Microsoft Zune: The Next Chapter a Open Letter

Dear Microsoft Zune;

The internet has been awash with the impending doom of the once mighty Zune brand no scratch that mighty isn’t the right choice of words for it. To the people who have used it, terms like wow and excellent do however come to mind followed by the inevitable “why isn’t this sucker a success”… Conventional wisdom states that the Zune HD is a failure because it was going up against the behemoth that is Apple, but I don’t believe that at all. Microsoft isn’t some start up in a basement fighting the good fight against the “man” Microsoft is a giant in its own right.

This essay isn’t the usual pile on trite that is found all over the internet praising the virtues of Apple and Google while kicking the fine folks at Redmond, no this is the exact opposite these are my thoughts as a loyal Microsoft product owner and user and what I think needs to be done and why to move this division forward to match all the other successful parts of the company.

Confidence

When I purchased my Xbox 360 there was no doubt in my mind that Microsoft was in this battle to win it. I got it a year after the PS3 and Wii were eventually released into the market and the Wii was selling like gangbusters while the PS3 was the odds on favorite to crush everybody due to its dominance during the previous console generation. Sometime during the middle of this epic fight the Xbox division did something uncharacteristic at the time, in order to capitalized on things the other companies weren’t doing they upgraded the software rather than rebooting the hardware which paid dividends in the market and helped to bolster its position in this race. The end result is now Xbox having 2 years plus of strong gains and even outselling the competition sometimes by huge margins. Analysts didn’t expect it other companies have been caught flat footed trying to figure out what that special sauce is that makes this thing do so well. But the undeniable thing that is there is confidence, from the PR release of the NPD numbers every month regardless of position, somebody from Xbox lets you know that the company means business, all the way down to the showing at E3 every year showcasing what is coming next and delivering it on time. These are the things that are the difference makers. Zune HD on the other hand no matter how excellent the hardware and software are, feels like Redmond is trying out a thing rather than this is an important pillar in the Microsoft brand and a foundation to the company. The funny thing about consumers is that they can tell, they feel it from the lack of advertising to the lack of updates to the hardware and software. They can tell from the lack of expanding deals to push the brand into new markets stores and countries. They can tell from things like releasing a SDK later rather than sooner and most of all they can tell from the deafening silence from Washington. It is the little things like updating the Zune desktop that lets people know that there is still something going on in the labs and if you haven’t gotten one yet you should pay attention because you might be missing out. Sadly I feel the same thing happening to Windows Phone 7 although the circumstances are different and it feels like the company is making more of a push to help lift this to a successful status the feelings are still there and so people wait. You can see it on the internet there are rumblings from owners and people feel uneasy with the brand like the rug could/will be pulled from underneath them at any moment and this is helping to bolster the case of waiting rather than jumping in. Once this feeling creeps in it is almost impossible to undo the damage it causes.

Leverage

Microsoft unlike most companies who get into this fight to sell MP3 players or the like has a unique thing most companies do not and that is a ridiculous portfolio full of things people LOVE and use at their disposal, unfortunately each of these things is separate and has little to no interaction with each other. If they are ever going to make solid gains in this market this has to change. Their competition is not shy about throwing around its weight behind its products and it is something that Microsoft needs to consider if it is going to chip away at their market share. Utilizing Hotmail in Windows Phone 7 is a start but that is not nearly enough the Zune desktop should be able to talk to and manage my Xbox as would any device that is plugged into that computer. I should be able to transfer purchased (or otherwise ripped) songs from my desktop over my home network directly to my Xbox as should pictures and videos, and the experience viewing these things needs to go from blah to wow. The most ironic thing about this is that they don’t need to create new programs from scratch the Zune looks amazing playing music and thus so should the Xbox. Looking at pictures looks great on a computer and even a phone why aren’t these experiences pushed to all devices in a similar fashion. These are the very things Apple and Google toss around that Microsoft could do very easily I might add but don’t and for the life of me I can’t figure out why. The same goes for Zune Pass, why is such an amazing thing hidden from the public. Things like the MSN.com portal should integrate everything MS together but it doesn’t. Logging into my Zune account doesn’t give me any pertinent information on the msn.com page special to my music interests. No band information no tour dates no album release dates for the music I like, there is no information as is on my Xbox itself. These are the places that I would like to get my updates rather than needing to search for it elsewhere. Use your music service to your advantage!

The Future

What is the future for the brand as a whole, the buying public wants to know scratch that we need to know that there is a future. Are there going to be more products down the road are you going to get out of the manufacturing game instead and service just software. All of which are super important answers that us consumers have no leadership on. Make me excited give me some meat, the silence is terrible in every way imaginable. Timelines are important but speed is more important. 18 months of being quiet and making little to no movements is not a sign of success or confidence regardless of actual unit sales.

If the reigns were given to me and Steve Ballmer said DJ Mic Mayhem here is our best team of engineers and software developers you have x amount of dollars and 6 months… OK GO. The absolute first thing I would do is develop Zune Pass for Android, HP, iPhone Blackberry, Traktor and Serato. I know what you are thinking the last two aren’t even phones that doesn’t even make any sense but bare with me I have a point to all this. The first and obvious thing is a no brainer, everybody who has ever used Zune Pass rave about how good it is but unfortunately it isn’t available in their country or on their phone. Zune pass is your Trojan horse to a taste on all that Zune goodness they are missing. While you make this free downloadable app available to all phones markets and platforms make the streaming service free to everybody who is a Xbox live gold subscriber. Now here is the rub you must always make the WP7 version better, I’ll repeat because somebody didn’t hear me ALWAYS make your version better. What we have now is the equivalent of the visiting team getting the fireworks, eye of the tiger theme song, and cheerleaders while the home team walks on the court already defeated to silence. Never and I mean never give other phones your products before you service your own phone. Anyways back to my original point All Zune “apps” across all platforms should have the ability to stream low and high quality music over the phone on wifi or 3G.

The second thing I would do is create Zune Radio. The emergence of radio streaming apps and companies is a budding market, one that has no competition from the other major phone companies (at least not yet but it is coming and wouldn’t it make more sense to be there first?) This radio streaming service should be 4 parts new media and 1 part old school, I am of course talking about making an actual radio station with real DJs/hosts the whole nine yards. So in addition to the real radio programs you of course have multiple channels that stream music like satellite radio does today directly to your Xbox, Zune or wp7 + all the other platforms (android, iOS, Palm/HP, Blackberry, Symbian). The end result would be a cool new app streaming unlimited continuous commercial free music in various traditional music channels like Rock Dance top40 Rap R&B Country etc… each of these channels can choose music based on a algorithm which calculates relevance from portable devices, desktop clients, Bing searches, and even requests from social media like Facebook and twitter. The ways to integrate and make a new user experience custom to your listeners could be unlike anything out there, and is yours for the taking. And the beauty of this is that being here first sets the tone (much like Xbox Live) for how Apple and Google must respond when they eventually bring their versions to the market and by then it could even be too late. The real radio station does two things, 1st it creates a presence in the real world that artist and music fans can see away from their phone/Xbox/Zune/desktop that shows Microsoft’s brand at award shows interviews concerts etc… and 2nd it creates a real face to Zune that people can relate to rather than a faceless company. Little known fact the reason I bought an Xbox instead of a PS3 was because I listened to the Major Nelson show religiously. You can call me old fashion but it means something to me that there are real people behind the scenes who game not just accountants worried about the bottom line. And finally the best part about these radio stations, I like most gamers listen to music when I game and I would love live radio stations beamed down into my Xbox gaming experience that brings to me the latest and the greatest and just like that you could reach an additional 30 million plus Xbox live subscribers and turn them into potential Zune users.

On to why did I include two DJ programs in this list… Integrating your music service with the two largest DJ software companies in the world would change the game in so many ways. Not only would the information the users provide help you keep track of the trends for what music you should focus on who is the target market where and why. I can’t even begin to explain how valuable it would be having people directly in the community of music fans automatically becoming a Microsoft evangelist by default because the two worlds believe it or not do overlap.

The last two things I would do is step up efforts to bring the independent community to the mainstream. Let the musicians be your voice by promoting their music through the Zune service and radio helping to reach potential customers of music and future Microsoft products. Next develop an independent channel that helps you discover new bands or find out where & when they tour, even go as far as creating Zune music festivals. If you want to win the best way is to start on the next generation of budding superstars.

Community

When the Zune was first created the idea that they sold us on was that this was going to be a community of listeners and the first steps were taken with things like the badge, and sharing your music with other Zune owners all of which were good ideas, but now is the time to turn to your existing Zune community and use them to make the service better. As blown away as I was with the Zune desktop client and the wallpapers and bios that showed up on my phone it immediately struck me that there are too many holes in the system. There are well known at least in my eyes artist with platinum and gold albums who have no backgrounds, pictures or bios. It is such an amazing feature that could be improved upon if it was opened up to Zune users and owners. Let the community help keep artist tour information up to date in their own respective cities. The whole Zune platform was designed for music fans and there is so much that the community could offer so why not take advantage of it. While for the most part the background photos are new and fresh every so often you run across artist that don’t have any information or pictures. I know it is a massive undertaking to maintain, but I’ll repeat more could be done if you allow end users to help you do this. This service could become the “go to” place for all things related to music, why not even work together with places like AllMusic, or Wikipedia to enhance the information or a major magazine like rolling stone for interviews that can be read through your portable device or Xbox. These are the things that will make this service stand head and shoulders above the rest and the changes while minor would only improve things. Artist information wallpapers tour dates album releases interviews and news should be available to everybody away from the Zune desktop app on things like the msn music hub and I’ll repeat on the Xbox 360. This is the best hidden thing you have that should be in the limelight everywhere.

Rap up

Listen I know it seems like everybody on the internet is ganging up on you guys, and that is because they really are, it is not a mirage and you guys are giving them all the ammunition in the world. While I know full well that some of my suggestions are a little more difficult to pull off and some have more risk than reward Microsoft needs to once again do things that their competitors wouldn’t or can’t. This is what separates them from other companies in the market right now. I didn’t write this as some sort of back handed suggestion box I am a genuine windows user. I didn’t take the wait and see approach with Windows Phone because I believe that eventually you guys are going to get it right, now it is your turn to prove it.

Editor and Chief, GPlusMath. For questions and comments you can email me at