Thank for reminding us that the promotion of headphone amp modules for X7 exclusive in US may annoy the customers in other countries, we hereby would like to apology for our negligence of using the FiiO account to announce the promotion for US region. In addition, we would like to explain the whole thing to all of you.
Some of you might not know that US market has been separated as an independent market just like the Chinese market since April and we have a special crew taking care of the after-sales service and promotion of US. So basically the market operation in US is different from that in other countries. and we announced it on our website before:
http://fiio.net/en/story/425
In addition, having a special crew to take care of a market will consume great manpower and materials resources. Therefore, we are unable to apply this mode to other countries so far. In countries other than China and US, our local sales agents are the one to decide whether to run a promotion and we, FiiO couldn't and wouldn't force our agents to follow our promotions in China and US. The reason why we announced this promotion on Head-Fi is that there are some of US customers here and we thought that some of them may interest in this news.
Soon we will have another official account FiiO US to announce news for US market only and we hope that you can kindly understand the different market strategy we have for different markets.
We are so sorry for any inconveniences that brought to you.
PS: please just tell your deep voice if you want the promotion happens in your country,we will consult with the local sales agents in the coming days to get their approval, if they agree, the promotion will be held in your area in the future.
As far as I can tell, this US-exclusive promotion is happening because the US has become the only region other than China where FiiO distributes directly. And that's what's eating all their "manpower and materials resources".
At least, that's what it reads like to me from "separated as an independent market just like the Chinese market", "special crew taking care of a market consuming great manpower and materials resources", etc. etc. Feel free to correct me if the above is incorrect
FiiO FiiO Sunny JamesFiiO.
As the sole distributor of the US, FiiO would have the right to dictate promotions as it sees fit to maximize its long-term profit and/or market share. Whereas on the other hand, 3rd party distributors for other regions and countries may not share FiiO's long-term priorities and would certainly go up in arms if they wake up today to hear that the MSRP for the amp modules they'd already imported had been slashed in half via a unilateral decision on FiiO's part.
That's a reasonable explanation for a US-exclusive promotion as far as it goes.
Having said that, I see a pattern where FiiO tended to piss off a lot of people with directly-administered promotions, even though, if people knew how few people actually benefit from the promotions, everyone would have dismissed them as nothing to care about. I mean look at the present promotion--it doesn't benefit Amazon customers, it doesn't benefit retail store customers, it only benefit the handful of people who
1. saw this promotion announcement on head-fi (or their FiiO US facebook, presently with ?? followers)
2. bothered to send the requisite details to market@fiio.net
3. ... further bottlenecks include the rate at which FiiO can sift through the emails and vet the address details provided
4. ... and the rate at which they can ship these discounted modules, one by one, direct from FiiO China to these lucky applicants (would shipping be charged? How much?)
5.
and the applicants have to happen to be in the US! At this point I'm wondering if there's
one single reader of the announcement who actually lives in the US! Kinda incredible really, considering how I thought US readership dominated head-fi...
I think FiiO needs to come up with a way of administering promotions such that
1. the offer is mostly seen by those who are actually eligible, and
2. if you are going to alienate some people with exclusive offers, at least make it worth FiiO's while, by arranging the logistics and promotional channels such that it is possible for lots of customers to benefit... :rolleyes: