Wireless Carriers, Market Share and Media Buys?

Is the advertising of wireless carriers based strictly on what carrier spends the most (on media placement) rather than a spiffy new creative campaign?

No, not fully is the market share of a carrier based only on media buys....call failure, attractive customer service, coverage and rates have an impact-but what about when they are all offering the same or are experiencing similar growth patterns...it may come down to media and how much can you buy...

Speaking to a colleague earlier this week brought this question to the forefront of my thoughts for a few minutes. Sprint has the third place ranking in market share, just over 20% I believe. Ad spending; well thats third place as well.......per Ad Age. Case and point with AT & T and Verizon too; Verizon respectively spends 1 billion more than Sprint in advertising and AT&T, more than 2 billion more exact figures found at Ad Age ...then the runner up I believe is T-Mobile or Alltel Corp with Suncom standing strong near the bottom. Let's not pick on Suncom as they are operate in only several states....and in proportion to the national players their budget is rather heavy. If the ads are consistent and entertaining and they are for the most part-I have come to the conclusion that market share is strongly based on spending more in media than the others.....granted a special offers are in the creative mix and the carrier continues to improve upon their connections and coverage-most of these items are taking place with the top three, even the top 5 which means when high frequency and a large amount of media is purchased by an experienced buyer, a carrier can gain the needed market share overtime. Just a though I wanted to expound on. AT & T needed to capture many different markets with the merger, and purchase of Cingular....the spending was very high and it is a very basic model with the main factor being buying as much media as they can, again high volume and for a long period of time.......even with Sprint's billboards being too long and unreadable they were able to maintain and protect market share while they flip flopped around about what's next....

Sprint Forward, Ahead, Everywhere

quotes from 9/6/2006 and 6/27/2007 appear similar

"The new Sprint advertising campaign will involve both television and print and is a part of a larger strategic move by the company to bring together a positioning that empowers customers to do more. The campaign also reveals the new company tagline: "Sprint. Power Up." The full story can be found at PhoneDog.com and this except from CBS News: "Using the tag line "Sprint Ahead," the eye-catching ads, which will be unveiled in movie theaters Friday and begin airing on television Sunday, are another attempt by the company to........In addition to the TV spots, the company also plans a range of billboards in 26 cities and print advertising, which will appear throughout July and beyond. Advertising does tend to follow a lot of the same ole, same ole in terms of media.... over the years and of course newspaper, TV and billboards are the primary methods still working at some level to reach the masses. Changes in these buys will need to happen and they are slowly, as interested as the carriers are in having the advertising industry go balls to the wall with mobile marketing-I would expect them to be a little more willing to spend on new media channels to promote their own brand-not really happening-yet. They are careful where the precious broadcast dollars move-this is a statement, not right or wrong. We should see some movement in the next 6 months from a few companies that will help to move the needle on specific industries such as digital signage...


"Nationally, Sprint expects to invest more than seven billion dollars in 2007 to enhance its networks, and to meet growing demand for extensive mobile broadband coverage. Sprint is completing an upgrade of its Sprint Mobile Broadband Network to Evolution - Data Optimized Revision A (EV-DO Rev. A) technology. Sprint will also be first to market with a next generation broadband wireless network based on WiMAX technology while continuing to enhance the Nextel National and Sprint National networks." Full Story

The above info is what consumers want to hear and the spending of additional money is going to give Sprint more media share thus creating greater overall market share...here are some links of recent stories about Sprint:


Sprint Full Story-Monster & Critics
Sprint-Washington Psot
Sprint-News and Observer
Sprint-CBS News
Ad Age
PhoneDog.com