In pointing out the major differences in the mentality behind mobile and online gaming during last weeks Games and Mobile conference here in NYC, Robert Tercek, CEO and Founder of MultiMedia Networks, pointed out that the Wireless Industry is one that, since its earliest days of Land Line telecom, is based on predictability. “Consistency,” he told the audience during his Keynote address, “is the core to telecom.” Now, mr Tercek was telling us this in order to relay an important message to those in the mobile industry, telling them that when it comes to mobile gaming they better loosen up. But what he is saying regarding the network operators need for accountability rings true for most American’s (with, according to a Harris Interactive Poll, 78% of those surveyed said their cellphone companies could improve coverage and service quality) and the message most of the carriers want you to hear is becoming all to clear, pun intended.
The network operators here in the United States have spent billions of dollars pushing the concept of “full bars” and seamless coverage. Verizon Wireless has been roaming around the country claiming to be “America’s Most Reliable Network,” the Sprint Nextel trench-coat man assured me yesterday that “no one has a more powerful network. And Cingular (for the sake of disclosure the carrier I rely on) has been trumping up a recent Telephia study which claimed that there networks had the fewest dropped calls. Mrs Catherine Zeta Jones and T-Mobile still seem hung up on minutes.
At the same time, and to give the carriers some credit, they have also put some of their money where their advertising mouth is having recently spent 10’s of billions of dollars upgrading their networks.
As the wireless industry becomes more commoditized , therefore, the emphasis for carriers is shifting from price and minutes to actual call and network quality.
We are in the middle of an advertising “coverage war” here in the United States and the network ads are, according to a recent (yesterday) New York Times article “causing backbiting as intense as any showdown between Coke and Pepsi.”
Technorati Tags: ads, advertising, coverage, networks, nextel, nyt, sprint, verizon
