How did companies like Mushkin and OCZ develop brand recognition and loyalty?

I've only been involved in the memory industry for a little less than a year, and I would like to ask the more knowledgable people here for some insight. My question is how companies like Mushkin and OCZ started from their humble beginnings to become two of the biggest and most recognized brands for memory modules?

What kind of position did they have in the market, 1-2 years after they started? What did they do to make you give their products a try? What was it that made their products so damn good. I appreciate your feedback, because I'm really amazed at the immense customer loyalty they have gotten for their products.

Is this some kind of marketing survey?

First off, OCZ sucked when they came out. Crappy ram, crappy TIM, lied and cheated there way though the computer business. Then they changed.

Mushkin, well I dont know what to say. I'd like to think that their BH5 was what put them on the overclockers radar.

Micron/Crucial was the first company that came to my mind 4/5 years back when I was getting into it. Not becuase of their product, but because of their service.

A-data had its days, but can't keep up, or isn't for some reason. Play with the big boys, or find a new way to innoviate.

I started on crucial because they were known for being quality ram and low prices. I moved on to mushkin because of the bh-5.

I love mushkin because I bought a stick of bh-5 from them and it came with one of the heatspreader corners bent off. I ran down to their sales department? in denver and he tested it, confirmed it was bad, and gave me a new stick of ram on the spot along with a 256 stick to mess around with and a sweet pen. I dropped the pen though a few days later and my dog bit it and broke it in half.

Shortly put, awesome customer service.

I also got this cool ram bag that you place your ram inside and blow it up at the end and you can play football with your ram and not damage it :>

It really has to do with innovation and products. There is only loyalty when people see that what we have is the best

To me, it is all about three things.


The chips that you use.

The standard of integrity that you test your product to.

Your customer service record.



I don't care who makes it... if you sell RAM with the ICs that enthusiasts want, with an aggressive speed bin for semi-guaranteed overclockability, and if your products consistantly have a decent overclocking margin above stock, people will purchase your products. A good reputation for excellent customer service is possibly most important - if your company has a good reputation within our community, people will purchase your products.


"steven_a-data" - I assume that you are with A-Data. Heh, you're lucky to be getting information this key for free - usually you have to pay for valuable market research .

It's all about the products they bring out.

Both OCZ and Mushkin have best of both worlds and they simply demolish any other competitors. Just look at DDR. Two most popular brand of chips Winbond and Samsung are both being dominated by them.

OCZ has had a hold of TCCD/TCC5's with their ever so popular OCZ Platn Rev 2's that go for a fair if not cheap price when compared to top dawg G-Skill that sell their TCCD's for a much higher price and you get close if not same results with them. Corsair TCCD/TCC5's are ok, but they mad a mistake of not going with BP PCB's on their modules.

On the other hand Mushkin lately has got a hold of Winbond UTT CH5 with their impressive XP lineup (XP4000's to be more precise) which OC better then any other Winbond chip out there (Gold VX's come close but not as good). To bad they won't be producing them anymore.

These days it's all about 2GB kits as we slowly moving towards M2 socket and end of DDR. In that field Crucial has been holding the top spot with their Micron 5B D's which OC/perform better then any other 1GB chips out there. Infinion and Samsung are coming close with their latest revisions but they still have way to go.

That's my .02

The last time I remember A-Data being in the spotlight was with their Hynix based PC4000 and PC4200 modules. They were popular for the brief window between BH5 being discontinued and TCCD being debuted. Earlier than that, A-Data was recognized in the enthusiast circles for having about the best BH5 in existence...except that it apparantly was impossible to obtain anywhere outside of Japan. Even if you guys do have an amazing product at this point in time, where am I supposed to purchase it? All I see at newegg from A-Data are some long obsolete modules and SO-DIMMs. So to echo what the others have said, you need to begin with a highly competitive product, and even more competitive marketing. Right now you guys appear to be lacking in both.

There's my $2.00. Now pay up.

OCZ hired me and the RAM flew off the shelves....

Steve- adata should know better

Mushkin started building memory that eventually would be used by gamers to get better performance and stability in (Edit) their PC gaming. Bill Mushkin built up some modules for his own use and saw that the memory he built with the chips he used was faster than what was out there in the market. He sold some to his firends and colleageus and some memory companies started to buy them from him also..ie. . As time went buy they kept ordering more and more. So he figured he start a formal business and start selling it to the masses. He and others developed the 1st heatspreader on memory and asked a company in Taiwan to build it for them and others copied. Mushkin was selling mostly to endusers via their website. As Mushkin was sold to Ramtron, they asked me to come onboard and build more strategic alliances. Thus we started selling to etailer, retailers, and others.

We are now doing others stuff that I can not say yet but look at our website. www.mushkin.com. we have completely revamped. as some of the reviewers that I have spoken to in the last several days will attest, we will make this stand out and be the best site for enduser and reseller support in the coming months. we are still doing other stuff you will see..

EDIT--- when ramtron bought mushkin they did not pump any marketing into it and had set goals for mushkin that we had problems meeting. Thus we figured for us to survive, we had to buy ourself from them and start fresh. 1 work on the product line. 2. build relationships with mobos, video card manufacturers, sound card manufacturer 3. bild stronger relationships with our customers 4. put mushkin into other channels where we are not yet 5. get enthusiasts like people in this forums to comments and assist us in finding the needs of the gamers and enthusiasts. 6 better our customer service and offer assistants immediately via our website and phones .. there are other stuff we will need to do but that is just the tip of it.

Duonger

Thanks everyone. I just wanted to hear your guy's opinions or thoughts about these two companies when they first came out. Like Mushkin 10 years ago or OCZ 5 years ago.

Was it a killer review for a kickass module that got you hooked? Or word of mouth from other enthusiasts?

I chose OCZ psu/mem for my current build mainly because of the reputation and respect they have here at OCforums. And from what I hear they have great support too. I also like the general idea that people from the different firms we buy our stuff from comes here (and other forums) to talk, help out with product problems and tell us what they are up to.
Most reviews I've read are good too(ocz).
And the best part is that I'm not dissapointed with my memory or my psu.
(The only problem is that I'm not sure why they(OCZ) put a 52A 5V line in my modstream...)

What makes them good companies?

Why because they're on the forums to help us. What better tech support is that.

What attracts new customers?
A flashy explensive looking advertizing campaign. Give out free stuff. Send binned RAM to reviewers to get great reviews. Have a good website. Make yourself look good and professional. This will build community rep, and people will notice you.
Have good products, and people within the community who buy on the rep, will recommend you. Then you have created a brand image. Competitive pricing helps too.

How to keep customers?
- Consistantly produce up to date solid products
- Excellent customer services.

Exactly, OCZ is my first purchase of performance memory. What other company is willing to clock the snot out of their product, and tell you what worked for them? Awsome.

Edit: I forgot to quote apu318

SteveOCZ said:

OCZ hired me and the RAM flew off the shelves....

Click to expand...

Actually the memory moved just a little faster when we hired Steve, it started doing Mach 2 after I got hired. heh

OCZ started out as a small company with humble beginnings. It took a lot of hard work and sacrifice by many employees of the company to turn us into one of the most respected manufacturers in the enthusiast market.

We care about our customers and recognize the market we are in. OCZ has always made top quality product and we stand behind those products completely. By catering to the enthusiast market moreso than other manufacturers we were able to build a large following that allowed for us to expand and become a much larger company. At the same time, we retained a lot of the key values that got us to the point we are at now. You can look at other examples of companies that tried to leap into the enthusiast market and didn't complement it with a good product or good support, those companies are now out of business.

SteveOCZ said:

OCZ hired me and the RAM flew off the shelves....

Click to expand...

You are in need of an ego-check, aren't you?

1st and most important is CUSTOMER SERVICE and HONESTY and INTEGRITY (did I just lump three things into one?)

2nd is competitive and/or superior products.

3rd DONT EVER LIE!

Crucial from what I've experienced has great customer service, but their ram is only slightly above par thats why OCZ Mushkin and to some degree G.Skill dominate the market. OCZ especially has the best customer support. Also just remember that your paycheck comes from customers. We are your boss, we own you.

wow... two ocz reps? insane tech support. i started with corsair and was VERY impressed with the Value Select($85?!?!?!?!) but then i found out my friend's mom worked at OCZ(my friend isn't too bright) and i started getting small discounts and they have had a GREAT reputation for stuff on every forum i visit.

-1cem4n

1cem4n said:

wow... two ocz reps? insane tech support. i started with corsair and was VERY impressed with the Value Select($85?!?!?!?!) but then i found out my friend's mom worked at OCZ(my friend isn't too bright) and i started getting small discounts and they have had a GREAT reputation for stuff on every forum i visit.

-1cem4n

Click to expand...

There are 3 reps active on OC Forums.