Analysis of the Marketing Strategy of Apple Inc - Dissertation Example

The death of Jobs in 2011 has left Apple’s stakeholders, its many avid followers, and the business community in a state of uncertainty about the company’s future and its ability to sustain continuous innovation as it had under Jobs. The dissertation aimed to examine the marketing strategy and related systems that are responsible for the success of Apple, Inc. since 1997. The objectives included an assessment of the fundamental changes in Apple under Steve Jobs, the marketing systems and corporate strategy supporting its most successful products, the analysis of Apple’s competitive strategy compared with that of Microsoft, its longest running and most important competitor, and an analysis of the likely prospects of the firm moving forward.

A review of academic literature was undertaken on market strategy and the related topics of strategic management and planning competitive strategy, innovation management and change management. Its purpose was to explore theoretical frameworks which may support an analysis of Apple’s case relating to these topics and market strategy in particular. The theories aided in the assessment of the secondary data gathered from reports and online sources dealing with Apple’s market performance in the period 1997 to 2011, with particular attention given to the market success of the iMac, iPod, iPhone and iPad in the period 2005 to 2011.

Attention was focused on corporate strategy, specifically the Digital Lifestyle vision of Jobs which gave rise to the Digital Hub strategy in its innovation management. . Steve Jobs provided the foresight, the inspiration and the motive force behind Apple’s recent successes, and there is every indication that given the leadership style of the new CEO Tim Cook that balances corporate and innovative strategies, Apple will continue to be successful into the future. Table of Contents Abstract 2 Chapter 1: Introduction 6 1.

1 Background of Study 6 1.2 Steve Jobs & the Apple Story 7 1.3 Marketing & Strategy at Apple 8 1.4 Industry Dynamics 9 1.5 Research Aim 9 1.6 Motivation for this Research 10 1.7 Scope and Delimitation 10 Chapter 2: Review of Related Literature 11 2.1 Overview 11 2.2 Strategic Management 11 2.4.1 SWOT 13 2.4.2 PESTEL 14 2.3 Marketing Strategy 14 2.4 Competitive Strategy 18 2.5 Change Management 20 2.6 Innovation Management 23 2.7 Synthesis 26 Chapter 3: Research Methodology 28 3.1 Overview 28 3.

2 Research Approach 28 3.3 Data Collection & Analysis 29 3.4 Research Validity and Reliability. 30 3.5 Limitations of the research methodology 31 Chapter 4: Results and Analysis of Results 32 4.1 Overview 32 4.2 Fundamental changes undertaken by Steve Jobs, 1997-2005 32 4.3 Marketing systems and corporate strategy, 2005 to present 35 4.4 Discussion of Marketing strategy, Innovation management, and Change management 38 4.5 Competitor analysis of Apple vs. Microsoft 41 4.6 Future implications of the existing strategy of Apple 46 Chapter 5: Conclusions and Recommendations 50 5.

1 Overview 50 5.2 Summary of findings 50 5.3 Conclusion 52 5.4 Recommendations 53 5.5 Directions for future research 54 Bibliography 56 Chapter 1: Introduction 1.1 Background of Study The year 2009 was marked by of one of America and the world's worst financial crises, which became known as the Credit Crunch or the Global Financial