Comparing Apples and Galaxies - Essay Example

Comparing Apples and Galaxies

Persuasion basically refers to the act of influencing some other person’s mind for any particular reason or issue. As for persuasive messaging, it refers to the act of convincing others through formal or informal modes of communication to take some specific actions. Apple and Samsung are the two smart phone giants in the present world. Apple is considered the leader of smart phone technology, whereas Samsung has always been the closest competitor of Apple. Both companies use persuasive messaging technique quite effectively and efficiently to attract people and make them buy their products. In this paper, the focus will be on the persuasive messaging techniques and their analysis of both companies to know the way both companies are using persuasive messaging technique to increase its customer base.

The success of Apple Company can best be understood using the theory of reasoned action. The theory of reasoned action is based on the concept that behavioral intentions of a person are based on his/her attitudes and subjective norms (Dillard & Shen, 2013). This means that attitudes and norms play a dynamic role in shaping the behavioral intentions of a person that ultimately leads to the actual behavior. The important elements of this theory include belief and evaluations, motivation to comply, attitude towards behaviors, norms, behavioral intention, and actual behavior.

For example, Michael may decide to buy an Apple smart phone because not only he thinks it to be a reliable and market value phone as compared to other brands but also his friends also have Apple smart phones and they have a positive belief about the quality of the Apple mobile phone. In this example, Michael’s intention to buy an Apple mobile phone is based on his own belief (self-evaluation) and positive compliments (motivation to comply), which consequently lead to setting his attitude towards buying behavior and shaping subjective norm respectively. Both attitudes towards behavior and norms lead to shaping the buying intention of Michael (behavioral intention) that make him actually buy (actual behavior) an Apple mobile phone.

People have a very positive attitude towards Apple products, particularly its ipads, laptop machines, and mobile phones. If we talk particularly about people’s perceptions and attitudes about Apple’s mobile phones because in this paper the comparison is being made with Samsung Galaxy mobile phone series, we come to know that people not only have a positive attitude about Apple’s mobile phones but also the financially sound customers have adopted it as a norm to buy and gift Apple mobile phones only. The reasons may vary from person to person depending on his/her personal choice and preferences about the features of a mobile phone. However, the factors that make most of the people buy Apple mobile phones instead of others include iOS preference, wide support for apps, clear information about the security features of iOS, status symbol, and reliability and durability. Many people consider using Apple mobile phones as a status symbol. People trust the quality of Apple Company and its products and consider it to be the pioneer and leader of the world of smart phone technology. It is a fact that a company that comes up with any new idea holds a unique place in the minds and hearts of people and new companies following the same idea find it very hard to change the already developed perception of people. Same has happened in the case of Apple Company and its competitors like Samsung. Apple was the first every company to introduce the idea of capacitive touch screen mobiles in 2007. After the introduction of the idea, many existing and new companies adopted it quickly and started coming up with their own models of touch screen mobiles. However, people already had a good image about Apple Company and its products, thus, they tried their hands on iPhone and the quality and features of iPhone played a key role in developing a strong perception and shaping the attitudes of people about Apple products. Now, even after a decade, Apple uses those perceptions and attitudes of people to offer new products and continue generating higher revenues. Apple uses its persuasion strategy to keep its customer base intact as well as to gain more customers all around the world.

The new iPhone 8 definitely seems to be the signature product of Apple Company. It is the attitude of people that has made Apple to achieve so much success with its mobile phones. Attitude is something that persuades and motivates people to behave in a certain direction. The three major functions that shape the attitude of a person include cognition, affect, and behavior. When these three components combine in the mind of a person, he/she performs an action directed by his/her attitude. If we discuss the ad, ‘Portraits of Her’, the source variables, which are the aspects of the communicator that he/she uses to persuade others, include her elegant style, hot looks, clarity of the main object in presence of other objects, and her sparkling dressing. I think Apple has chosen this model as the face for their new product because of her unique style that catches the attention of every person. One thing to be noted in the whole ad is that viewers cannot distract their attention from the main model even when going through a series of scenes. It is the quality of the looks of the model for which Apple has probably picked her for the new advertisement. The ad illustrates the motivational qualities illustrated in the functional attitude theory. Camera is one of the main factors that play a key role in selection of any mobile phone. In the ad, the model motivates the viewers by giving an exceptional look under different light conditions.

In the second ad, ‘new light’, the body of iphone 8 has been shown from different angles. The ad’s persuasive strategy via theElaboration Likelihood Model (ELM) seems to be focused on central processing because every person looking this ad has some sort of ability and motivation to think about message being conveyed through the ad. The ad is simple and keeps viewers engaged right through the end of the ad and this is the most important key towards a successful ad.

Both ads give a message about the elegance and features of iphone 8, which motivate the viewers to make a buy decision for the new iphone. The emotions that are being evoked through the ads include style, eagerness to get hands to the new product, and motivation to learn more about the product. Although both ads project the striking style of new iphone 8, but the first ad, portrait of her’ is more eye-catching and persuade viewers to view the ad again.

As for Apple Watch’s slogan, ‘Freedom Calls’, I would say that it matches the persuasion theory effectively and appropriately. For example, it calls for the freedom from the need to hang on with the mobile phone all the time. One can go out of home for walk or to spend some time privately without carrying the mobile phone because Apple watch with a cellular connection would do all for him/her in case of any emergency. The basic purpose for anyone carrying a mobile is to remain connected with the rest of the world. With Apple watch, one can feel freedom as a feeling of privacy and loneliness comes with mobile phone placed back at home. Yet one can be reached in emergency if needed (Haselton, 2017). Moreover, all basic functions of a mobile phone like timer, scheduling, music, and weather updates have been included in Apple watch, which call for freedom from mobile phones at times one really needs it. Thus, one can say that ‘freedom calls’ is a slogan rightly made for Apple watch that persuades people to use Apple watch.

By looking at the Watch’s main page on Apple’s website, it can be noted that Apple is mainly trying to persuade sportsmen and youth to use Apple watch rather than sticking to the mobile phone because the watch performs almost all basic functions a mobile phone would do. The site uses the text and images in the right combination that make it easy for the viewers to understand the meaning being conveyed to the users. Both text and images are well-connected and targeted towards youth and athletics. The combination of text and images works well to attract the customers and influence their attitude about the Apple watch.

After analyzing the ipad section on Apple’s website, it can be known that Apple has used persuasive messaging on the webpage to convince customers to buy ipads instead of searching for other pads. If we talk about Apple’s persuasive strategy on its website from the perspective of the theory of inoculation, one can say that Apple is making the customers aware of its products and that awareness can help the customers in making up their minds and defend their choice when confronted with the users of other brands. The working mechanism of inoculation theory is that one needs to improve the resistance building skills in order to fight persuasion and that resistance can come through knowledge and awareness. Communication is the main element of this theory and Apple has used it well in the website to provide knowledge about counter arguments that a person needs to remember and use to defend his/her beliefs in case of applied persuasion. The theory relates to persuasion in that it emphasizes on the importance of the use of persuasion as a method targeted towards helping a person protect himself/herself from being persuaded by others. Persuasion may lead a person to change his/her mindset and adopt a certain behavior but persuasive training and early knowledge can create resistance in a person as in case of Apple website about it products.

After looking at the Galaxy 8 page on Samsung website, one can know that the entire persuasive strategy seems to revolve around switching to their phone and it is true and legal in a sense that every company works to attract customers and this can best be done by persuasive marketing. As for Samsung, the messaging reveals the way the company imagines existing consumer attitudes and behaviors. The company targets the features in the website that customers demand the most in their mobile phones. For example, the company persuades customers to buy Samsung Galaxy 8 series because of better screen, curved design, smart camera, better night photos, extended storage, 15gb cloud storage that is more than any other mobile phone company offers, long lasting and fast charging, and many other features. One thing to note is that Samsung has used the persuasion strategy more powerfully as compared to Apple because Samsung is fully aware of the fact that this is the world of marketing and those companies succeed that draw customers towards them by explicitly persuading the customers by comparing their products with those of their competitors. This strategy of Samsung has a clear effect on persuasive outcomes as the company has become the strongest competitor of Apple with even more number of mobile phone sales as compared to Apple in the last few years.

The terms like clearer, smarter, bigger, longer, and greater used in all of the sections of the webpage clearly reflect that the company is using persuasive technique not only to convince customers about their products but also to provide a comparison of their products with those of the competitors. If we talk about the persuasive messaging of Samsung in line with the cognitive dissonance theory, we can say that the company is trying to persuade the attitudes of people to bring a change in outcomes. Dissonance theory works specifically to bring a change in attitudes as well as to build certain behaviors in people (Wickland & Brehm, 1976). And that change in attitudes and formation of behaviors eventually help people in solving problems and making informed decisions about different matters. The basic principles of the theory are that disagreement may occur for a person when he/she has to choose between certain contradictory behaviors and attitudes about a particular product or issue. “This produces a feeling of discomfort leading to an alteration in one of the attitudes, beliefs or behaviors to reduce the discomfort and restore balance etc” (McLeod, 2014, para. 1). I believe that the Samsung’s strategy is more closely and rightfully linked with the inoculation theory as the company is clearly persuading the customers by informing them about their product’s features and comparing them to others. I think the emotional appeals made by Samsung can make the customers switch to Samsung because the company has made a perfect use of persuasion by targeting the emotions of people regarding the features they desire to have in their mobile phones.

Summing it up, both Apple and Samsung are making use of persuasive messaging technique to convince customers about buying their products. However, Samsung appears to be more engaged in persuading people by indirectly comparing their products with Apple, which appears to be a good strategy in today’s world of competition where customers find it difficult to make informed decisions. Apple is also using persuasive messaging technique but it is not comparing the products with any competitor directly or indirectly.