Want to dig through the Marketing-tactics of Apple?

Can I ask you to stop at whatever you are doing as I’m going to bring something in front you that you always wanted to know?

It’s about the brand that launched the Jesus Phone, not a Smartphone (because it doesn’t qualify to be called just a Smartphone, it is an iPhone).

Exploding stock prices, cascading tweets, ever-multiplying craze, back orders are not out without a reason.

Apple has made people worship it. Besides doing this, it is doing something else very RIGHT.

The marketing bible of Apple is THAT something which any marketer would never want to miss.

It is not too early either to know its holy-grail because it has already been 10 years of bashing monopoly of Apple with iPad, iPhone, iPad and almost whatever it launched. They became a symbolic leader of the product segments instead of being just another brand of each segment.

Needless to say that you don’t buy a Smartphone, you buy an iPhone.

What did Steve Jobs say that everybody started believing him? How did he say it?

Drop everything; we’re revealing iPhone’s under-the-cover popularity tactics!

Here is your ride-to-remember because it is very much inherited from Apple’s marketing ride:

i) Rhyme with the users

Steve Jobs core philosophy was ‘users don’t always know what they want’. Make consumers identify with that angle which your brand markets with.

Nobody knew that they wanted an all-touch screen phone until it was into their hands. Customers’ mind was read correctly and was articulated well enough by Apple that they instantly started adoring what they received.

Here’s a hint of benefit: Multiply your efforts on market- research, it presents the telltale signs of what your customer wants precisely.

ii) User- Reviews hold the reins

Positive rave reviews from users do magnificence in building the buzz. Word-of-mouth reviews speak about your product with an honest and non-commercial intent.

Phil Schiller, senior VP of Apple’e marketing, denied any need to pay for advertising. He says,” We didn’t need “. Several rave reviews from users do a better job than advertising to build a buzz.

iii) Design a customer-experience not just a product

 iPhone was drastic departure from the PC, it was a Transformative Product that made the lives for millions (it had sold its billionth phone in 2016) heavenly great.

The secret lies beyond its product line and design standards. The welcoming approach of Apple’s interface built a legacy of unique experience that is hard to find from any other product.

So, when are you starting to carve out the enriching experience that will be the feel-good pillar of your brand to keep customers coming again and again?

iv) Build a cult and your fanboys (fangirls too)

Identify your loyal users, the ones who cannot do without your product and market it exclusively to them. Let the rest of the crew follow desirably.

People fail to understand why Apple-lovers are so much dedicated to it, looks like infinite-love, if it’s countable!

This love-story remains a cliff-hanger to the non-users.

Even the bickering about it makes a spot-light and contributes to the discussion on this hot topic.

It’s like a tribe which is so much difficult to get into until you buy the pass for it.

Start fanaticising your audience until you find your audience’s threshold to fall in love with your brand, irretrievably.

v) Build beautiful

Hand an exquisite gift to your consumer’s something that takes hassles miles away and the only takeaway is a proud smile of possession.

Apple’s product-details are just information that remains like a dusky-detail to its product users. Definitely, they cannot deny the pull to its irresistible exteriors that do not fail in overwhelming any random onlooker as well.

vi) Use customer’s language

Make your customers feel and say it to you, “Amazing, you get me “.

Your potential customer is not a techie, a chemist, a physicist and or any subject-matter expert that marketers, unfortunately, forget often.

A consumer can’t decipher, decode or understand and he/she won’t even try the least to do so.

Apple directly spoke in the language of users by saying that iPod could store 20,000 songs instead of saying that it had “80-gigabyte” memory. After all, one doesn’t need to know the alien jargon ‘gigabyte’ to be a ‘user.

The reason is simple that any marketing pitch is not about you or your company; it is about your customer and selling to the customer.

vii) Make simple

When did you start assuming that the way to stand out amidst loud and flashy marketing industry was to be even louder and flashier?

Enough evidence, statistics, and research findings indicate that consumers are tired of being bombarded with loads of information. It is distracting rather than fixing in the buying decisions.

Simplicity is the best a customer can ask for, in any form be it advertising, marketing, servicing or as simple as an user-experience. Reward them with your best possible simple form and they will be glued as your fan forever.

viii) Exclusivity & Secrecy paradigm
Marketing without marketing actually but with one exclusivity technique.

How?

The first iPhone model was made exclusively available from just one mobile provider for its’ entire life span.

Which other company could turn an ordinary press conference into a Live-global-event?

The eye-rolling scene of long queues of the bone-deep loyal customers of iPhone on the launch of every new model defines how exclusivity is carried (with full-grace!).

Already generating a faux scarcity among the iPhone-deprived users, it continues to be the benchmark product for others, all by dint of its supreme-secrecy technique.

If you noticed carefully, it was not its tool; it was the behavior of this uber-cool brand.

9- Tinge of difference

I can gush philosophies galore to prove that how much ‘being different’ is the essential nerve required to bring a revolution.

But, I will tell my own version here :P.  A new page is written with a new storyline of content and not with copying the past page storyline. (Not saying a book because there is enough plagiarism in the world.)

Similarly, for a new product/service/marketing deliverable, if you want to claim it be your own and importantly NEW, it has to have a distinct idea, the newest idea on the horizon that nobody has. Any resemblance/copying WON’T make it your own.

Steve Jobs, faced criticisms only some uncountable times and his idea of just a simple phone shook the entire mobile industry.

You may choose to copy his slogan”Think Different “as your credo; at least it will inspire some wild outcaste-sort-of different thinking.

Who cares about what people think with their pre-conceived notions?

Stick-to-your-guns, no matter what (humanly or situational obstructions) the heck comes in the way.

Takeaway:

Apple has created a mind-set rather a SENTIMENT with its iPhone (all its products) in a world of people who think walking out of the house without a phone is like walking into the streets naked.

Apple’s marketing is the classic among the trends of marketing.

They have not done ever SMM, SEO, PPC, Email marketing and so on ……….

Why else you needed to heed the above points?

1- Apple’s had a formidable ‘marketing strategy’, the elements that you just read above.

2- Mobile is the future of marketing. With the dire need of increasing mobile marketing,  iPhone users continue to dominate your target audience. Play your game accordingly.

3- iPhone has launched a ‘business chat’ feature in iMessage that is on the lines of Facebook messenger chat bots but way more advanced than it because Business chat does not use bots. Business chat is a powerful way for brands to connect with customers via messages.

Dear digital marketers, it’s proved again that iPhone users are among your target consumers.

Broadly speaking mobile users are crucial and make them notice you through your digital marketing!

Let us know your problem in doing mobile marketing.

Once, ‘we get the problem’,’ we will get on to the solution’.

Hitesh Kothari

Has played some key Digital Marketing roles when at IBM-Australia and New Zealand, Infosys, Sonata Software. Also worked with the world's best Digital marketer, Neil Patel as Internet marketing consultant helping startups to billion $ companies with their Digital Marketing. Has worked on 100+ marketing campaigns and a few of them are IBM Australian Open, SAPPHIRE, Oracle Open World, etc. He's currently leading Marketo Labz and giving digital marketing strategies to various companies and individuals alike.

1 Comment

  • Manjeet singh says:

    A well written and intelligently drafted article about the most iconic brand our generation has seen . I learnt few things which I didn’t know but since its APPLE and everybody has heard a lot about it , it would be more intriguing and interesting with your crisp and intelligent writing that you write next time about a smaller brand and how that brand used digital medium in its success.it would be interesting i guess.

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