Strategy Plans - Apple Incorporated - Essay Example

?Apple Incorporated Introduction Apple Incorporated is an integral part of Personal Computers Industry under the hardware sector. Its major competitors include Microsoft, Dell, Google, and Hewlett-Packard Company. It is in this reason that competition is getting tougher at Personal Computers Industry and each major key player aims to be a cut above the other. Apple Incorporated specifically aims to achieve its competitive advantage in order to become a cut above the other. In this paper, the proponent tries to find out the strategy plans of Apple for growing its business, the strategy it is using, and how does the existing competition in its industry influence its strategy selection. Furthermore, the proponent gives comments on how Apple has implemented its strategy within its organization, the control it placed on the organization to monitor its success and eventually how this influenced its staffing requirements. Strategy Plans Due to various changes in the computer industry, strategies need to be planned at Apple Incorporated. There are two essential considerations that Apple has to take into account in order to entirely deliver its strategy plans. These include allocating resources between traditional and new product offerings in order to both maintain and improve its market position, and maintaining its competitive advantage through its unique retail strategy and capitalizing on new and emerging trends (Di Muro, Murray, & Goode, 2010). All of these are remarkable components of Apple’s strategy plans in order to grow its business especially in the midst of constantly changing market in Personal Computers Industry. Thus, there are two obvious strategic plans that Apple should pursue and these include the idea of maintaining and improving its market position and its competitive advantage, respectively. These are essential plans that Apple should remarkably do especially in its industry where each key player tries to compete with each other in order to survive and even reach the point of becoming a cut above the other. Competition and Apple’s strategy selection Competition pushes Apple to go try more than just the very basic of its traditional approach. This means that the company needs to explore possibilities based on its goals. Apple’s plans include maintaining or improving its market position and achieving its competitive advantage. Clearly, strategies need to be formulated as well in order to obtain these goals. In particular, under improving or maintaining its market position, Apple Incorporated needs to exactly create highly differentiated products through its initiative in latest product development or innovation. It is in line with this that Apple needs to substantially create more focus in dealing with its traditional and new products based on the latest trends. This means Apple needs to compete with making a difference with its product offerings. This is the very point of its differentiation strategy in order to improve or maintain its market position. On the other hand, in order to achieve its competitive advantage, Apple needs to substantially consider its unique retail strategy which is related to the creation of its market share. In the midst of a very competitive market due to different key players trying to emphasize target market for their product offerings, Apple remarkably needs to consider exploring more possibilities on how they exactly make it successful for their products to reach into their customers. While adhering completely on its branding strategy, Apple needs to ensure that its products are handled accordingly by highly accredited retailers. This is to ensure preserving its property rights, which at some point has become an integral part of its product identity and quality trademark. Thus, Apple substantially invests its resources in maximizing the image of its brand as essential component of its unique retail strategy. Implementation of strategy Implementation of strategy would never be that easy especially in the industry where Apple belongs due to a very tight competition. However, the implementations of Apple’s strategies have to be more intense within the organization rather than on taking extra consideration of its external environment such as its competitors and the entire market which are substantially affected by competition. Within the organization, Apple needs to organize everything most particularly in allocating its resources. Everything needs to be maximized most importantly its human resource. As stated earlier, Apple needs to expand its horizon in line with product development and innovation. This only implies that within the organization, the human resource in particular should be highly equipped with the knowledge of research and development. Apple would have not been successful if not because of its research and development. In this case, it is evident that Apple remarkably invests in its human resource in order to come up with successful research and product development and innovation. Control and staffing requirements Quality control is obviously one of the most important priorities at Apple Incorporated through its highly dynamic support team (Apple Incorporated, 2011). It is in line with this that the company requires more expert personnel in line with product development and innovation. In addition, understanding customers’ needs (The New York Times, 2011) is another important way to formulate control at Apple Incorporated which is in line with knowing its market share. Knowing the market share is a significant measure or control that will help to find out the success of Apple in its industry. It is the bottom line just prior to knowing its market revenue, profit and so on. Steven Jobs has proven that he really knew what the customers wanted by redefining the potential of its existing or produced products in the market (The New York Times, 2011). Thus, Apple needs someone just like Mr. Jobs having the right market intuition and a strong sense of understanding customers’ needs. In short, Apple requires market-oriented personnel who seek to understand the impact of creating value for the customers. Conclusion Apple Incorporated is a company tested by time. Due to its ability to strive for the best possible outcome, it has become one of the most renowned companies in the world today. Its success was primarily due to its ability to plan and from that various strategies are obtained, implemented, and measured. References Apple Incorporated. (2011). Support. Retrieved November 5, 2011, from http://www.apple.com/support/ Di Muro, F., Murray, K., & Goode, M. (2010). Strategic Planning at Apple Inc. Retrieved November 5, 2011, from http://hbr.org/product/strategic-planning-at-apple-inc/an/909A26-PDF-ENG The New York Times. (2011). Apple Incorporated. Retrieved November 5, 2011, from http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/apple_computer_inc/index.html Read More