HP's mixed messages make Dell of a muddle

Hewlett-Packard's inability to stick to one story is giving its partners the jitters, writes Guy Matthews.

The other day, while relaxing with my copy of CRN, I found my eye drawn to the headline: "Hewlett-Packard denies targeting Dell." Shurely shome mishtake, I thought? But apparently not.

Imagine my surprise when not 48 hours later I read in the Financial Times that the PC industry had come down to a "clash of the PC titans" between, yes, Hewlett-Packard and Dell.

These two megacorps were going to slug it out like a couple of prize fighters. This story was confirmed by no less an authority than HP's chief executive Carly Fiorina and Duane Zitzner, head of HP's global PC business.

Does this mean that the CRN story was wrong? No, of course not. However, what it does highlight is the problem of mixed messages.

Dell, God love it, has one simple message, which it repeats ad nauseam: "Direct is best, direct is best, direct is best." It talks about nothing else.

HP, on the other hand - and this goes for all other vendors wedded to the channel - seems incapable of such clarity.

A similar situation in the media world was the positions taken by the two leading UK tabloids during the recent conflict in Iraq.

The Mirror took a stance against the war but, once the troops went in, it backed our boys all the way.

The Sun, on the other hand, backed the war, backed the troops and backed the fireworks. The Mirror's circulation fell dramatically before and during the war, while The Sun's rose.

Does this mean that Britain is populated by warmongers? No. But what it does tell us is that people like clear, consistent messages.

CRN has often written about the fact - and it is a fact - that Dell quietly uses the channel for various tasks. However, one cannot criticise Dell for adopting a marketing strategy, sticking to it and executing it brilliantly.

What is amazing is watching channel vendors tying themselves in knots trying to formulate even the simplest of marketing policies to counter it. More often than not they give up and opt to have a pop at each other.

'Do it this way and no other.' That's what people want to hear. Not 'Do it this way except when we'd like you to do it some other way. And here is a third option for those of you who don't like the other two. We hope that's all clear.'

The point is that all resellers should be asking their vendors what they're doing to target Dell. Do it now. It's later than you think.