Branding Apple Inc. Has Created

Branding

Apple Inc. has created a truly impressive brand that is not only immediately recognized throughout the world, but enjoys a cult-like following that has been seen only with short-term fad products and, certainly, never with a technology company. Taking this one step further, the Apple products themselves take on a sub-brand life of their own, and none has been so successful and so absolutely domineering in the market as the iPod. In terms of overall lasting success, Apple Inc. (nee Apple Computer, Inc.) has been creating overwhelmingly successful brands since 1977. Though it is outside the scope of this paper to examine the history of Apple Inc., history indeed is important - the company started out as the first provider of true home-computers - and created machines that looked like nothing else, engaged people like no other technology had, and even though the financial side of Apple went through many very tough periods, the iconic Apple corporate symbol is directly linked with everything exciting we want to believe about ourselves. No other product demonstrates the power of the Apple brand than the iPod line. On the flipside of this branding issue is Microsoft and the Zone. Microsoft enjoys world dominance in the realm of operating systems and desktop office software, but it has utterly failed to capitalize on its brand with the Zone. Understanding where Apple has succeeded with the iPod and Microsoft has failed with the Zune begins and ends with branding and, most certainly, with the twenty-two immutable laws of marketing as laid out by Ries and Trout.

Apple was not the first company to enter the mp3-player market. Apple was also not the first company to turn the personal computer into a truly versatile modern jukebox. It was also not the first company to allow people to create a private universe of music and a life-soundtrack (Sony, most notably, achieved this with the original Walkman). but, what Apple has done is something that no other company could achieve before or has been able to achieve since - create a product line that so successfully embodies the brand that the two are the same. And at the same time, the iPod is a wholly self-contained branding phenomenon in itself. Thus, two massively popular, mutually supportive, and incredibly successful brands support each other and have given Apple and the iPod a 84% market share (Elmer-DeWitt, 2008). Is the iPod the most innovative MP3 Player on the market? Apple makes you think so, and so do the pundits and plaudits. Is the iPod a truly revolutionary product that you simply can't achieve "cool" without? Again, Apple makes you think so, and so does everyone else.

Microsoft, however, has failed miserably with the Zune. Microsoft has capitalized on two primary things in its history - creating cheap copies of other companies technologies (most notably the entire Windows platform being a shameless rip-off of the Macintosh OS) and the ability to put their brand on nearly every computer and computer user in the world.

By not tying their OS to a particular hardware configuration (other than basic and freely used specifications) Microsoft quickly took the dominant market share away from Apple's Macintosh and achieved a near monopoly in the Operating System market starting with the release of Windows 95. In the process, while they gained mindshare and desktop real estate, Microsoft never gained much in the way of friends and never seemed to worry about being cool, accessible, or at all exciting (InformationWeek). People use windows products because they have to, not because they truly absolutely want to (how many people have you ever heard say, "Man windows is the best operating system EVER"? but, does EVERYONE in the world know windows? Yes, does nearly every computer user in the world use Windows? Yes, they do. So, what happened with the Zune?

Brand didn't work, simple as that. First, Microsoft isn't a "cool" company (Creamer & Cuneo, 2008). Apple simply is. There are innumerable articles written every year about the cool-factor that Apple enjoys - it's the creative, exciting, bad-boy on the block that everyone wants to date or be like. Microsoft is the dysfunctional, but extremely massive, family down the street who intimidates people on the block into using their products rather than enticing them - and brutality often wins over quality to the detriment of everyone (Barron, 2003). The Zune, then, entered the market with a big singular handicap - the Microsoft brand itself. Then, it has a name that simply means nothing - it's a brand that makes no sense. "iPod" we get. "Zune" we don't - what is it? Branding 101 - make sure your audience knows what they're supposed to lust after.

Microsoft Windows (in all current variants) has a 92% share of the computers in use, world-wide, where the Macintosh has only 6% (Longo, 2008). The Zune? 10.2% (RoughlyDrafted.com, 2007). One would think that with all the power of Microsoft, that they would be able to simply walk in and take over any market they like. What happened? What makes Apple and the iPod such a successful brand and Microsoft and the Zune such a failed one? The answer can, in part, be found within the leadership of the company. Despite coy protestations from Apple that "it's all about the product, not the person," the man and the company have become synonymous (Moren, 2008).

The Law of Leadership. Well, neither Apple or Microsoft were the first to the marketplace. but, what Apple did achieve first was widespread acceptance of the MP3 player as the successor to the Walkman and portable CD players - something that no other MP3 player had been able to do. Microsoft is simply late to the party with the Zune.