Sprint goes all-out with $264,000 Palm Pre advertisement

Will Park

Will hails from The City of Angels - Los Angeles, California. He spends his time playing with his numerous gadgets and looking forward to seeing what future holds for mobile technology. An avid promoter of a fully "digital" life, he promotes the widespread adoption of truly mobile, paper-less living. He dreams of the day when he can go completely digital. No more snail mail, paper receipts, bound books, notepads/spiral notebooks, credit cards, hard currency. He's a digital warrior - fighting for the converged life. He is an idealist and a realist - he has a perfect view of what the world should be but knows that the world is not perfect. Can we ever hope to see Will's dream become reality? We'll see...

• q

  I intend on buying a pre, but come on. All those words and the Sprint name on top isn’t doing a whole lot to introduce people to the Pre. I recently watched an ATT commercial and the iphone was up front the whole time. I think sprint and palm could have done a much better job on this one. And based on sprints past reputation their name really should not be on top.

• David

  Sprint is in the process of trying to change how America perceives the company. Many people believe the reason why the Pre will be a flop is because people don’t want to switch to Sprint. I already have Sprint and I’m out of contract so I’m ready to upgrade to the Pre whenever it finally comes out.

• Tenika

  Everyone is saying that this commercial isn’t advertising the Pre…this isn’t a commercial for the Pre. Sprint is advertising there now network and just added the pre as an addition. I know that Sprint and Palm will come hard with the marketing and this is because of how much money they put into the Instinct commercial for such a crappy phone…the Pre is way better so expect big commercials. I have been with every carrier and Sprint is the best way far and I enjoy there Customer Service and the deals that they have for family plans…I will but 2 when it arrives.

• Travis D

  @Tenika
  Why do you sound like someone from Sprint posting a response? How do you know the Pre is “way better”, have you tried one? You enjoy their customer service, uhhh okay, when Sprint is historically known for bad CS. You will buy 2? Yeah, either you’re a major Sprint homer or you work for them.

  The WSJ ad doesn’t make sense to me, no one cares about the Now Network. Most people don’t buy a phone based on the network if they did millions would not have left their current service for ATT/iPhone. They buy the iPhone or BBStorm for the phone first, network second.

  The WSJ ad doesn’t even have the word “Pre” on it, so people who may be curious can’t even do research on it or ask for it. That makes no sense to me, every other phone advert mentions the phone over and over. The Pre will sell well, but I think Sprint will screw-up the marketing just as they did for the Instinct. There is a reason Sprint is in last place, poor marketing is part of that reason. Even in their TV commercial, they never mention the Pre – only showing it for 2-3 seconds at the end, WTF is that?! I say it again NO ONE CARES about the Now Network, people want the iPhone, G1, and Storm for the features and cool Apps, etc. Sprint is bumbling this already.

  Lastly, why mention Twitter over & over? Yes, Twitter is the new cool thing, but a lot of people have no idea what Twitter is and guessing a lot of WSJ readers could care less about Twitter, they care about business and serious news. Know your audience and craft your marketing to that audience. Put that WSJ ad in USA Today or some other casual news place, not WSJ. In WSJ tell how people can check stock quotes or email business folks or get sports/news updates. I am a Sprint customer (until the new iPhone comes out) and Sprint has been okay to me, but marketing is not their strength.

  :later.

• Preedom

  I’m just waiting for my new Palm Pre. I think my BB Curve sucks. I know there’s no perfect phone out there, but I think I’ll be more satisfied with a Palm Pre & all it has to offer. I just hope they stock enough for all. I’d hate to have to wait for back-orders.

• Mitch

  I’m on the fence between the iPhone 4 and the PalmPre. I’ve been using Palm for 15 years….but it’s time to make a final decision between the two. After all the differences, it seems to me like the one thing that will kill the Pre for me is the measly 8GB hard drive. iPhone is set for 32GB in June, I have to wait for that first. But man, I would sure love to stick with Palm. But Where’s the music? Where’s the Video? Where’s the space I need? Will Palm have bigger models available eventually?

• David

  Horrible Marketing Sprint! Horrible!!! Plz for the sake of your own company STOP MENTIONING THE NOW NETWORK AND MENTION THE PRE!!!

  I Feel like Sprint is trying to cover their own back because once Pre moves to other Carriers, Sprint will have nothing exclusive..

  …but for now mention the Pre!! build Buzz in those groups of people who havent heard about the phone yet to bring customers! Have commercials showing the Web OS features! plz someone talk some sense into Sprint’s Marketing People!!

• Kirk

  Sprint is way better than at&t and t-mobile. Trust me, I have had all three in the last 4 years. I’m with Sprint now and loving it. Better customer service (yup, better than t-mobile with zero wait times during peak hours), better plans. They need help in the marketing department though. Their ads suck.

  If pre is as good as I think it’ll be, I’ll get it in a heartbeat. The world will be a better place with a little competition for Iphone. I’m sick and tired of seeing it every where. I mean, its the windows of the mobile phone world.

• Robb

  I find it interesting that people are dissing Sprint advertising the network. Has anyone ever seen an “It’s the network” Verizon ad? What about a “More bars in more places” AT&T network ad? Apparently networks matter–it’s not just the network, but it does matter.

  I don’t know about the rest of the world, but money matters to me as well. With 4 phones, two of them Blackberries, I couldn’t afford to have unlimited Internet, texting, and email on other networks, but with Sprint, I can. And by the way, those plans are all on the “Now” network.

  As for customer service, I have had some bad experiences with Sprint in the past, but not recently. My worst one was about 5 years ago with home service, but I have also experienced bad service with other carriers (VERIZON). For me, the difference is that Sprint has always resolved my issue and never ended the conversation with “you will just have to live with it.”

  Palm Pre is Sprint’s current great hope. The display looks awesome as does the user interface, and I want one badly based on what I have seen so far. The I-phone is a kick-ass product to try to beat. For Sprint to have a winner, people will have to fall in love with their Pre and not want to put it down. In the end, the success of the pre will be dependent upon getting enough useful, free apps that people enjoy using paying a subscription fee every month.

  Perhaps then, the Now network can get over the 49,000,000 hump.

• Robb

  Oh, and one other thing….all of Sprint’s promotions are set to expire on June 6th, meaning they will have new marketing plan on June 7th. I will leave it to you all to surmise when the Pre will really hit the market.