Hoopla iPhone 5 Release - Strategic Planning working!
Posted by Mitch Ellner on Fri, Sep 21, 2012 @ 10:05 AM
Will there be a new one? Yes it is coming in September. Oh my it is here!
The frenzy surrounding the release of the new iPhone is astounding. It does not appear that any other company or technology gets such hoopla when it introduces something new, even if it is only slightly different from what existed. For example, on each release of ANY Apple product produces such a world wide excitement. I cannot think of any other "product" event that has brought so many believers collectively together, that MUST have whatever they are offering, than Apple. Even the non-believers or skeptics join in. Whether they buy one to compare or just provide negative feedback, they are providing "free" marketing to the cause.
We have become such believers that what you hear is people asking about your "iPhone" or do you have an "iPhone" more over than asking about your "smart or Android" phone. This is shear madness and excellence in strategically planning the releases. We are not even talking about the technology itself as that would take a whole other blog to begin with the compare and contrasts. Even their "other products" such as the iPad, bring about conversation from most everyone on mentioning the "iPad" over saying "tablet" or any other brand name.
Apple has become known for not talking about exactly when the new products will be released, if they will be released, what they will be, have, etc. What they have been known for, is consistently making new product releases during certain times a year, and allowing the media, social media, believers and non-believers to market it for them. We can talk about all types of strategies, yet I beg anyone to tell me what better strategy there is to marketing. Even this type of bad marketing, skeptics, is good!
Some of the biggest opportunities that people are talking about are the missing apps surrounding maps and YouTube. The battle between Google and Apple is corporate based and is based around to corporate entities competing for and in a similar or like space. Competition is good and can actually work well side by side, and in other cases they can be total competition, which appears to be the case here. Will the general public and businesses suffer from this challenge that faces the two companies? As for Apple, again, kept secret until the release, the maps app is based upon the "Cloud" and means it is in real time, so the more that it gets used, the more "real" that it is. So Apple is banking on the strategy that their map app will sooner than later provide the best alternative as it is happening in real time as compared to the "lagging" feed that may exist in the past and currently. So road conditions, directions, locations, etc, should be appearing as the really are, as more and more users adapt. Again, another business strategy that goes hand in hand with the way that Apple has chosen to do business and has paid off in spades for them on Wall Street and with the consumer at large.
Apple is banking much on the cloud space, as this process is the direction where real time and instantaneous results apply. No more lagging indicators and no more "assumptions" yet reality of what is really happening and where you are. Isn't this what business is really about? Real time? Knowing where you are, what you are doing, how you are performing, how you can re-direct NOW instead of later when it might be too late and the Apple's of the world have dominated your competitive landscape? The cloud is still in its infancy. Albeit it is 10 years old, yet many times businesses are like the Titanic when it comes to letting go of their legacy businesses and hold on to them, even if their is a faster, more reliable way of garnering information to run the full business performance. Apple is teaching all of us. Businesses and consumers alike, to believe there is another way, a different way and maybe even a better way to do things. I am not advocating for Apple, yet I am advocating for the strategy and the results that have been proven, even when there is a glitch, they are on it and it is resolved ASAP. The first example was the release of the iPhone 4 and the antenna. The refunds, the redesign and the covers were all done so quickly that I doubt many people remember it, yet more importantly, it did not stop them from adapting, buying, wanting, etc.
- So what is it about what Apple does and how they market, or don't, and how they release, the product(s), the use of the cloud, the use of real time information and just the hoopla about strategically allowing the public to market for them, not transcend into how we run our businesses?
- What is it that we can learn from what they are doing, that it is truly simple, and take this to what we do to measure and manage our own businesses?
- Why are we so slow to adapt or change how we deal with our own business information and still believe in implementing BIG systems that provide lagging indicators on the most important aspects of our businesses - people, processes, finances - all of our strategic resources?
Not only did people camp out world wide for the newest and latest release from a strategically positioned innovator, yet the pre-order sales topped 2 million!
What lessons, good and bad, will you take from Apple and these "point, counter point" questions, comments and realities to better simply measure and manage your full business performance and will you? Or will you live in legacy information and data and never truly understand that there are simpler and easier ways to stay abreast of garnering real time information.
Strategic planning, alignment, execution and results can take many lessons from how Apple does things and even more importantly the results that have been shown and proven, even with the glitches, as that is what real time is about - finding, knowing and thus changing!
Take control of your business - bring GPS's3 (Simple Strategic Solutions) to how you and your business get information and take back the simplicity!
