Why Microsoft Actually Failed In Watches?

This was a huge opportunity for Microsoft, and they missed the market…

In short, let’s learn how NOT to make wearable

This is no joke. When Microsoft announced that they were starting their own watch product line, the response was positive from everyone, ready to try it out themselves. Microsoft also had a good reputation(at the time) on what they were about to do with watches. This should suggest the fact that Microsoft was definitely not unlucky. It got it’s chance and… Well… It was just not taken seriously. And because of this, Microsoft is still known for less trust in terms of watches.

And I decided to research about this a bit what they did wrong. And ohhh boy have I got some points for you today… Let’s just get started before you go to sleep.

How Did They Start This?

This was their first product as “A thing which could be worn in general” and I’m talking about a watch. Although the signs of the product being planned was seen at the time as early as 2012, this was not officially announced to anybody… until 2014.

In October 2014, Microsoft released its first model preview and announced what they were up to. The features it had were as good as any other bands. Heart rate monitor, Gyrometer(whatever that means), GPS, Microphone, and more. It was had everything it needed, and yet… It failed.

It even announced “Band Store” which is an app store for Microsoft bands, which still is officially available to download for some reason. Surely it should be an easy route for Microsoft right? and Yet… the buyers were not in huge quantity(at least when compared its actual competitors, like the half eaten fruit and the rainbow colored G). This was of course a huge loss. And when I say loss, I mean it was way lesser than even the half of all sails of Apple Watches, when It actually should be the opposite. But it does not end there.

In 2015, Microsoft announced its new product with a grand program. I’ll link the program here but you don’t HAVE to watch it to get it(not from official Microsoft). It was fairly cringe and… Let’s just say non-technical. It was a women who seemingly memorized her script and said it without any emotion just like my friend Siri. I think this was a major hit for the company and I’ll talk about this later.

There was also a Microsoft band release 3, but It barely got sold and had a lot of hate piled up.

At this point, people knew how it went. The genuine and honest reviews from YouTubers, critics and articles on the band itself, and the past mistakes of Microsoft (with the Windows 8 hate, since the band follow the same steps for the software), all combined and created a massive snowball effect thus finally announcing the discontinuation of the Microsoft band.

There has been some leaked discussions of Microsoft re-continuing this product recently(although I don’t know how much of this is true), but if this happens, I’m donating $500 to any charity YOU say. I’m saying this because I’m almost certain that Microsoft is done with the watch market at this point.

It did have some positives though

Microsoft band was arguably the first band to offer the ability to download third party custom workouts. Also the Microsoft Health software was fairly unique and had a good UI.

So… What Went Wrong???

Well everything

The uncomfortable design

As much as Microsoft wants to disagree with this, it reportedly had very bad design structure as a wearable.

There are reports of the band coming off, the main case body being too heavy and hence making it difficult to stay on the top of the wrists and rotating towards the other way. Also the “smooth round curve” which Microsoft talks about was not the best cyrbature radius for all wrists, making it uncomfortable for larger writs to fit.

Golf!?

We’re committed to delivering tech powered insights for everyday athletes, no matter what sports you play and that includes Golf — Microsoft

And hence, Microsoft implemented a very unique feature this time in version 2 of the band. Microsoft Golf… Of course it helps every athlete no matter what sports you play right?

It provides shot detection when you hit on a Golf ball(no puns intended) and it detects when you are near tee box (I don’t know what that even is).

The problem I find with this is that even if this was helpful to the Golf players, it useless bloat for others. I mean… I get it, you need to have something unique to sell it, but at this point the selling point should be useful enough to actually sell it. In short, it had feature which people didn’t want.

The Speech…

Personally, if I’m buying a newly announced product, I’m probably having a look at the announcement video(if any). In this case, I think that was what happened.

The announcement was too technical and understandably boring. The small little puns they added were meant to laugh, but you might notice that nobody laughs at it because it’s just not funny. Don’t get me wrong, the points were put out well, but I don’t think that it’s a good first impression. The announcement for a new product was… pale, to say the least. I mean… at least comparing this to the apples announcements which are equally boring but has some info and energy, at least that’s my opinion.

The Features

This is the biggest bit. There was nothing that made the Microsoft band stand out and drive people to buy it. Apple, Samsung and other watches were already in the market and Microsoft decided to do nothing and yet try to win the wearable tech market which of course, did not work. And no… I don’t consider the “golf” feature as unique since it has almost no use case to almost anybody who does not play golf.

In short, there was nothing that actually made people buy this more than Apple or other competitors. Also, they really did not have a target audience. Although they focused on sports in the software section, the design, and the market focused towards the normal audience (unlike Apple which focused on a very niche group of iPhone users).

And Many More…

There were a lot more mistakes as you might guess, which lead to ultimate decline and eventually the discontinuation of the product. The UI uses Windows 8 design, which was already hated by many people compared to 7 or XP you know.

Devices were reportedly not the most accurate when it comes to the data it gives about your body, and the barometer just said a very limited data on the environment. Of course, unlike MacOS and Apple watch, Microsoft band and Windows had a terrible ecosystem and integration and was not as connected with other Microsoft products to give a “premium ecosystem feel”.

I’m gonna make more videos/articles on this on YouTube and Medium. With that said, hope you guys enjoyed reading this, and… I’ll meet you in the next one.

You’re Awesome :)

FadinGeek