Brands Create Customers

It’s brand decision time at Microsoft.

The upcoming release of Windows Vista and Office 12 presents a significant brand opportunity for Microsoft. The issue: what kind of customer does MS intend to create with the new OS and application suite?

Microsoft reinvented the business world with its Windows OS and Office products in the 1990’s. Before then, smart, imaginative workers often suffered under entrenched, rigid bureaucracies. They lacked the means to initiate and develop new solutions.

Microsoft changed that. It gave tools to active minds. It empowered initiative and creative thought. Using Microsoft products, motivated employees could innovate on value and break through layers of thoughtless routine. They made their companies far more efficient in the process.

The brand question: how will Vista and Office 12 advance the Microsoft customer? Google is creating customers left and right. And so is Apple. How does Microsoft create better customers?

The answer may lie in Microsoft’s roots. If Microsoft defines its customer as the proto-Gatesian iconoclast who needs better tools to grow his/her capabilities, i.e., if Microsoft delivers freedoms to potential value creators, its new offerings can re-confirm Microsoft as the enabler of the personal and productive edge.

Brands create customers. But first they design them.

NOTE:  On February 15 Microsoft announced that “Office 12″ would be officially designated “Office 2007″.

This entry was posted on Friday, February 3rd, 2006 at 11:00 am and is filed under Creating Customers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.