Google Nexus One & T-Mobile: How NOT to Announce a Product!

Like many technology pundits, I was eager to find out more about the latest Google Android mobile phone, the Nexus One. Although I had been following the other Android phones, I, like many folks, was particularly intrigued with Google’s first foray into hardware design. So, on Tuesday, January 5th, I logged onto watch the Live coverage of Google's Android phone announcement in near real time by Tom Krazit at CNet.

I was disappointed that I couldn’t find any way to watch the announcement on streaming video, the way Apple always does its big product launches. Instead, Google invited the technology press to attend a closed press conference, from which they all blogged.

I had already downloaded and watched many of the “leaked” demos of the Nexus One, so I knew what to expect about the features and functionality. And, I was happy to learn that T-Mobile would be the first carrier to offer the Nexus One, since I already have a T-Mobile contract for a very old Blackberry that isn’t working very well (makes phone calls on its own and my voice can’t be heard—so it annoys everyone in my phone book with dead air calls and racks up fees in the process!).

I was able to follow the press conference pretty well by refreshing my browser every few minutes to get the latest snippets from Tom Krazit. At the same time, I tweeted and surfed to both the Google Nexus One Web site and the T-Mobile site. That’s where things went south. Although the Nexus One Web site was up and running, the information on it was very minimal. There was absolutely nothing on the T-Mobile site at the time of the launch, nor in the hours that followed. I tried to order the T-Mobile version of the Nexus One from the Google site and was given an uninformative error message.

 
On Jan. 5th, the T-Mobile write up didn't include the details of the service plan you needed to have from T-Mobile. This version (Jan. 7th, still doesn't tell you how to get it!)

When I tried to order, this is the error message I got on Jan. 5th and again today!

So I resorted to waiting in a chat line for T-Mobile, from which I was bumped after moving from being 76th in line to 34th in line and had to start back over at 98! Eventually, an agent came onto the chat and was able to tell me what I needed to know: What T-Mobile service level do I need for the Android and how do I get it? She told me that I needed the T-Mobile Even More Individual 500 Plan for $79.99/month. I told her that was fine, please upgrade me. What she didn’t tell me (and I should have figured out), is that that move would knock out my Blackberry service. She also couldn’t tell me how soon I could get my Nexus One or how I would move anything (e.g. contact list) from one platform to the other. All in all, it was a disaster from a customer experience standpoint!

During the 24 hours I’ve had to contemplate whether or not the Nexus One will actually work for me and whether I should complete my order or just fix my Blackberry, buyers’ pre-remorse has set in. I realize I’m not sure that I can live without a keyboard for typing email. I’m pretty fast at thumbing my email. I probably will keep my old Blackberry, use it for email and messaging only, turn off the phone feature, and go back to my old plan. So, both companies lost out.

So did I. I was looking forward to learning the Nexus One and being part of both the Android ecosystem and the Apple ecosystem (I have an iTouch, so I use the apps, not the phone part.)  Verizon continues to be my mobile phone provider for voice services. (And, yes, I WOULD like to have a single device, but my need for belt and suspenders in communications, as well as my interest in watching the Apple and Google application ecosystems evolve will keep me juggling devices for another 12 months.) 

What should Google and T-Mobile have done?

Nobody should announce a product without first testing all of the scenarios that would-be customers would use. What I should have been able to do was to find a comprehensive set of guided scenarios on both the Google and T-Mobile Web sites. The scenarios offered should have included:

• I am new to T-Mobile, but I want to sign up today and get the phone and the 2-year service plan, what do I need to do?

• I am an existing T-Mobile customer, how do I migrate from one plan to another? How do I migrate from one phone to this one?

The same information should have been accessible from both sites. There should have been ample customer support people available both by phone and chat to help each customer through their migration scenarios. T-Mobile stores should have been ready to answer questions from walk-ins and call-ins and could have helped staff the flooded customer support lines. 

When I searched for Nexus One on the T-Mobile site on the day of the launch, nothing came up! Two days after the launch, still no page that explains how to buy it from Google and how to upgrade or buy the service contract to support it! At least the search is now redirecting to something that makes sense, but T-Mobile is not going to close any orders this way!

Apple would never have launched a new product or relationship without having designed and fully tested the customer experience for every scenario and every channel. Grow up, Google!

Comments

[Patty Seybold]

I wasn't the only one with customer support problems. Now, I'm really glad that I wasn't successful in buying the Nexus One! http://www.pcworld.com/article/186399/google_faces_deluge_of_nexus_one_complaints.html

[Patty Seybold]

Thanks, Scott! Great analysis as always!!

Patty

[Scott Jordan]

Patty,

I enjoyed your take on the Nexus One intro. For me, the bigger picture disappoints as well. Some random thoughts:

1) The iPhone, like the Mac, has benefited from a strongly-enforced central vision that governs everything from its user interface to its apps store. Apple's walled-garden paradigm results in a marketing corpus and a user experience which are consistent, coordinated and choreographed. Every incremental effort assists in building the brand. (In the case of the iPhone, which was quite the paradigm-shifter, there was the additional need to enforce security measures and limit impacts on its partners' networks, for example by denying users who want to tether their PCs to their phone, as you can do with even your ancient Blackberry, and by stalling Flash implementation.)

2) In both OS X and iPhone OS, Apple took a solid open-source OS that was going nowhere (FreeBSD Unix) and turned it into a commercial and technical tour de force that has a unique and compelling persona all its own. The result is a unique and effective hybrid technical and licensing architecture that seems to leverage the best of the open-source and proprietary models.

3) Now, as exemplified by Grand Central Dispatch and propelled by its newly acquired chipmaking capability (PA Semi) and cloud investments, Apple seems poised to rocket further ahead of the industry in technical capability.

4) Google, by comparison, certainly could have enforced a central vision when it introduced the Android OS. But they didn't, and their choice of Linux as their solid-open-source-OS-going-nowhere imposed GPL strictures which kept them from effectively corralling the developmental cats. Android immediately suffered fragmentation issues, including software and UI inconsistencies from phone to phone. It falls to the level of blood libel to suggest that Android may be the new Windows Mobile in that regard, but there's truth to that.

5) Google's Nexus One intro, to my eye, seemed to exhibit a tinge of corporate annoyance to it. It is almost as though Google was saying, "Look, you guys are getting it wrong, this is what we meant this platform to be." And, as you pointed out, their introduction's tactical implementation was... well, kinda lame, with many missed stitches compared to Apple's usual benchmark for such things. There's the risk that users will emerge more confused at the chaos that is Android, and it remains to be seen if leading-by-example is an effective way to battle open-source fragmentation.

6) Also regrettable is that Nexus One comes so close on the heels of Motorola's well-done Droid intro, precisely the aggressive and ballsy salient that stodgy and staggering company needs to survive. What is Google telegraphing about its commitment to its partners? In this regard, Microsoft's ostentatious spotlighting of its licensees in its Windows 7 roll-outs and Ballmer's CES star-turn is starkly contrasting, and very wise. Competing with one's customers never goes well... and although an Android licensee is hardly a "customer" in the cash-paying sense, the notion is the same. Meanwhile, Microsoft has generally kept its licensing-based and hardware business models pretty well separate: Xbox competes with no OS licensees, ditto for Zune. (And the less said about Sidekick, the better!)

Bottom line: there's a reason desktop Linux is nowhere today. And I speak as a fan of it. The Nexus One intro leaves me wondering if Google failed to learn some important lessons from Linux's example. And I'm really wondering if Google possesses an amoral corporate culture that is incompatible with collaboration. Between the points I've mentioned above and the fracturing of their once-close relationship with Apple (which, let's face it, looks like it may have included outright poaching by Google), I'm getting a picture of a perilous partner to have in the trenches with you.