Typically the announcement of a big vendor hiring on a new marketing chief gets a bit of splash, with a few tech pubs making light mention during a slow news day. And if the hiring company isn't a Google, Microsoft or SAP, it sometimes doesn't even make an appearance in the heavy tech news stream running 24 x 7 these days.
But that wasn't the case this week at all. While HTC is not Apple stature, it attained that level of notice for awhile in the news stream when it hired on the person who marketed the Samsung Galaxy into the galaxy of smartphone lovers, giving Samsung it's biggest lift yet in terms of U.S. smartphone notoriety and product attention. It's a Galaxy vs. iPhone world now and it's all because of one marketing guru, Paul Golden, who headed up marketing for Samsung's U.S. mobile division.
Now we'll see if Golden can do for HTC what he did for Samsung as he has been hired on as an adviser to HTC Chairwoman Cher Wang.
Golden served as Samsung's CMO for four years and his LinkedIn resume notes sales doubled from $5 billion to $10 billion and that he drove a four-fold increase in market share for the Galaxy brand. His accomplishments also include achieving a 50 percent increase in Samsung consumer brand preference and an over 50 percent increase in unaided brand awareness.
"Transformed Samsung's approach to marketing resulting in unprecedented market share growth and a fundamental change in consumer perception of the Samsung brand. Led all marketing functions including brand strategy, advertising, traditional and digital media, new product go-to-market strategy and execution, sponsorships, channel marketing, PR, market research and analytics, CRM, and field marketing for Samsung's US mobile phone and tablet business," states his profile summary.
According to a report HTC's latest One handset sold about 5 million phones in its first two months, compared with 20 million for Samsung's Galaxy S4 and Apple's iPhone 5 hit the 5 million mark in the first three days of sales in 2012.
The Golden appointment is just the latest in marketing leadership changes for HTC and Wang has now taken an active role in overseeing marketing plans. It comes just a week after Wang told investors HTC has to do better communicating with customers.
It's clear Golden clearly has a formidable challenge ahead but he clearly also has the experience to make it happen.
