Discuss about the Marketing Principles for Apple Company.
The increasing number of products and services has led to a drastic increment in the types and numbers of marketing Principles available. According to Dr. Philip Kotler, Marketing is nothing but the science and art of Exploring.” The elements of marketing are meant to satisfy the needs of the customers by providing them customized services. The marketing principles entirely rely on developing strategies that could let the marketers to convey and communicate the value of the products and sell them at profitable rates to its target audiences. However, the new and innovative communication channels have allowed the firms to develop deeper, meaningful, strong and everlasting relationships with the customers and hence the marketing sphere has taken a new turn with the introduction of Internet and Social Media Platforms (Burnett, 2008).
The basic marketing theory states that in order to maximize sales, a form should demonstrate its product at an apt season and place so that the consumer finds an urgent need to buy it. This approach is also known as creating a brand or image of the products in the market. As the competition among the similar companies and industries is increasing at a rapid pace, hence it has become a prime duty of the marketers to present their products in a unique form so as to capture the minds of a huge customer base (Thorp & Bryant, 2010). The right message should be conveyed to the right person and for this a deeper analysis of the target markets is crucial. Sometimes, instead of attaching a number of promotional activities with the products, the marketers could keep the approach a bit simpler. Some of the best marketing outcomes come from the simplest initiatives.
Relationship building is essential for a company, but at the same time protection of that relationship is crucial too. Andre Cohen (President, The A Team), in one of his interviews said that Marketing is all about meeting the needs and wants of the consumers. As the perceptions and buying behavior of the customers are quite dynamic and keeps on changing with the ongoing changes in the marketing trends, so to meet these needs the company has to keep a close relation with its customers. When customers are loyal towards a firm they do not get lured easily by the other trending ventures in the market.
When a company learns to profitably transform the consumer needs into a great revenue, then at that time the main purpose of marketing is achieved. Moreover, Marketing principles not only talk about the consumer and his needs, but simultaneously they deal with the sales and profit rates of the company too. A customer is beneficial to a business only when it adds up to the revenue of a company. So the principles of Marketing, unveil the dual role of the customers that is to increase the sales along with the revenues of the firm (EY Team, 2012).
After a decade of hilarious success with its iPhone, Apple at present is facing a tremendous decline in its quarterly revenue. Earlier, the weak sales of the iPhone were considered as the most accepted reason behind this. But, now the flaws in the marketing strategies of the company are regarded as the major setbacks. According to the leading researches in the marketing field, the strategies adopted by the brand to lure its customers have become stale and the company is unable to adopt any innovative measure regarding this failure. There was a time ewhen Apple was at the pinnacle of creating a Brand Image, but, as soon as the competition in Smartphone market grew, this brand began to face a lot of inevitable challenges.
The earlier marketing team had adopted an approach that focused on telling Apple’s story in a meaningful way and this approach even left substantial impacts on the minds of the consumers. Earlier, the marketing strategies of the firm entirely focused on the stories rather than on product features. But, the rat race in the markets has compelled the firm to follow the same strategy of enhancing the phone features rather than the experiences of the customers (Matyszczyk, 2016).
Another notable problem for the firm is its higher reliability on the sales of the iPhone. From the year 2014 the company has started to shift all its focus as well as the resources towards this single product than ever. This could be proven by a fact that in the year 2012, the percentage of revenue derived from the sales of the iPhone was 46% which grew up to 63% till the year 2014. This heavy depending situation will have severe consequences because the company is focusing only on a single product and it does not have any new product to replace it in the coming future. IPad is already facing a decline and Apple watch is a mere accessory. So the recognized problem here is the single production line of the company which involves numerous risks in the future.
Apple has always considered style and Quality over the price and targets only such consumers who have the same preference (Kingsley-Hughes, 2015). But the firm has accumulated a number of disappointed customers due to its buggiest updates in the software in the year 2015. Even after paying a huge amount for the phone, the customers faced a lot of problems in dealing with the software. As Apple keeps a tight security over its gadgets and softwares, hence the involvement of a third party was also not possible in times of software crashes.
One more crucial problem is faced by the company when it is about to launch any new product in the market. Apple is the super-secret company and just before the launch of a new innovation, the company faces crazy levels of speculations, rumors, criticism and other type of nonsense that dulls the actual features of the product. The pre-release hype also increases the expectations of the customers with the brand and if the product fails to meet them, then the company faces a series of rejections from the customers. This not only lowers the sales of the firm during the post-release period, but at the same time the company begins to lose some of its loyal customers who were looking for a great transformation by the launch (Reuters, 2016).
The super-security system of the company has also prevented the company to remain away from a number of advancements ongoing in the market. It has been a tradition in the firm to not adapt all sorts of trend in its operations. Apple has lived up with its innovative ideas and always had been a role model for the other competing Smartphone businesses. But the rivals have taken a great competitive advantage of this fact and have readily adopted the trends in its phone. So, for a customer looking for a true amalgamation of Style, trend and affordable price, Apple has failed in becoming the first choice. The company has also failed in becoming social as this trend could prove as an element of security breach of the company. To preserve its innovative ideas and keep the talent in a secure manner, the company never reveals its coming steps. This is step has proven beneficial in myriads of forms, but in its extreme form this has been a loophole too. The current markets targeted by the company include all types of customers; customers who never thinks before buying and the ones who have to think twice before spending (jackson, 2013). In such markets, a marketer needs to assure a customer about his products and services and Apple has never taken such attempts. For this brand, only its products and experiences of its loyal customers speak. This approach has proven successful in the firm’s previous markets, but as the new markets comprise all classes of customers so the brand needs a pre promotion to attract almost all the sections of the society.
In order to be a leader in an industry and to maintain that position, a number of commitments are required by a company. Apple, as a leading entrepreneur, has always ignored the critics and has focused on what it wants to design and deliver, irrespective of the perceived costs. The company has faced a number of challenges every time it has come up with an innovative idea. But as it is said “Great ideas often receive violent opposition from the mediocre minds”, hence the company has prevailed and succeeded in almost all its ventures.
To target the specific minds, the company has always worked upon standard designs and simplicity. The approach of reinventing the old designs has captured the minds of a number of customers who want to stick to simple designs. Above all this, while designing its new product, instead of considering the trending features, apple works on the entire product. It works on the feedbacks of the loyal customers to include all the missing features in the new product. Reading the minds and anticipating the needs of the consumers is also a technique and Apple was able to analyze this fact at a very early stage (Zaru, 2016).
Justification of the price is also a crucial element of the marketing. As the people pay for something, then it is equally important for a firm to cater all the specific needs of the customers. Apple has justified the price of its products by offering myriads of features and benefits in the products that can’t be matched. For instance, no laptop is thin as the Macbook Air and no other software can match what iTunes brings to a customer (Kaputa, 2012). No product is more valuable than Apple’s product and because of all this the customers agree to pay a premium price.
One more approach adopted by the company to have an edge over the other competitors is the way it communicates its products to the customers. The leading rivals of Apple talks about all the technological elements of their products, which are never understood by most of the customers and Apple, on the other hand, use a language that is easily interpreted by a consumer and hides all the technical jargon behind simple yet appealing specifications.
The presentation of the product specification is given more attention rather than confusing the customers with heavy technical terms and words (Mrak-Blumberg, et al., 2006). If a customer never knows what a megapixel is then he cannot be convinced for the same.
Apart from giving a new experience to its users, Apple offers a unique digital identity to its customers. A particular user of Apple devices can access the firm’s homogeneity through the Apple ID. This unique account helps the users to manage their files and device preferences across different devices, allowing seamless transition of useful information (Huimin & Hernandez, 2011).
The halo effect during the pre-product launch period is highly coupled with the deep brand loyalty of the customers. This fact complements the sales performance of all the products of Apple in current as well as in the potential markets. The success rates of the company points to a fact that all the marketing capabilities of the firm centers on Product and Pricing strategies.
Burnett, J., 2008. Core Concepts of Marketing: Jacobs Foundation, Available at: https://www.saylor.org/site/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Core-Concepts-of-Marketing.pdf
EY Team, 2012. Effective marketing strategy: ACCA, Available at: https://www.ey.com/Publication/vwLUAssets/Flyers-Marketing-EN/$FILE/Marketing_ENG.pdf
Huimin, M. & Hernandez, J., 2011. Price Skimming on a Successful Marketing Strategy: Study of Ipad Launching as Apple’s Innovative Product, Available at: https://www4.pucsp.br/icim/ingles/downloads/papers_2011/part_3/part_3_proc_36.pdf
Jackson, E., 2013. The 5 big problems facing apple none of which is too much cash. The 5 big problems facing apple none of which is too much cash, 26 February.
Kaputa, C., 2012. 5 Marketing Tools Apple Exploits To Build The Hype. 5 Marketing Tools Apple Exploits To Build The Hype, 28 September.
Kingsley-Hughes, A., 2015. Three huge challenges facing Apple in 2016. Three huge challenges facing Apple in 2016, 07 December.
Matyszczyk, C., 2016. Apple’s biggest problem is a marketing problem. Apple’s biggest problem is a marketing problem, 13 March.
Mrak-Blumberg, E., Renery, A. & Bundgaard, T., 2006. Strategic Report for Apple Computer Inc.: Pandora Group, Available at: https://economics-files.pomona.edu/jlikens/SeniorSeminars/pandora/reports/apple.pdf
Reuters, 2016. Here’s Why India Will Be Such a Challenging Market for Apple. Here’s Why India Will Be Such a Challenging Market for Apple, 24 May.
Thorp, D. & Bryant, R., 2010. https://www.cim.co.uk/files/improvingmarketingeffectiveness.pdf: Deloitte, Available at: https://www.cim.co.uk/files/improvingmarketingeffectiveness.pdf
Zaru, N., 2016. 7 Key Strategies That You Must Learn From Apple’s Marketing. 7 Key Strategies That You Must Learn From Apple’s Marketing, September.
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