving good advice steering folk away from Apple puddings and getting bribed to do so.. win win

Good point!

kona786 said:
The thing is that you 'can't polish a turd'. No matter how good advertising is if a product is carp it won't sell for long.

They make good products is why they are successful.

Oh without a doubt, their phones are superb (especially the GS 2, it just nuked every device from orbit at the time of release), however, taking the GS 3 and its popularity/sales, it isn't "that good" of a device imo, as in it isn't that "much" better than the competition, if any better at all, depending on how you look at it imo. There are loads of good devices that have been excellent and as good as the Gs 3, however, haven't sold well due to the lack of marketing/advertising.

Samsung have sorted themselves out in more than just advertising/marketing though i.e. the brand name, keeping their "unique" features with a unified name which is much better. HTC have really shot themselves in the foot with their releases, naming of devices and features i.e. boom sound, zoe, blink feed

There are a number of other wee things but marketing/advertising is the biggest factor as to how well a device will do regardless of it is crap (by crap, I mean as in not having great specs etc. but working just fine with hardly any problems) or good.

It is a shame that these companies have to essentially "bribe" the employees that work in shops etc. in order to sell/push their devices onto customers

In the end, they aren't going to be recommending what suits the customer the best

stoosh · 26 Feb 2013 at 18:04

Myshra said:
Good news, I can confirm it's 100% true ask any P4U/CPW employee how their incentives work if you dare SE gave some lovely holidays IIRC, used to see promos all the time on the shop intranet at orange.

Ah my perception of a perfect untainted phone shop world is now in tatters! :eek:

I thought phones were sold on their own merits

kona786 · 26 Feb 2013 at 18:29

Nexus18 said:
Oh without a doubt, their phones are superb (especially the GS 2, it just nuked every device from orbit at the time of release), however, taking the GS 3 and its popularity/sales, it isn't "that good" of a device imo, as in it isn't that "much" better than the competition, if any better at all, depending on how you look at it imo. There are loads of good devices that have been excellent and as good as the Gs 3, however, haven't sold well due to the lack of marketing/advertising.

At the time the GS3's main competition was the One X, Xperia S, LG 4X. It crushed 2 of them with ease and was better than the HOX in a lot of ways for me.

For me it had a better NLED, storage, removable battery (extended options), better Soc, better screen, better dev scene - and my LTE version has 2GB RAM and DC-HSPA.

So for me it easily bettered the competition.

HTC seem to always mess around with stuff and make a lot of it worse. They never make a complete phone for my use case scenario.

Nexus18 · 26 Feb 2013 at 18:36

You forgot the one s........

I wouldn't even put the xperia S and LG in the same league as the S/X, GS 3!

HTC would have had a real winner on their hands if they just released the XL here instead of the "X".

kona786 · 26 Feb 2013 at 18:59

The S wasn't is the same space if someone wanted 720p/~4.7".

Like always HTC always mess up a major aspect of their phones.

The HOS is a great phone - no doubting that. But it didn't have a 720p screen which in 2012 was a must for me.

Samsung got all the key components correct and were rewarded for it.

EDIT: I want HTC to be crucified for what they did to the nav buttons on the new ONE

Adrianr · 26 Feb 2013 at 19:47

HTC could get themselves back into the race if they just made one good phone and marketed the absolute arse off it (What they are hopefully now doing with the One). The HOX was a great device, it both looks and feels far and away more expensive than the GS3. The battery life was awful and it wasn't as feature rich as the GS3, but with a good focused marketing campaign (a fashion student skydiving from an aeroplane, really?! If someone didn't get fired for that car crash there's no hope), they could have made it the premium iPhone alternative. Instead they made the One X, One S, One V, waited 4 weeks and made a One X+, waited a few days and made a One XL, and before the kettle was boiled announced the One.. Just put the bloody drawing board down for a minute and have a think about what you're doing. The only people who can keep up with what HTC are offering are phone enthusiasts, which really isn't the market you want to be shooting for.

HTC need to have their Galaxy S2 moment. One good phone that fits a huge chunk of the market that everyone knows about when coming to upgrade their phones.