Is it even fair to compare Android sales to WP?
When the Android launched, it was the best contender to an alternative iPhone smartphone style. The app grid icons were there, the features, and it had a iPhone "like" feeling to it. There was no other system like that, so it makes sense for it's market share to jump up so quickly. Not everyone could afford the iPhone lifestyle.
It's very true that the Andorid sales in it's first two years totally beat (or will beat) WP. The causer however can't be compared as Android was the only alternative in it's first years, while WP has to contend with Android and iOS. It's very hard to sell your platform when you have two giants already well established.
Mindshare is something that can be measured, but not with precision as sales can. Microsoft has to overcome the mindshare that Android and iOS have on the U.S market.
When Android launched the OS wasn't even that good, and it was reviewed as such. An HTC Sense WM 6.5 device like the HD2 was clearly superior to something like the G1 - easily, even the Droid wasn't much better than it, if at all.
WP7 has low traction because Microsoft was late and they're still stuck in 2010 or before. 2010 for the hardware their OS runs on. Before for the functionality the OS provides since it's still missing some features you can get from a feature phone and that most people would expect from any smartphone.
The perception of an OS that functions like something from years ago running on hardware from years ago is strong and negative. When people buy a new phone, they want just that - New. Android provides that, and so does Apple when they launch their new phones. They give you advances in hardware beyond what they had in their devices prior to that date and in the case of google they iterate on their platform at such a pace that it's almost impossible (at this point) for WP7 to even catch up to them from a functionality perspective (maybe Apollo will change that, maybe not, but the damage that has been done is done and you can't rewrite history).
They should have worked a bit harder to launch the platform earlier. Launching after the iPHone 4 and Galaxy S (nevermind HTC's high end devices - they were on a roll back then) really hurt them. It literally gave them table scraps for people to sell to.
They are launching some nice LOOKING phones these days (Lumia 800/900, Titan II, etc.), but the hardware in the phones is not really much different from what is in T-Mobile's mid-range Mango devices.
In fact it's a bit ironic that people rave about those devices yet there was a ton of "lulz" threads on the forums when Apple launched the i4S "refresh" device, which actually has over a year of technology advancement in it while WP7 devices moved up in like 3 months of tech time from Launch to Mango, starting a year+ behind the competition hardware-wise.
Microsoft did themselves no favors with the hardware restrictions and playing favorites with their OEM partners (holding back HTC/Samsung so Nokia can succeed in the WP7 ecosystem on design while using terrible internals compared to Apple/Android high end devices, for example). Play favorites after you get the ball rolling. They held themselves back by going the route they did and I doubt the user experience would have suffered much.
Those excuses they used were used by apple but unlike iOS WP7 users have like 5+ different "high end" phones to choose out of, not just 1 top end iPhone. It was a bad decision, IMO.
As far as I'm concerned the main obstacle that has been in the path of WP growth has been sales reps. So many people shopping for phones don't do any research so whatever the rep says it what they buy. Now AT&T is pushing the Lumia so I expect it to do well. With WP 8 some of the buzz words like dual-core, LTE and high resolution screen will apply so more reps should push them. It's taking a while to build up steam but by this time next year WP will be doing a lot better than it is now.
Well times have changed. Now the buzz words are Quad Core, LTE, and things like WiFi Direct, BT 4.0, AppleTV-type devices to stream media wirelessly to your TV... Stuff like that.
They need to skip a generation. Their currect hardware is 2010 level, going to Dual Core won't cut it, unless they're doing that for mid-range devices. All new Android devices are going ot be Quad Core except for the purpose of LTE support (which should start making it into Quad Core SoCs soon enough).
Carriers like T-Mobile and Sprint won't have decent LTE Coverage (or none at all) for another year or so so that won't work too well on them. I wonder if T-Mobile and Sprint will launch high end Apollo devices, though...
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