Huawei guys, or most other Chinese handset makers, need to hire me as its head of Int'l branding in high-end markets, since this
Shao is absolutely clueless!!!
Seems that he doesn't understand what makes a premium phone, or
"occupy a place emotionally in consumers' hearts". The size of Global marketing budget, or ability to make similar products, as he cited, is far away from being the key.
1. software quality and consistancy of this quality all the time: some of Huawei phone's hardware are great. but lagging on software quality and still have small gliches here and there. This is a
no no for high-end consumers, who just like ones who check into a 7-star hotel
expecting nothing short of perfection, not "more or less", of the services/software.
2. Innovation, innovation, innovation! to make products with features and hi tech that other premium competitors don't have. That's the key! So the strategy should
not be that "
Huawei can more or less also make what Samsung and iphones make but with only half a price", not only that, but also more importantly beyond that to become "
Huawei can make some flagship phones with tech that are so good ans so unique that neither Samsung nor iphone can do".
In other words: if the best of Samsung and iphone are marked at £700 in the market, the day when Huawei is able to, and dare to, mark its counterpart flagships at £800 instead of usual £350 is the day when Huawei handsets
"occupy a place emotionally in consumers' hearts", and THE place. Want to compete with £700 brand names? then start to make £800 phones rather than £350 ones which always look "cheap". e.g. one of my first phones a decade ago around Y2K was a tiny Sony (only 2G GSM, with a sizable antenna
) which costed me about 1,000 euro at a time. I didn't care and I wanted the best in the market. This is the high end market that Huawei wants to compete in.
The high-end market is not money-conscious by default, but quality and technology-conscious.