Saturday, October 20, 2012

5 Reasons to Buy A Smartphone and 5 Reasons to Keep Your Dumbphone

5 Reasons to Buy a Smartphone


1. Save time and money
With the ability to stay connected to the internet wherever you go you have tremendous money and time saving tools in your hand. If you need to get gas, you can use your phone to find the cheapest gas nearest you. Forgot to clip coupons? There are plenty of websites and apps that you can use to digitally clip coupons and add them to your discount card. If you have lost your way to an event that is out of town and you need directions, a smartphone has GPS built right in so you can find your way again. You can even scan barcodes at stores to comparison shop on the fly!

2. Get rid of your devices!
Consolidate your devices into one smartphone and save yourself a lot of headaches keeping track of them all. Let's list all the devices a smartphone can replace: watch, calculator, calendar, organizer, GPS, mp3 player, digital camera, digital camcorder, TV, digital voice recorder, torpedo level, gaming device, compass, flashlight, oh and let's not forget our regular cell phone. I'm sure there is more, but I just listed off 15 devices that do the same thing a smartphone does.

3. The purchase price is about the same as a dumbphone
With many dumbphones running $50-$150, you can get mid-range to high-end smartphone for the same price and sometimes cheaper! Why not get a better phone if you can get it for a better price?

4. Trade up for a better phone
More and more retailers are taking trades for new phones. A smartphone is far more valuable than a dumbphone when trying to trade them in. If you take a dumbphone that cost $50 on contract and a smartphone that cost the same, you can get between $30-$100 more for your trade even though the purchase price was the same. Let your money work for you by trading in your old smartphone.

5. Get with the times!
Everyone has a smartphone! That is if you consider about 46% of cell phone owners everybody. But a smartphone can really increase your status socially and professionally. Carrying the right device can make you appear to have a higher status than you might actually have.

5 Reasons to Keep Your Dumbphone

1. Extra monthly charges
I'm not even going to go into the fact that some companies are eliminating unlimited internet usage because the fact is that most people do not approach their limits. Instead, I'm going to focus on the guaranteed cost added to your bill to own a smartphone. You can add anywhere from $20-$50 per phone or $50-$150 per family plan. That's every month! If you don't utilize the money saving features of a smartphone then it's probably not worth it.

2. More complicated
Smartphones generally have a large learning curve if you have never owned one before. The operation is going to be totally foreign if you haven't had one in the past. Gone are the physical buttons and tiny screens. The new smartphones of today have large, glass displays and hardly any physical buttons. With the displays being so big there is no room for anything else, which means that all those physical buttons are moved to the touch screen. That might be a little hard for you to get used to.

3. More expensive to maintain
In order to insure a smartphone, expect to pay about $2 more per month than your old dumbphone. On top of that, the deductible is more than twice that in some cases reaching up to $150-$200 to fix or replace a lost, stolen, or damaged phone!

4. Longevity
With all the extra functions and features these new smartphones have, the battery life is generally expected to last only a full day with moderate use. If you get better battery life than a full day that is considered exceptional battery life for a smartphone. Most dumbphones can last several days without needing to be charged.

5. Carrying around extra devices isn't a big deal
Maybe you are the type of person that doesn't mind carrying several devices around. I mean, who needs to carry a nice digital camera with them to the grocery store? Or a gps to work? Sometimes a smartphone is just too much even though you have fewer devices with you.

I love my smartphone and I would have a hard time living without it. I'm not saying it can't be done, but it sure would be difficult. I find value in my phone everyday that makes the extra monthly cost worthwhile. If you are contemplating upgrading to a smartphone then I believe that should be your measure for deciding on if you should get one or not. If you just recently upgraded from a dumbphone to a smartphone, let me know what you think of it! Do you find more value in the daily use of your smartphone or is it too expensive for what you use it for?

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