My suggestion is to advertise what they have. Biggest thing is to turn on the CDMA bands so it can be used on the largest US Carrier. If the bands don't exist; the death knell can be heard.
No amount of advertising can save W10M in its current state. Advertising only makes sense if you have a unique and/or compelling sales pitch. Every iteration of WP up until W10M has sacrificed more of its uniqueness, and at no point in time did the things that were unique draw a stark enough contrast to the competition. At best, MS could claim that WP/WM is able to do X, Y, or Z better, but "better" never trumps familiarity (with iOS and/or Android). The only way to trump familiarity is by offering something that is unique, or that is clearly and obviously so much better that it is considered unique by most people (as opposed to something that is possibly just slightly better but not worth the hassle of changing ecosystems).
During all these years, nothing about this dire situation has changed. Until it does, advertising is a complete waste of money. There's just nothing substantial MS could currently advertise. MS can always bring on the dancing and W10M wielding kids, but that won't convince anybody. The billions of dollars required to finance a useful advertising campaign are far better invested into making W10M better, which means:
- specifying a target market
- putting together a feature set that is well tailored to that target market, and making sure three to four of those features are unique to W10M, easy to demonstrate on TV, easily grasped, and highly desirable
- polish those features to perfection (the features you want to build a brand and marketing campaign around must be perfect)
Then advertise...
They won't be advertising phones until/if they release their surface phone this time next year
My feeling is that next year will be too late.
MS won't be advertising phones again. Ever. That means next year won't be too late, because it's already too late. WP/WM as a phone OS is over. That ship has sunk. If you want an MS phone, then the iPhone or Android/Cyanogen (with MS' apps) are where it's at.
You might have heard some people say something along the lines of "WP is dead, but WM is alive and well". I never know if that's just meaningless fanboy-bravado, or if there is more thought behind it. From my point of view, that really means MS' efforts to build a phone OS are over and done with. WM will admittedly retain the ability to make phone calls, but we should probably stop thinking of it as a smartphone OS. It's still a mobile OS however, or a more secure Windows Light if you will.
Some future W10M devices will still look like phones (although some will be tablets), but their primary usage model won't be that of phones as we know them today.
This is a really old concept.
I don't think any of the details accurately represent where W10M is going, but it does demonstrate a device that can be used to get real work done with software that is a lot more complex than your average app. That is where W10M is headed, and if MS is smart, they won't be marketing it as a phone, but as something entirely different (similar to the way MS calls their 2-in-1 devices "convertibles" rather than "laptops").
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2lj109xEZw