Putting the 'Windows' in Windows Live

A new marketing campaign for Windows Vista gives equal billing to Windows Live, promoting online capabilities offered through downloadable Windows Live desktop clients. The new campaign will provide fewer opportunities for OEMs to sell high-margin hardware than Microsoft’s past emphasis on digital media, and inconsistencies with the Windows Live brand may make it ineffective. Also, Microsoft’s willingness to link Windows Live clients to third-party services shows that promoting Windows is a higher priority to the company than selling advertisements on its own Web sites.

The Changing Definition of Windows Live

When Microsoft introduced Windows Live in Oct. 2005, it was a set of online services for consumers, many of which already existed under other names. For example, MSN Search was rebranded Windows Live Search, Hotmail was rebranded Windows Live Mail, and MSN Spaces (Microsoft’s blogging and personal Web page service) was rebranded Windows Live Spaces.

Despite the application of the “Windows” brand, the connection between the Windows OS and most of these services was slim to nonexistent. In fact, Microsoft said that the services were being designed (or redesigned) to work equally well with multiple browsers, including Firefox, which runs on both Mac and PC. This suggested that Microsoft was merely trying to apply its most successful brand, Windows, to its relatively unsuccessful online services, which have consistently lagged behind competitors in terms of financial success and innovation.