Alley Cheung

WMBA 506
Global Strategy Paper
Dr. Kristen Schiele
April 18, 2013

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I.

Background

More than ten years ago, HTC started out as a manufacturer of PDA and handheld
devices founded in Taiwan. It produced products under the brands such as Qtek, Dopod, and
O2, etc., and it later began to manufacture smartphones and tablets under the HTC name,
introducing itself to the consumers as an independent brand which it used to be well known to
its corporate partners only. According to John Wan, Chief Marketing Officer of HTC, he claims
that branding is not about communications. Its about the thousands of pixels in the raindrop of
a weather app. HTCs brand is built on a culture that does not put the company at the center; it
puts the consumer at the center (Interbrand, 2012). Wang describes HTC as an innovative
company, which needs to formulate their brand strategy when facing a bundle of competitive
competitors in the industry (Interbrand, 2012). HTC is facing strong competitors, as Nokia,
Motorola, and Sony Ericson were better known for innovation. LG and Samsung were making
good quality products. The iPhone had just launched. And they all had deep distribution, long
heritage and huge marketing budgets (Interbrand, 2012). Although the market portfolio has
changed throughout the past year, it holds true that all competitors of HTC spend a lot on
marketing budgets.
The companys customer-centric strategy, which is Quietly Brilliant as shown in the
startup screen of all HTC phones, is explained to be committed to innovation quietly by Wang
(Interbrand, 2012). He also claims that Quietly Brilliant refers to do great things in a humble
way, as it is HTCs personality and has a universally good meaning around the world (2012).
From the currently launched of its new flagship smartphone, the HTC One, it has integrated
U.S. marketing campaign to include Live Experience Tour in the major cities of U.S. (HTC,

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2013), giving consumers the chance to experience the phone in person before it is available in
stores.

II.

Analysis

According to HTC, the phone will be available globally through more than 185
mobile operators and major retailers in more than 80 regions and countries (2013), and it will
be sold at AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Best Buy. The company claims that the new HTC One
has reinvent the mobile experience and set a new standard for smartphone (2013). They are
trying to provide their customers a chance to compare their current phone experience with the
new HTC One, so that customers words can tell the world about how unique is the new HTC
One. Since HTC is marketing its products with a global approach, as stated in the book
Strategic Marketing, that products are developed for the global market, selling the same
product in the same way, to everywhere. (Mooradian, Matzler, & Ring, 2012, pp.302). This
marketing strategy has always been true for HTC, as they never put advertising campaign as
their major marketing strategy. Perhaps this is a good tradition for Asian company to do a
business in a way that they would rather focus on working hard to make better products, than to
make a lot of noise in different mass medias, they have built their reputation through word-ofmouth in many Asian countries such as Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore.
On one hand, HTC has been working very well in providing differentiated products to
customers with different preferences. It has been developing phone operating on Windows and
Android systems. However, when HTC believes that their innovative well-designed products
can attract customers without advertising a lot in all of its target markets; it obviously has not

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done enough research on customer assessment. It is important to get enough understanding on
the study of customers in general to identify (a) trends in needs and demand, and (b) customer
insights (Mooradian, Matzler, & Ring, 2012, pp.72). Getting to know customers characteristics
in different geographic locations can help the company to better develop their marketing mix
and positioning. They should have focus on researching to pretest and refine tactics, including
price, promotions, and advertising, new products or product modifications, and merchandising
programs; and to gauge the effects of those tactics on achieving the desired position
(Mooradian, Matzler, & Ring, 2012, pp.72).
From the article, Its time for HTC to start fighting dirty by Dan Graziano, he
discusses that the main reason that lead HTCs revenue to decline for five consecutive quarters
is because the company is lacking of brand recognition among consumers, when it is still a
relatively new company compared to Apple, Samsung, and LG (2013). Graziano also
comments that HTC has not done well in building its brand image which can identify it from its
competitors (2013). This situation has been improved a bit, after HTC has appointed Benjamin
Ho to become the Chief Marketing Officer starting from January 2013, right before the new
HTC One was released (HTC, 2012). Ho is responsible to refocus HTCs marketing and massmarket brand outreach, which is referred to as Marketing 2.0 internally (HTC, 2012). Graziano
doubts that HTCs new brand direction is less favorable as Apple and Samsung, while Apple has
its i branding and Samsung is well-known for its Galaxy brand (2013). One is not a good
name which can recognize users about what type of smartphone they are using.
Moreover, HTC was not successful in advertising its products, as it once tried to
challenge skydivers to take pictures with HTC smartphones when they were falling from the
sky at 126mph (Hing, 2012). As Hing describes, the aim is for the ad to be treated as a

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personal recommendation (2012), it was a failure that the general public could not relate their
needs of using smartphones to the HTC phone which could take pictures high up in sky. It is
important for HTC to have a clear direction of what it wants to tell the consumers about what
HTC One is capable of, and what they can do better than iPhones and Galaxy phones.

III.

Results

It is good that HTC has recognized what went wrong on their marketing strategy in
the past few years. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, HTC CEO Peter Chou admitted
that the company did not market their products aggressively enough last year, but vowed to
win consumers back by developing more innovative products (Poon, 2013). HTC has been
keeping its words by introducing the new flagship HTC One smartphone, and set up HTC
BoomSound Lounge to introduce their front-facing stereo speakers on One; HTC One
Showroom to interact with customers in the pop-up stores where they can experience the new
phone; and the HTC Live Cinema Experience where HTC One is introduced to people through
live product demonstrations in the lobby of select theaters and showing the latest commercial
for the new HTC One on the big screen (HTC, 2013). At this point, HTC is moving a step
forward to get closer to its customers, showing improvement on its marketing strategy. It is still
early to give a conclusion on whether the new marketing strategy of HTC has succeeded or
failed, but it is foreseeable that in the near future, the sales figure for HTC One can tell if the
company is getting on the right track.

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References
Graziano, D. (2013). Its time for HTC to start fighting dirty. BGR Media. Retrieved from
http://bgr.com/2013/03/21/htc-one-marketing-analysis-389415/
Hing, D. (2012, March 30). HTC kicks off new marketing strategy. M&M Global. Retrieved from
http://www.mandmglobal.com/news/30-03-12/htc-kicks-off-new-marketing-strategy.aspx
HTC. (2012, November 28). HTC appoints Benjamin Ho Chief Marketing Officer. Retrieved
from http://www.htc.com/www/about/newsroom/2012/2012-11-28-HTC-appointsBenjamin-Ho-Chief-Marketing-Officer
HTC. (2013, April 5). HTC challenges consumer expectations with new HTC One live
experience tour: Tour launches across the country to show consumers the new HTC One
is everything your phone isnt Retrieved from
http://www.htc.com/us/about/newsroom/2013/2013-04-05-htc-challenges-consumerexpectations-with-new-htc-one-live-experience-tour
Mooradian, T. A., Matzler, K., & Ring, L. J. (2012). Strategic marketing. New Jersey: Pearson.
Poon, A. (2013). HTC vows to step up innovation. Wall Street Journal. Retrieved from
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323374504578220860255595952.html