Don't underestimate the power of good brand marketing. The author of this post caulks up Apple's success to good design. I think design is important, but the Apple brand is more important. Apple has created this club-like feel to their products... if you own a Mac or an iPhone, you're in the in-crowd, and they have spent ungodly sums of money on star-powered commercials to create a brand with that "in-crowd" effect.
You have a point, but at the same time: Apple is only able to get away with their particular brand of marketing because their products work in ways similar to the manner broadcasted.
Case in point: the iPhone commercials, which were extremely minimalist and made out to promote the iPhone as this ultrasmooth, ultraenjoyable product. That commercial line made the iPhone as popular as it has become. But it wouldn't have worked that way if the iPhone hadn't had such perfect design. Imagine a commercial for the Voyager attempting the same types of ads. It plain wouldn't work. Not because the Voyager is a poor phone per se, but because it's so deeply flawed in its design.
Product design is as much a part of their marketing as their commercials/advertisement. The strength of Apple is that they convey a single message to the world. It extends to advertising, product design, store design...all the to the way steve jobs carries himself in his keynotes. Everything that they do says "minimalistic design with focused functionality."
I find it really sad that marketing is so pervasively backwards that marketing that's useful to the user can be considered an interesting concept... it should be the norm!
If a product or service is so great and amazing, it seems to me that simply describing it, without the usual bullshit hype and borderline (or outright) lies that usually accompany the description, should be enough for people to try it, love it, then tell everyone they know how great it is.
As an example of what I'd call "real marketing", for my upcoming niche fansite about some MMORPG, I want to give maximum information to potential users about what my site does and how, before they even sign up. And I'm working hard to structure the site properly and have usable navigation, and eventually I want tutorials integrated all throughout the site and such. In fact, I'll let users try a limited version of the site just by providing a username and password, no email required. The idea is to make barrier to adoption almost impossibly low.
And I do want to produce marketing material, though I'll let my users distribute it. First, the marketing stuff will be segregated in one section of the site, so that people can go look it up only if they actually want to, I don't want to use the braindead "opt-out" approach that seems so popular where you spread your bullshit hype everywhere and your customers have to ignore it if they happen not to want to hear it (which most of them don't). I'll produce a couple versions of my marketing material, targeted to specific kinds of users. So if for example some alliance member wants to convince his leader to adopt my service for the whole alliance, he'll show him the leader-targetted page. So, make a great product that people WANT to talk about and then make it EASY to do so, provide a lot of "meat" so they have lots to talk about. I'm lucky because my site is so focused on a tight audience that I just need to tell a few people directly about it to bootstrap adoption.
To summarize the article "By choosing to compete on design instead of technology alone, Apple seems to have found a loophole in the Innovator's Dilemma."
Can we apply the same type of concept to Internet based company and be successful? Does 37signals use this concept?
Apple designs a single, specific product with no more than two or three distinct configurations that looks good, functions well, and is sold at a premium, first and foremost. Then, they collect feedback from users, and make a change in one of their next patches or product releases.
I really believe Apple has user feedback as part of their entire strategy, but not necessarily before a product's release. They release something simple first, and then improve it continuously based on user feedback and sales numbers.
Other computer and electronics companies try to flood the market with as many products as possible, and seeing what sticks. The designs suck, software is rushed (if not still in beta) when the products are released, and lack an overall theme or brand among all products the company has, unlike Apple.
I think apple has a great lead and will for sometime because the same reason Google does.
- they were first to market with an "ah-ha" Idea; when google search worked it was an "ah-ha" for many people and most stuck around - today you see google as a "verb"
- when I first saw the Ipod it was an "ah-ha" moment with the wheel and the way to legally get music built in. Although I have come to realize that their weak point is their proprietary format.
- what I'm trying to say is they both have something that others can't easily replicate, its not a feature or killer product (Although it started that way) its now a "Brand" and a huge chunk of users that adore them.
Because they read the Innovator's Solution. There's a chart in there (can't find it in Google Books) that has the hierarchy of what customers value - it's something like 1) possibility 2) cost 3) ease of use. Ah, I'm not doing it justice, I've got to go get the book now.
