Canon vs. Nikon – update

In my old post, When to Announce New Products, I described the different marketing strategies adopted by Canon and Nikon, the two leading makers of Digital Single Lens Reflex (DSLR) cameras.

On Aug 20, 2007, Canon announced a new camera – EOS 40D. It hit the shelves in Hong Kong immediately. Three days later, Nikon announced the contender – D300. As noted in my earlier post, I suspect Nikon is telling the shutterbugs, “Don’t buy Canon. Wait for us. We have some nice stuff in the pipeline.” Nikon D300 is, indeed, better than Canon EOS 40D (on paper), even though it is also more pricey.

Has Nikon succeeded? To find out, I browsed the forum for Hong Kong’s photographers, http://www.dchome.net/. Here are some interesting posts…

lmfu wrote:

都話左預先公佈呢招係險招黎啦, D200個銷售情況跌得好犀利, 係估唔到40D都冇乜受N既策略影響。

It has been said that pre-announcing [the products] is a risky move. Sale of D200 drops terribly, but we didn’t expect that 40D is hardly affected by Nikon's strategy.

samuelhu wrote:

D200 銷售情況跌得好犀利, 我諗未必關40d事,好可能d人想等D300呢

Sale of D200 drops terribly, but I think this may not be related to 40D. Perhaps the people are waiting for D300.

D200 mentioned above is Nikon’s existing offering and D300’s predecessor. It appears that the strategy of pre-announcing a product before it is available is a double-edged sword. It dents Nikon’s own sales more than that of Canon.