I just returned from CES in Las Vegas. One of the more interesting and attention-grabbing products was eye-fi's (www.eye.fi) wireless SD card. It fits in any digital camera with an SD slot, and then when you are in your home network it wirelessly transfers your photos to your PC or a photo sharing service. Technically its probably not very complicated, but its simplicity is elegant, and its value proposition is compelling. Think about it - what it can do is useful to both young people and elderly people. How many tech products can you say that about?
However, I do have two issues from a marketing perspective. First of all, the name. I get why you want to create an association to WiFi, but why the 'eye'? What's the connection, its not obvious. If you wanted to create the WiFi association, how about MiFi, or MyFi. It makes it more personal. The second issue ties into the name. I went to look up their website, and not surprisingly typed in www.eyefi.com. That's not their site; and even worse the actual business is internet related, so there is a high risk of confusion. You'd have to google their name to find them, because you'd never think of eye.fi. Clearly, neither of these marketing mistakes are hurting the good press they are getting. But I think they could have helped themselves more here.
However, I do have two issues from a marketing perspective. First of all, the name. I get why you want to create an association to WiFi, but why the 'eye'? What's the connection, its not obvious. If you wanted to create the WiFi association, how about MiFi, or MyFi. It makes it more personal. The second issue ties into the name. I went to look up their website, and not surprisingly typed in www.eyefi.com. That's not their site; and even worse the actual business is internet related, so there is a high risk of confusion. You'd have to google their name to find them, because you'd never think of eye.fi. Clearly, neither of these marketing mistakes are hurting the good press they are getting. But I think they could have helped themselves more here.
