Marketing Mix - Apple Inc and Iphone - Essay Example

? Marketing Mix Case: Apple Inc and Iphone Introduction Marketing mix refers to factors that affect consumer decision with regard to buying a certain product. According to Gitman and McDanie (2008, p.295), once the firm has identified its competitive edge in the market and the product they want to deliver, it is now time to develop a marketing mix around which their strategy will be developed. There are a number of factors that include economic, social, cultural and cognitive factors that affect the way the consumers will regard a product in the marketers. Marketers must always be able to identify these factors as a way to increase the way they market their products. In marketing a product, a marketer will always have to look at the four Ps of marketing and make sure that all the four Ps have been well considered and addressed. The four Ps Product The seller must look at the product and make sure it meets consumers’ needs. The product is the centre of the marketing strategy because it is the eventual interest f he customer. According to Belohlavek (2008, p. 15), the product is extremely influential in the marketing mix because it is the ultimate way in which the firm will deliver value and worth to the consumer. Produce development should therefore be the first point at which the marketing mix begins because the customers can only be willing to buy products that they think or know provide them with the value for their money. Price Every product has its price at which it is delivered to consumers. In this regard, the price of the product is an extremely beneficial aspect of marketing because it affects consumer behavior and decisions. It is itself affected by so many other factors such as culture, consumer attitudes and economic factors. Pricing is hugely valuable because the right pricing can give the firm a long term success while the wrong pricing strategy ca lead to the firm dying from the market. Place This refers to the availability of the product. Having the right product will not help the firm unless and until the brand is in the convenient place at the proper timing. Place plays a particularly significant role in the way the brand and its producer will be successful in the market place. It is therefore, every necessary to ensure that the brand is available to the target market to make sure users can conveniently access the product every time they need it. This increases the sales of the product as well as improving the user awareness of the product thus making it endeared to the consumers. Promotion To boost sales and deal with competition, promotion of the product becomes exceedingly prominent and makings sure has visibility is hugely crucial. There are a number of ways that any marketer or any firm scan use to expand the market. Promotion is communication with the potential and existing customers to enlighten them about the brand and its advanatages. One can use all of the possible methods such as internet, mass media, print media and any other available channel to communicate with consumers. Case: Apple and iPhone One of the firms that have been able to take care of the marketing mix is the American technology firm, Apple Inc. Apple Inc. produces a number of technology product from cell phones, table computes, laptop computers, desktop computers and including consumer software. However, for the purposes of this paper, the iPhone will be the only product considered. However, Apple has been able to apply the marketing mix for all its products and thus creating a tremendous success for its products. Product With regard to its product, Apple Inc. has been able to understand its industry in an exceptionally clear way so as to deliver a product that resonates with the needs of the consumers. Instead of being reactive to the market conditions, Apple Inc. is one of the fewest firms in the world that decided to be proactive in the way it meets consumers’ needs. It always delivers a product that is ahead of other firms in the same industry. This has enabled the firm to be able to be the market leader in the industry. In marketing, product evolution is always extremely influential. Every product has a life cycle that starts with the development and growth phase and ends with the decline. Apple has demonstrated its knowledge of the product life cycle remarkably well, and this has enabled it to meet customer needs in a decidedly unique way. The product life cycle is even much shorter in the technology industry, and apple has struggled to make sure that it delivers a new version of its products before its products start to decline. In this way, apple has been able to always fascinate the consumers with a new exciting product to make sure that customers are kept interested it the firm. At the same time, due to its construal production of new exciting products, Apple Inc. managed to always keep the consumers waiting for a new product to come out. With regard to their product, the other area where the firm has been uncommonly good in is placing the product as a high profile product. Unlike most other phones, Apple Inc. has managed to make the iPhone to be the world’s leading smart phone in terms of customer attitude. This has helped the firm in at least two ways, one it manages to sell its brands at much higher prices compared to other similar products, without losing market. Secondly, it is able to use price scheming which is a terrifically essential strategy for technology products. With product differentiation, apple has been able to capture a market niche that its competitors find extremely hard to get. According to Westcott (2009, p.12), the ability of Apple Computer, Inc to sue the I to brand its products has been tremendously effective and has helped the firm create an exceptionally unique brand that also supports brand loyalty. Apple is one of the sheer few firms in the world that understand the marketing mix darned much. Its creative and innovative products indicate that the firm understands that the marketing process starts way before the product reaches the market. While most marketers may stick to the traditional definitions of marketing as the process of placing the right product at the right place for the right price, Apple Inc. seems to understand extremely well that marketing is creating value for the customer way before the product reaches the market. By creating value for the customer, it becomes easier for the firm to create the standards and also to have an upper hand in the market. The marketing strategy that Apple Inc. uses is that of understanding the user needs even before the users know that they have these needs. This can be exemplified in two momentous occasions where apple has used its innovation to reveal user needs that were prior not understood by the users. During its launch as a personal computer manufacturer, Apple Inc. was able to show that there was a great and ready market for personal computers even though other businesses in the smear industry were totally blind to this fact. Place With regard to place apple has achieved a unusually good distribution process around the globe. Although the firm first rolled out in only six developed countries in its initial release of the iPhone, the firm has been able to reach every corner of the world by 2012. The distribution takes a multichannel form where in order to make sure that any potential customer in the owls is able to easily access the product. iPhone stores are available in almost every serious cities, and customers can buy from these stores. Apart from iPhone stores, the product is also distributed through other channels such as the AT&T distribution channeled. However, the most creative distribution channel is through the mobile network operates who sell the product. In many countries away from the United States of America, the firm is able to network operators as its distribution channel. This is a terrifically astute distribution channel because it being a cell phone it becomes easier for the firm to be able to reach every potential customer. Apple allows operators to sell the product along their products such connectivity and other services. This has allowed the product to be well distributed. Only a few months after the phone was made for the first time, the phone was available in almost all potential markets around the world. In this regard, iPhone was able to become a household brand that is now endeared by many people. Today, iPhone is there everywhere in the world. Once a new product is developed, for example the latest iPhone 5, it is accessible everywhere in the world within weeks. Apple Inc. has used the internet to enhance it distribution channel. iPhone is now available through the apple online retail and anyone in the world can buy the product from the internet and have it shipped to them in no time. Apart from this, iPhone is increasingly available in retail shops around the world. These retail shops don’t necessarily work in conjunction with apple but are independent retailers. In places like China and Africa, it is not unfamiliar to see small electronic shops selling iPhones in the almost every street. Making the product available has also been one of the strategies that Apple Inc. has used in an exceptionally clear way. Apple is produced in China but the distribution of the product is done in America. This gives the firm a better way to manage the supply chain as well as the value chain for the firm. Price As already discussed, apple has been remarkably good at pricing its products which make it easy for the firm to go on with its operations and good product. Apple Inc. has a profit marketing of over 50% on net expenses. Its products are always highly priced by due to its delivery of the best and the most innovative products, the firm has always, been able to sell it product at prices that are way higher than the other products. Fig 1.0 showing Apple Inc revenues by product: retrieved from http://www.businessinsider.com/iphone-profit-2012-8 Apple Inc. has benefited a lot from its pricing strategy and has used this to be ahead of the competitors in the market. It has combined high quality, market proactively and branding as a way to maintain its market niche. Instead of most of the competitors, Apple’s strategy is to take the cream of the market and concentrate on providing high quality, highly priced products to its customers. As Sadeghi (2012, p.52) says, apple has been able to use a particularly good pricing strategy and given its ability to use economies of scale, the firm could still achieve more profitability in the future. Promotion Apple is one of the firms has been able t do quite good promotion of its products. Apple has used every possible channel for marketing and promoting its products both in the media and the informal media such as social network. With regard to iPhone, apple has been able to reach an exceptionally wide market by advertising heavily on mainstream media; this was especially so during the earlier days when the firm was launching its first iPhone. Today, the firm gets a lot of publicity from international media such as CNN and almost never needs to pay for advertisement. For instance, news about any release of a product, especially the iPhone are always out through the mainstream media and s the general public is always aware. Unlike most of its competitors, Apple Inc. always uses a ceremony to launch a new version of the iPhone. Only six years after Apple Inc. first released its first iPhone, many customers today are always expectant of a newer version every year. This is helpful in various ways. First, it creates a market for the firm’s products in the market and it also helps apple to successfully use price scheming. Most iPhone users are always ready and eager to buy the next newest version of iPhone at a high price. When a new release is made of the iPhone, Apple Inc. is able to sell the first few products at extraordinarily high prices and then lowering the prices as time goes by. By the time the product is reaching maturity, an enhanced design of the product is released into the market and the process of price scheming is done. This has only been possible for Apple Inc. due to its promotion strategy that has endeared the product to many people. Creating brand loyalty As William and Ferrell (2011, p.400) say, branding is particularly beneficial to a firm because it creates brand loyalty which makes it easier for the firm to promote its products. Researchers have found that customer’s affective, cognitive and conative are major tenets that affect the way customers will be loyal to the brand of a firm (Gerald, 2011, p. 13). Apple has been remarkably good at creating brand loyalty even without giving incentives to the customers. Fig 2.0 showing comparison of profitability between apple and main competitor in the Smartphone category: retrieved from: http://www.statista.com/topics/847/apple/chart/547/net-profit-margins-of-apple-and-samsung/ Apple does this by providing s product that is unique that that meets the users’ needs without concentrating too much in hype. Other similar products have tried to offer technology hype that clams to do this and that tricks, but most of these tricks do to add value to the users and therefore the users don’t feel that they need them. Apple on the other hand has been exceptionally good and using innovation to provide users with a product that they are sure that will deliver and improve the user’s experience. In this regard, because customers of iPhone are always sure that the net version will improve their lives, they never shy away from buying it regardless of the higher prices offered by the firm. IPhone buyers have been regarded as hardcore fans which won’t even consider other brands from Apple’s competitors. Fig 3.0 showing Apples Smart Phone market share, retrieved from: http://www.iphoneincanada.ca/news/ios-may-be-slipping-but-apple%E2%80%99s-profit-margin-is-excellent/ This ability to create customer loyalty is increasingly influential in the sense that that it reduces the firm’s needed to do promotion. The products already have their customers’ way before they reach the market and customers are always eager to buy the next product from the factory. Apple has created a sort of a tribe that is help closely together by the feeling of being in a club. This iPhone club mentality imposed ion iPhone customers has a decidedly fundamental impact on Apple’s marketing strategy and the firm has to be immensely useful. According to Summers et al, (2005, p.157) brand creation is a process that begins with creating an awareness and then creating a brand image. Apple has been able to successfully and effectively to this in a remarkably easy and manageable way. According to Schneiders (2011, p.19)apple has been exceptionally good at utilizing cult marketing in order to achieve a loyal following that allows them to have a string grip on the market. Conclusion There are several influential factors that must be considered in order to achieve successful marketing. The four key factors include the four tents of the marketing mix, which include the product (the values delivered to the customer), the place (the distribution of the product through the market channels such as supply chain and value chain, the price at which he product is delivered to the end consumer and the promotional strategies that are used to give ht product visibility in the marketplace. Apple has carefully and strategically used these four tenets to create a very good marketing strategy and create a market niche for itself in the technology industry. More so, in the smart phone sub-industry, the firm has been able to amaze many people in the way it has taken over the market and leave is competitors in the shadows. Among the most strongly used strategies that the firm has used include creating a brand loyalty that can only be matched by what has come to be called cult marketing. Apple has been able to use brand loyalty to grasp a market niche that it has utilized to increase its revenues over and over. More so, while the firm has been accused of using cult marketing, many forms around the world can learn on a valuable lesson from Apple’s success especially in the smart phone sub industry. That is, marketing starts right from the time the product is being designed, so as to offer the right value to the users and therefore make it convenient easier for the customer to make a favorable decision about buying the product. Reference list Belohlavek, P. (2008). Unicist Marketing Mix. New York, NY: Blue Eagle Group. Gerald, P. (New York, NY). Panama's Low-Income Consumers' Brand Loyalty: Panamanian Consumers. 2011: Universal-Publishers. Gitman, L. a. (2008). The Future of Business: The Essentials. London: Cengage Learning. Sadeghi, S. (2012). Defensive Strategy – Apple’s Overlooked Key to Success. Epubli. Schneiders, S. (2011). Apple's Secret Of Success - Traditional Marketing Vs. Cult Marketing. Hamburg: Diplomica Verlag. Summers, M. e. (2005). Sports Marketing. London: Cengage Learning Australia. Westcott, A. (2009). Visual Identity: Promoting and Protecting the Public Face of an Organization. New York, NY: M.E. Sharpe, . William M.P. and Ferrell, O. (2011). Marketing. London: Cengage Learning. Read More