Apple Inc. sold more iPhones in its first 3 days than the first month of sales of Motorola Razr phones.
Apple did very little advertising and promotion in the traditional media. One guy (Steve Jobs) talked about it in January and let the world know it would be available in June. The word-of-mouth by Apple product advocates took over and fueled a vigorous conversation in both online and offline communities.
The traditional media picked up on the buzz and gave the iPhone a lot of free publicity, included heavy coverage of the lines forming outside Apple Stores the day before the iPhone when on sale.
Online communities are more prominent today than when the Razr phone came on the market so it is not a pure test of marketing strategy. Nontheless, in my opinion, Motorola missed the mark. Motorola doesn’t have enough customer mindshare and consumer passion to fuel this type of marketing strategy.
This is a wake-up call to Motorola and other product-focused companies—start shifting the focus of your customer relationships. Build trust and credibility with a passionate base of customers so they fuel the fire and passion for your innovation.
Check out our new enewsletter: Hooked: The Psychology of the Customer Experience, we will be dealing with this issue in more detail in the coming weeks.
