Nokia E61i Refresh and the importance of the out of the box experience
Published by Rafe Blandford at 11:14 GMT, November 26th 2007
In an article to accompany this video, Rafe looks at some of thinking behind the repackaged Nokia E61i which is now hitting the European market.
Introduction
A ‘refreshed’ version of the E61i is now available in European markets. There is nothing startling new, the additions revolve around some extra marketing documentation and a microSD card with Mail for Exchange and Nokia Maps pre-installed.
The refresh may at first glance seem rather mundane. After all, Mail for Exchange and Nokia Maps are available as free downloads – surely anyone could make this package up themselves? However, this rather misses the point - just because it can be done doesn’t mean it is done. The aim here is to create a better out of the box experience for the novice user. Moreover, this is not something that is aimed at the consumer market, but rather is something for small businesses that are looking for an easy to use and, just as importantly, easy to implement mobile email solution.
While typical readers of All About Symbian will be quite comfortable installing extra software and otherwise customising their phones, this is not necessarily true for others. A significant number of people are either unaware of the ability, or lack the incentive, to add software to their phone. This problem is particularly acute with the more advanced software and services found on smartphones. By creating a mobile mapping and email solution that is not only available out of the box, but given extra emphasis by the quick start guide and marketing ties, Nokia can go at least some way to solving this problem.
E61i from the small company perspective
This section is a partial transcript of Steve's Video podcast of the refreshed E61i.
Let's look at the new E61i pack from the perspective of a brand new user and the company that they work for. The company probably has less than 30 employees and has bought the E61i for them to improve their productivity while mobile - and to squeeze a little extra work out of them on the train or tube, no doubt!
Such a small company is unlikely to have its own IT department or a full Microsoft Exchange server and they've probably been muddling along for a while with standard ISP or Google/Yahoo email accounts. With the E61i refresh, Nokia is aiming squarely at this scenario, preloading its Mail for Exchange 2 client onto the card and partnering with a third party Exchange provider, the obviously named 'Mail for Exchange Ltd ', with whom Nokia has arranged a one month trial of the service for each new user.
So the new E61i owner pops in the supplied card and Mail for Exchange installs automatically, saving the user having to burrow on the CD or find the install file on the Internet. They then follow the screen-by-screen steps in the quick start booklet. The first of these is to set up a trial account on Mail for Exchange Ltd's servers and the rest is just entering Nokia's MfE client's settings. These can be tricky to get right, but it's just a case of typing in the settings listed in the booklet.
At the end of which, five minutes later, the new user has a brand new and working push email account on a full Exchange server. Without needing an IT department to help set things up. The default £5 a month account only handles email, but higher levels from Mail for Exchange Ltd (£10 a month) include Microsoft Exchange Contacts and Calendar as well, making the E61i a robust and easily replaceable solution.
The options are flexible, too, with options for a completely new @mailforexchange.com email account or collecting email from an existing account OR using an existing domain name, and this means most existing situations are covered and can easily be switched over. You can also, importantly, still set your own 'from' and 'reply to' addresses.Also on the microSD card is the latest version of Nokia's free Maps client, although there's no default map data, this being a Europe-wide product. As with MfE, the Maps client is automatically installed and all the user has to do is start it up and watch while maps are pulled in over the air. It would have been nice for Nokia to ship a Bluetooth GPS with the E61i, but I guess that would have cost far too much. You'll be familiar with Nokia Maps, I'm guessing. It provides street level maps for much of the world for free and, with a Bluetooth GPS in tow, gives the opportunity for proper navigation. As usual, the user will need to pay a little extra, ad-hoc, around five pounds for a month, for example, for full voice-guided turn by turn instructions while driving.
Concluding Thoughts
While most media attention is inevitably focused on the announcements of the latest and greatest devices, it is the sales of handsets that have been in the market longer that are just as important and if the E61i can reach new markets by improving the out of the box experience then it is a path that is well worth pursuing. Hardware, in terms of device form factor and functionality, is routinely used by manufacturers to segment the market. It makes a great deal of sense to further divide these segments by offering versions targeted as specific groups within a market segment.
Companies like Nokia, RIM and Microsoft often talk about the unfulfilled potential of mobile email. Currently the number of mobilised corporate email accounts is measured in the 10's of millions. However the addressable market is estimated to be the region of 650 million. A significant part of this market is in the small-medium enterprise (SME) sector and selling mobilised email to this segment is much more about marketing and creating an easy experience.
Traditionally, mobilised email has revolved around the installation of server software. This approach has very high initial costs and, although it makes sense for large corporations, it is generally both beyond the budgets and the needs of many small businesses. Such companies will instead be looking for a solution that needs little IT expertise, can be plugged into an existing system, has a low entry cost and a predictable per person cost.
Nokia's E61i refresh therefore offers an approach that ticks may of the boxes, with particular emphasis on the ease of use and price point. The only issue for Nokia may revolve around making small businesses aware that the solution exists.
Rafe Blandford, 26 Nov 2007
See Also
Nokia E61i Review - Part 1 - physical
Nokia E61i Review - Part 2 - the information
Nokia E61i Review - Part 3 - the applications
Categories: Comment, Hardware
Platforms: S60 3rd Edition