{"id":647383,"date":"2013-03-18T12:59:44","date_gmt":"2013-03-18T16:59:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.talkandroid.com\/?p=154572"},"modified":"2013-03-18T12:59:44","modified_gmt":"2013-03-18T16:59:44","slug":"how-htc-can-get-its-groove-back","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/647383","title":{"rendered":"How HTC Can Get Its Groove Back"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-154585\" alt=\"HTC\" src=\"http:\/\/img.talkandroid.com\/uploads\/2013\/03\/htc.jpg\" width=\"625\" height=\"395\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Around the summer of 2010, my contract was coming to an end and the HTC EVO 4G on\u00a0Sprint was very appealing. Touted as &#8220;America&#8217;s first 4G phone&#8221;, it featured a large display and great specs at the time. I desperately wanted this phone and every Sprint store, Radioshack, or online store, was out of stock for four to six weeks. With my contract ending in just a couple weeks, the options were simple: Either buy the EVO 4G for full price and then some due to demand, or just grab a Blackberry. Unfortunately, an outdated BlackBerry Curve it was.<span id=\"more-154572\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p>In the Spring of 2011, I finally got my hands on a\u00a0slightly used EVO 4G. It was a great investment and I was even using it up until the fall of last year before I was due for an upgrade, going with the <a  href=\"http:\/\/www.talkandroid.com\/reviews\/phone\/u-s-samsung-galaxy-s-iii-review-a-contender-not-to-be-reckoned-with-video\/\" >Samsung Galaxy S III<\/a>. Fast forward to now and HTC has taken quite a hit because it doesn&#8217;t have quite the zing or product support as we&#8217;d seen in the past. In fact, over the last several years, <a  href=\"http:\/\/www.talkandroid.com\/143671-htcs-november-2012-sales-fall-31-4-from-previous-year\/\" >declining profits<\/a> and <a  href=\"http:\/\/www.talkandroid.com\/124874-htc-leaves-the-south-korean-market\/\" >market share<\/a> have pushed the\u00a0Taiwanese\u00a0company <a  href=\"http:\/\/www.talkandroid.com\/143008-sony-overtakes-htc-for-second-place-in-uk-android-market\/\" >further down the list<\/a>. Earlier this year, CEO Peter Chou blamed poor marketing <a  href=\"http:\/\/www.talkandroid.com\/146622-htcs-new-years-resolution-bring-unique-products-to-market\/\" >as the reason for their decline<\/a>. However, he said the same thing last year and nothing really changed.<\/p>\n<p>Samsung has quickly grown to be the world&#8217;s number one Android manufacturer, capturing a massive 40% of all Android smartphones and tablets. They capitalized on HTC&#8217;s poor marketing and lack of clear vision with a product line. In 2012 alone, <a  href=\"http:\/\/www.talkandroid.com\/154223-samsung-ramped-up-advertising-in-2012-outspent-apple-by-68-million\/\">Samsung spent $401 million advertising its mobile devices in the US<\/a>. In today&#8217;s marketplace,\u00a0great devices do not sell themselves: <a  href=\"http:\/\/www.talkandroid.com\/154515-the-samsung-galaxy-s-4-isnt-about-the-specs-its-about-the-features-and-marketing\/\" >great marketing does<\/a>. By comparison, HTC cut its advertising budget by 45%. It&#8217;s pretty clear that Samsung&#8217;s advertising push is paying off, then again, they&#8217;re selling devices like hotcakes which makes it much easier to invest so much money. What makes Samsung&#8217;s latest flagship device particularly appealing <a  href=\"http:\/\/www.talkandroid.com\/154515-the-samsung-galaxy-s-4-isnt-about-the-specs-its-about-the-features-and-marketing\/\">isn&#8217;t the specs but the software features<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>At Unpacked 2013, the South Korean giant really pushed its new software features from Smart Scroll eye-tracking technology to new sensors that work with S Health to help users stay more active. When you break it down, the Galaxy S 4 and HTC One have very similar specs: 1080p HD display, quad-core processor, 2GB RAM, up to 64GB of storage, and so on.\u00a0In all reality, trying to sell the One based on specs and quality\u00a0isn&#8217;t going to cut it.\u00a0<a  href=\"http:\/\/www.talkandroid.com\/151280-hands-on-with-the-htc-one-and-the-new-sense-5\/\">HTC announced a slew of new features as well<\/a>\u00a0and they need to utilize those as selling points. I personally think the One is a higher quality phone as opposed to the Galaxy S 4, but consumer&#8217;s are going to buy the phone that gives them the most features. Samsung clearly wins in that category, and is something HTC needs to change in the near future.<\/p>\n<p>The One seems to recapture the special feeling the EVO 4G had and with its interesting features such as Zoe and Boom Sound and that&#8217;s what mainstream consumers really care about. This is where their focus needs to be instead of\u00a0<a  href=\"http:\/\/www.talkandroid.com\/154472-htc-launching-offensive-against-samsung\/\">bashing Samsung<\/a>\u00a0in some desperate attempt to grab attention.\u00a0At this stage of the game, HTC simply can&#8217;t revert to their old ways of talking and not doing. With the One hitting US carriers towards the end of March and the Galaxy S 4 not launching until the end of April, they do stand a chance of selling a good amount before the inevitable rush of Samsung fans upgrade.\u00a0However, HTC might not have enough new features to attract enough consumers.<\/p>\n<p>Can HTC recapture the consumer&#8217;s attention? It&#8217;s anyone&#8217;s guess at this point. Maybe Peter Chou is serious this time. While highlighting the One&#8217;s features are important, one can&#8217;t forget that it all comes down to marketing.\u00a0Sure, HTC isn&#8217;t profiting hand over fist, but they&#8217;ll have to reach deep into their pockets to make it happen, and I hope they do.<\/p>\n<p>\n<strong>Come comment on this article: <a  href=\"http:\/\/www.talkandroid.com\/154572-how-htc-can-get-its-groove-back\/\">How HTC Can Get Its Groove Back<\/a><\/strong><br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div style=\"text-align:right;\"><small>Visit <a  rel=\"dofollow\" href=\"http:\/\/www.talkandroid.com\/\">TalkAndroid for Android news<\/a>, <a  rel=\"dofollow\" href=\"http:\/\/www.talkandroid.com\/guides\/\">Android guides<\/a>, and much more!<\/small><\/div>\n<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~r\/AndroidNewsGoogleAndroidForums\/~4\/3SIxB3uMYj8\" height=\"1\" width=\"1\"\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Around the summer of 2010, my contract was coming to an end and the HTC EVO 4G on\u00a0Sprint was very appealing. Touted as &#8220;America&#8217;s first 4G phone&#8221;, it featured a large display and great specs at the time. I desperately wanted this phone and every Sprint store, Radioshack, or online store, was out of stock [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7705,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-647383","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/647383","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7705"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=647383"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/647383\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=647383"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=647383"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=647383"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}