Apparently smartphones have topped the list of holiday gift returns according to a 2,000-person survey by Research Now, but that’s not counting the iPhone or BlackBerry. The reason for a wooping 21% return rate from smartphone buyers? Difficulty in set-up. Yep, users can determine pretty quickly if a handheld is something they want to keep or not, and being turned off due to technical issues that early on can apparently wreak huge effects on not only sales, but reputation too.
“Irreparable damage to a brand’s reputation and perception of the company itself is at stake when a product is not easy to setup and use,” [Kevin Wood, VP and Senior Technology Analyst with Opinion Research Corporation] added. “Nearly 16% of the respondents we surveyed indicated that their poor setup experience significantly worsened their perception of the company that manufactured the product.”
Given these results, can we say that BlackBerry set-up is notably easier than other smartphones? I’d be curious to see how much the numbers would change if the iPhone and BlackBerry were included.
Bell has recently come out with a cool promo to ditch their old 8703e stock by giving away four of ‘em with every BlackBerry 8130 and 8830. Besides the devices, Bell is also offering bulk data plans to be split among those new users: $100 for 1 GB, $60 for 30 MB, $40 for 8 MB, $25 for 4 MB and another $20 for each additional user (over five?). This is a pretty sweet deal for companies that have executives and underlings to equip in a hurry. More info over here.
3 and RIM have announced the launch of the BlackBerry 8707g for customers in Sweden. That area hasn’t seen a lot of BlackBerry devices before so it’s good to see RIM expanding like this. The UMTS-enabled 8707g has a full QWERTY keyboard, and Cognos has modified their Go business intelligence system to work for the device. Additionally, 3 has pledged that they will collaborate with VM-data when customers need assistance integrating with existing business systems.
After wrestling with Pronto forms, the idea of forms on mobile felt a little awkward and hard to implement. So when we got our hands on HanDBase from DDH, there was some skepticism. DataVault was certainly more user friendly, but not quite as versatile. Could HanDBase, a relative newbie on the BlackBerry scene, paired up with its desktop cousin help us create and fill out databases on BlackBerry with minimal fuss? Only one way to find out…
The Verizon BlackBerry 8130 spotted in pink back at CES is set to launch this Friday. All the usual goodies, like 2 megapixel camera with 5 x digital zoom and video recording, EV-DO network support, GPS, and an externally-accessibly microSD slot, are there, available for $199.99 on a two-year plan. You can get another $100 off if you pick up a “qualifying” voice and data plan. Anyone have a Valentine they want to win over with gadgetry?
Apparently smartphones have topped the list of holiday gift returns according to a 2,000-person survey by Research Now, but that’s not counting the iPhone or BlackBerry. The reason for a wooping 21% return rate from smartphone buyers? Difficulty in set-up. Yep, users can determine pretty quickly if a handheld is something they want to keep or not, and being turned off due to technical issues that early on can apparently wreak huge effects on not only sales, but reputation too. 
Bell has 
3 and RIM have 
After wrestling with 
A facelifted CDMA Pearl 
The Verizon BlackBerry 8130 spotted in pink 
