Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!usc!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!uakari!uflorida!haven!wam!walrus From: walrus@wam.umd.edu (Udo K Schuermann) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: Re: Stability of Commodore/Amiga Message-ID: <1990Feb25.190708.5203@wam.umd.edu> Date: 25 Feb 90 19:07:08 GMT References: <25E6247E.3F0F@deimos.cis.ksu.edu> Sender: usenet@wam.umd.edu (USENET Posting) Reply-To: walrus@wam.umd.edu (Udo K Schuermann) Distribution: usa Organization: University of Maryland at College Park Lines: 113 I was going to send this as a reply to Jeff Brogden request for ways of making people trust Commodore, but thought it might be a good counterpoint to those bits like `oh C= such and such stinks'. Sadly, there are too many flames and not enough help. So here I am with my two CONSTRUCTIVE cents. -> If your flame-thrower is lit, or you want to discuss my points, please e-mail me. I don't want to start yet another flame war wasting bandwidth. -> All of this stuff is pretty much common sense. It just seems that no time has there been a posting that sums up the various points IMHO, the following things could be done to improve the Amiga's image and make people trust both the machine and (more importantly) Commodore: DEALERS: - Dealers should advertise the Amiga in some form or another. After all, how many pictures of Macs and IBMs do you see when you flip through the Computers section of the Yellow Pages? How about the news paper? Very often it is _little_ things like these that people will recognize and remember. - Have a full time Amiga knowledgable person in the store; make sure that Amiga questions are directed to that person to reduce fumbles and bad publicity. Bad publicity ("the Amiga doesn't have any software", "doesn't it crash all the time?", etc) hurt sales, your business, and Commodore. Above all, the customer won't buy an Amiga. - Prominently display Amiga magazines, software, hardware, and advertising in the store. A display of confidence is a MUST. Hide it, and people will think it has no software or that it can't be expanded, or that it doesn't have any support. - Do not hide the Amiga in a backseat position in the store. Present it, let it advertise itself (run animation demos) to catch peoples' eyes and draw them in -- then show them that it can do word processing and databases and spreadsheets and such things, too. Make sure a customer knows that there is more software available than they are ever likely to fit on any harddisk. Tell them that there is lots and lots of inexpensive titles available (such as from Fred Fish). Don't swamp a customer with concepts such as multitasking if they don't understand its usefulness. Give them examples from messy-dos: Terminate-Stay- Resident (TSR) programs which conflict or can't be unloaded, which can't be called up while you're downloading something, etc. Example: NewAge Computers in College Park, MD does a _very_ good job at all of these. Anyone who walks into the store, sees Amigas everywhere, the walls are full of Amiga titles, posters on the walls, GVP hardware under glass, etc, and the people working there own Amigas themselves and know the machine in and out. The image is: hey, the Amiga is noteworthy, and these guys put everything they've got behind it! These guys aren't scared that Commodore will go under! They trust Commodore. C= COMMODORE: - Commodore should offer a longer warrantee period. Some dealers extend the warrantee to one year by themselves to improve the Amiga's image. At least it should be possible to purchase one or two year warrantees at reasonable prices. The idea is if Commodore only offers you a 90 day warrantee, are they trying to push some shaky junk on you? Do they believe in their own product? This is, above all, an image issue. My A1000 has worked from day one and show no signs of wear (except for stains and scratches :^) ). I figure that the the cost overhead of a longer warrantee period would be worth the improvement in image. - Commodore did a nice job last fall, giving the Amiga better visibility. Hey, advertisement addresses a particular audience. These weren't meant for you and me. I've heard people here and there ask, "Oh, you have an Amiga? I heard it's a really nice machine." More and more people _do_ recognize the machine by name. - Commodore should continue advertising. Maybe not as big as fall '89 but it is worse, IMHO to advertise once and never again, than to advertise a little on a semi-continual basis. Avoid the scenario where a year or two down the line someone asks "What ever happened to the Amiga? Is Commodore still around?" MISCELLANEOUS: - Users like you and me can talk about our machine, demo it when the opportunity arises, and else get people to go to a store that we think represents the machine well. - Bad advertising is far, far worse than no advertising. Preventing people from meeting the Amiga in a setting of indifference or even incompetence should be avoided at all costs. - Although most of us bought our Amiga for what it can do, most people will first and foremost examine the IMAGE of the machine and how others react to it (baaaa). A machine that basks in the glow of a dealer's enthusiastic (and competent) support is sure to make people feel it is safe. - Dealers should perhaps offer small services at no cost. Things like that could include installation of software, access to the Fish library, installing a memory board, controller card, or perhaps a floppy or hard disk. At the _very_ least, service should be quick and suffer no excuses that drag on for weeks and months. Such things really undermine the support image. Well that's it for my two (maybe three) cents. If you disagree or have things to add, please do it through e-mail. DO NOT start an opinionated war on the net, please. We need a better s/n ratio. Thank you, Thank you! Udo Schuermann