OnePlus will spend money on marketing only "when it really, truly adds value" for fans

Starting as a young, small company, OnePlus last year entered the smartphone market with a marketing budget of $0 (yup, that's 0 bucks). But the company quickly gained notoriety - even before its OnePlus One smartphone became available to order - and had to spend something on marketing: "$300, $10,000, and eventually even more", according to OnePlus. Still, what the startup is spending is nothing compared to the marketing budgets of larger smartphone makers. And this won't change, at least not in the near future.

OnePlus today mentioned that it will "only spend money on marketing when it really, truly adds value" for fans. "If we can reach out to more people while at the same time not increasing our margins or prices, we will do it", the company also said. An example of when OnePlus thinks it's necessary to spend money on marketing is the upcoming VR launch event for the OnePlus 2. As you may know, the company allowed a limited number of fans to get Cardboard headsets for free (plus a $5 shipping fee).

The OnePlus 2 will be officially announced later this month, on July 27. OnePlus confirmed that the new smartphone would not cost more than $450. The company also revealed some of the upcoming handset's features, including: an octa-core Snapdragon 810 processor (which reportedly doesn't overheat), 4 GB of LPDDR4 RAM, a fingerprint scanner, and a USB Type-C connector. The OnePlus 2 might also have a metal body, and a 1080p display measuring 5.5, or 5.7 inches.

source: OnePlus