How to choose the right mobile phone handset

Mobile phones have evolved rapidly since their inception within the mainstream market a decade ago. The range of features and functions offered by mobile phones today bears little resemblance to the simple phones available in the early days offering call and text functionality. Cameras, Bluetooth, MP3 capability and web browsers are just a few of the advanced features that are now practically standard expectations that we now have in mobile phones. The increased functionality of these items perpetuates consumer choice and pressures to find the right mobile phone to fit our lifestyle.

Lifestyle has become an important factor in choosing a mobile phone. The status of the phone has been elevated from that of a functional item to a cultural artifact with the symbolic, iconic and style attributes that come with the increased status on the mobile phone. As a fashion item, branding plays a key role in the selection and use of mobile phones just as it does with jeans or trainers. So how does the consumer choose a mobile phone that contains the functionality and style elements that they are looking for?

Nokia has been the traditional market leader when it comes to mobile phone handsets. Reliability and simplicity have been the staples of Nokia, but this has been detrimental to their image and perception in recent years. Efforts have been made by Nokia to keep apace the latest technologies and lifestyle offerings to increase the perception and build the Nokia brand in line with the mobile phone as a cultural artifact. Nokia phones are now reflective of the status of the phone in terms of technology and branding and comparison sites (http://www.dialaphone.co.uk/nokiaphones.html) show how even the traditional mobile phone manufacturer recognizes the importance of the phone as a cultural and symbolic artifact.

Samsung phones have always been driven by technological innovation and entirely conscious of branding and status considerations. Although Samsung have less of a tradition as a market leader within the mobile phone handset manufacturers, this has allowed them to carve a niche within the market as an innovator, offering the latest technologies in a range of stylish, strongly branded phones (http://www.dialaphone.co.uk/samsungphones.html).

Sony Ericsson phones take this even further. Originally the Ericsson brand had a similar status to that of Nokia, but the Sony branding has now firmly been stamped on the manufacturers handsets. Sony Ericsson have gone further than any of the major manufacturers by including their famous Walkman branding within some phone ranges to reflect the strong music player capability that some of the phones (http://www.dialaphone.co.uk/phones/sony_ericsson/) have. Sony Ericsson, more than any of the manufacturers represent the meeting point between functionality, technology and branding, reflecting the seemingly dual status of the mobile phone as both a functional item and cultural artifact.