BlackBerry Q10 May Sway Converts Back to a QWERTY World

There is no denying that when the BlackBerry Z10 came out as an all-touchscreen smartphone, a lot of loyal BlackBerry users felt lost without the famous QWERTY keyboard. I myself had to get used to the screen keyboard. It took a while, but I’m finally comfortable with it because BlackBerry did a good job in designing it.

There are, however, those people who do not want to give up the tried and true feel of a real, touchable keypad. At the end of April, BlackBerry made the Q10 available in the U.K. It will be available in the U.S. soon.

Everyone that followed the keynote address last week also saw the new Q5. This is a phone designed for emerging markets, but also comes with the QWERTY keyboard. It seems that people really did miss the touch and feel of the physical keyboard.

TechRepublic is an online trade publication for IT professionals. It delivers advice on best practices and tools for the day-to-day needs of IT decision makers. On May 17, 2013, TechRepublic released the results of a poll it conducted during BlackBerry Live 2013 last week.

The results show just how much people love and missed the physical keyboard. The poll asked two basic questions. The first: If you are a BlackBerry lover who switched to Android or iPhone, is the new Q10 tempting you to switch back? The second question was: If you are a current BlackBerry user, is the new Q10 enough to keep you loyal?

You might be surprised by the results. In response to the first question, the TechRepublic poll shows that 64 percent of former BlackBerry enthusiasts who left the Z10 behind for either an Android or iPhone are tempted to switch back because of the Q10.

There are various reports that show BlackBerry is regaining some of the lost market share in Canada, too. At the end of April, on the weekend that the Q10 was first available for sale in the U.K., all of the units were sold out within the first two hours of sale.

This was incredible as the selling price was set at $1,077. The price notwithstanding, BlackBerry had to make hourly deliveries to the London store that was the first to sell the Q10. Maybe this is an indication that people may not be ready for major changes and are comfortable with the tried and true.

The second question about the new Q10 being enough to keep BlackBerry users loyal had an overwhelming 76 percent say yes. It would appear that a lot of people find comfort in the keyboard as opposed to the touchscreen version.

I think that BlackBerry did a very good job with the touchscreen keyboard – I can type as fast as I did with the physical one. I may have had an advantage, though, since from day one I have always typed with one hand; my left thumb does all my Z10 typing. I know that a lot of, if not most people, have to use two thumbs to type and the Z10 was actually designed for single hand action. So getting comfortable with it takes more time.

Most of the people who were polled at BlackBerry Live 2013 have said that they miss the hardware keyboard and without it they find that they either send out fewer e-mails or the ones they do send out are a lot shorter because they just don’t want to use a touchscreen keyboard.

If you keep in mind that the TechRepublic poll was taken at the BlackBerry Live 2013 event, then you have to expect that just about everyone who responded to the poll was a BlackBerry supporter. So the numbers may read higher on the positive side than say taking the poll in the streets of Manhattan.

The poll does show that people have always been loyal to the BlackBerry keyboard and, once the Q10 is available in the U.S., we may see an even greater number of people returning to BlackBerry. This is the type of push that BlackBerry needs to keep moving forward.