Comprehensive Brand Audit of Apple Inc: Strategies & Analysis

This report conducts a comprehensive brand audit of Apple Inc., a multinational technology company. It discusses brand importance, principles of brand development and management, and global challenges in brand positioning. The report includes market, company, competitor, and customer insights, along with a SWOT analysis to develop a compelling brand platform. It evaluates Apple's management approach, provides strategic recommendations for improving sales and market share, and concludes with key findings and insights into Apple's brand management strategies. Desklib provides a platform to access such solved assignments.

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Table of Contents
Introduction.................................................................................................2
Discussion...................................................................................................3
Brand Audit..............................................................................................3
Objective Scope and Importance of Brand Audit......................................3
Brand Audit Apple & it’s history...............................................................4
Brand Attributes.......................................................................................4
Brand Portfolio.........................................................................................5
Market Analysis........................................................................................6
Competitor Analysis.................................................................................6
Apple’s strategy of communication, pricing and distribution...................8
SWOT Analysis.........................................................................................8
Evaluation of the Management approach..............................................10
Recommendations.................................................................................11
Conclusion.................................................................................................11
References................................................................................................13

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Introduction
The aim of this topic is to conduct the brand audit of the Apple. It is
the technology based American multinational company based in California
which in engaged in designing, developing, selling computer software,
consumer electronics and online services (Apple (India), 2019). It was
been founded on 1 April 1976. Apple is considered as one of the biggest
four technology along with Google, Amazon and Facebook. It is publically
known that Apple has acquired almost 72 companies. The products of
Apple’s software includes operating system of iOS, macOS, watchOS and
tvOS, media player of iTunes, web browser the Safari, multimedia iLife
suite and creativity software (Apple (India) 2019).
However, it has been observed that Apple is struggling for achieving
its sales target, which results in the hitting of its share value. Therefore,
this report will discuss the critical understanding of the brand, its
importance, the principles of brand development and management and
the global challenges in the brand positioning. In addition, market,
company, competitor and customer insights will be discussed. Further, for
developing insights and direction for the compelling brand platform, SWOT
analysis of Apple will be discussed. Moreover, understanding of the
customer in providing direction and message as well as customer
segmentation will be discussed. Lastly, diagnosis and evaluation of the
responses of management will be done and possible strategic solutions
will be provided.

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Discussion
Brand Audit
Brand is considered as that experience of the customer about the
products and services that differentiates the product or the organization
from the other competitor. It is used in the business, advertising and
marketing. It consists of unique design, symbol, signs and combination of
all these, which creates distinct, image in the minds of the customers in
terms of the products of the customers. Like other lifecycle of the living
entities, brands have also their life cycles (Wheeler 2017). Hence, brand
audit is concerned with checking the health scorecard of the brand for
identifying and analyzing the areas of problems with the measures to
rectify the problems and then repositioning the brand. It is also concerned
with the psychological and behavioral nature of the brand equity, which is
analyzed in terms of their nature and strength. Hence, it includes
examining the current position of the brand in the industry in comparison
with the competitors as well as the effectiveness, strategy, positioning,
consumer views and market position of brand (Keller and Brexendorf
2017)
Objective Scope and Importance of Brand Audit
The perception of the brand is very complex. However, it is quite
important for the company to determine how the consumers and public
think of the brand. Auditing brand help, the organization to know the
effectiveness of the brand and the areas in which improvement is
required. It also helps the company in knowing the strength and weakness
and creating the opportunities for more improvement where there is the

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need. Apart from this, it also helps the company to face competitors by
sharpening the image (Romanenko and Chaplay 2017).
Brand Audit Apple & it’s history
For many years, Apple is considered as rising star of the technology
and it continues to overtake their competitors with the increase in the
brand value. It is one of the top most brand of the world. Apple has
continuously maintained its brand equity worldwide since long. Around
two decade, Apple has produced only personal computers (Seddon, J.,
2015). However, later the company started to produce range of products
while maintaining its brand equity. Moreover, the company’s strategy of
innovations in the present products helps in gaining the interest of the
public. Innovations have created the hype, which can be characterized by
the reaction by the release of the new products of Apple (Paugam et al.
2016).
Brand Attributes
Apple has maintained innovations and high quality in their products
throughout the years. It has helped the company for being different and
most successful brand around the world (Seimiene and Kamarauskaite
2014). The attributes of the Apple, which makes it the most popular brand
in the world, are as follows:
 Unique
 Stylish
 Innovations
 Multi-tasking

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 Intuitive
 Reliable operating system
 Retina display
Brand Portfolio
There are different technological brands in Apple with the strategy
of differentiation and premium pricing. Every brands of Apple is very much
successful around the market, especially I phone, I pad, Mac book and
IPod. Apple always strives towards innovations and to keep pace with the
market they launch the product with little change for positioning their
brand on top (Nguyen, Zhang and Calantone 2018).
Figure 1: Brand Portfolio of Apple

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Market Analysis
In the recent years, it has been analyzed that, Apple is struggling to
achieve the sales target and it has affected their shares price. The
company is revamping the line-up of their iPhone but they have to do
more for catching up their rivals in the markets of smartphones. In the
countries like China and other Asian markets, the signature device of the
company has failed for gaining strong foothold. The growth of the
companies in terms of sales of smartphones is increasing in these
countries (Devadoss and Ridley 2014). In the market of developed market,
also people are waiting for upgrading their phones. In contrast, Asia is
offering huge prospects for the sales of revenue. Millions of people have
never purchased smartphone, Apple have missed the opportunity in this
respect. The consumers of the china think that the prices of the iPhone is
not worthy of the cost and hence retailers are slashing the prices of
iPhone. According to the experts, the combination of the poor strategy of
pricing as well as lacking of the existing features in comparison to the
localized rivals such as Huawei has led in the weakening of the
performance in China (Rishi Iyengar 2019).
Competitor Analysis
Apart from offering wide varieties and range of the products, apple
still face high level of the competitions in several markets. Top
competitors of the company includes following:
 Dell is one of the competitor of Apple because of user friendly and
high affordability. The competition arises for Apple laptop due to the
fact that Dell offers more affordability than being expensive. They

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focus on campaigning through advertisement with the approach of
being economical (Khan, Alam and Alam 2015).
 Lenovo is the Chinese company, which provides software systems,
consumer electronics, mobile phones and PCs. The company after
the acquisition of IBM Corporation has enjoyed great success and
popularity in terms of world leading vendor of leading PCs (Khan,
Alam and Alam 2015).
 Hewlett Packard most commonly known as HP has now become one
of the leading vendor of consumer PCs. It gives competition to Apple
in terms of their quality with affordable price. In addition, the
consultancy services of the company are not only concentrated in
US rather all across the globe (Khan, Alam and Alam 2015).
 Microsoft is the direct competitor of Microsoft because of their latest
operating system. The company pride itself in being so quick and
the founder Microsoft Bill every effort in achieving objectives,
visions and missions. Almost 90% of the computers use Microsoft
software (Khan, Alam and Alam 2015).
 Xiaomi is the Chinese company, which develops manufactures and
distributes smartphones and electronics. It offers different varieties
of phones with differentiation in price in various segments of
customers, which attract many consumers. It is rapidly growing
popularity because of its competitive smartphone market (Khan,
Alam and Alam 2015).

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Points of Parity Points of Difference
 Hardware and Technology  Operating System
 Pricing Strategy  Innovative in trend makers
 Powerful Sound System  ITunes
 Delegate touch Screen  Marketing Strategies
 Completely based on
Applications
 Unique Design
 Completely touch  Exclusive Retain stores
Apple’s strategy of communication, pricing and distribution
Apple is good in their communication and their innovations. They do
not endorse the celebrity in advertising their products. As compared to
other competitors, they just stick to the communication strategy for
promotions (Wenzel and Koch 2018). It also distinguishes itself from other
competitors in terms of price it is due to the fact that they claims that
they offer quality and their product is the statement if style. The
distribution pattern of the company is wide. The products of apple is
distributed through the Apple store, which is situated in every parts of the
country, it is also sold though website and other retailers. It is due to their
wide distribution network, it makes easy to buy products (Pisano 2015).
The company does the analysis of the company in terms
segmentation, targeting and positioning as well as develops strategy

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relating to marketing. The analytical strategic frameworks help the
company in knowing their actual position in the market.
SWOT Analysis
Apple has been offering superior quality products over the years in
comparison to its competitors. The company has positioned itself in the
market for pioneer in their products such as iPhone, laptops and iPad.
SWOT analysis of the company includes the following:
Strength
 Focus on R&D
 Genius Management
 Strong Brand Image
 Exclusive Brand store
 High loyalty by the customers
 High value of the stock price in the industry of technology.
 Popular Advertisement of the products.
 Popularity among the customers.
 Overall world’s top brand (Sammut‐Bonnici and Galea 2015).
Weakness
 Less product line
 Battery problem
 Supports only Apple Mac utilities
 It offers only gadgets, which is touch screen.
 Decisions regarding restricting iPhone to the single operator. In the
several markets of the world, it was unpopular.

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 Consumers, who do not have enough money, cannot buy iPhone
products (Sammut‐Bonnici and Galea 2015).
Opportunities
 It has good relationships with big brands through joint ventures.
 Continuous and constant growth in the technological products.
 It is expanding in almost all the countries (Sammut‐Bonnici and
Galea 2015).
Threat
 It has tough competition in the industry of Pc with other giants such
as Dell, Hp, and Lenovo and in the mobile industry such as
Samsung, Samsung and Huawei.
 Expensive products.
 Apple’s sales can hit in the period of recession (Sammut‐Bonnici and
Galea 2015).
Figure 2: SWOT Analysis

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Evaluation of the Management approach
The management of Apple follows all the approaches such as
classical, system and contingency, human relations. It is because their
reliance on each other for consistency in sales throughout the years. The
management of the company strives to increase the sales of their product
all over the country by positioning the brand of the products in the minds
of the customers (Shamim et al. 2016).
Recommendations
Apple’s brand is characterized by their unique customer
experiences, simplicity, innovations and excellent service to the
customers. It is also characterized with appealing the lifestyles and
emotions of the consumers. However, the company needs to focus on
some areas, which can help the company in increasing the volume of
sales as well as their shares price. The first recommendation to the
company is that they should decrease their production cost, which will
help in lowering the prices of products. Secondly, they should also try to
serve different customers by offering Apple products of different prices.
Third recommendations will be that the company needs to focus on the
country in which it is operating such as income of the people, competitors,
culture and much more. Fourth recommendation to the company will be to
advertise more by different means for insisting people to purchase.
Conclusion
Hence, it is concluded that Apple is facing fierce competition these
days. The company needs to focus on their revenue by increasing their

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sales. It is because if the sales will increase, revenue will increase and if
the revenue will increase then overall value of the shares will increase
which will increase the value of the company. Apply should use their
strength and opportunities to overcome weakness and threats. The
company has already made brand name in the minds of the people all
across the world. Hence, analysis of the brand audit has helped in
knowing how Apple can do brand auditing of their company’s products
and what steps should they take in order to maintain their brand value
consistent.

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References
Apple (India). (2019). Apple (India). [online] Available at:
https://www.apple.com/in/ [Accessed 28 Mar. 2019].
Devadoss, S. and Ridley, W., 2014. Effects of the M exican Apple Tariff on
the World Apple Market. Review of Development Economics, 18(4),
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Keller, K.L. and Brexendorf, T.O., 2017. Measuring brand
equity. Handbuch Markenführung, pp.1-32.
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Commerce and Management, 3(6), pp.955-961.
Nguyen, H.T., Zhang, Y. and Calantone, R.J., 2018. Brand portfolio
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Pisano, G.P., 2015. You need an innovation strategy. Harvard Business
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ml [Accessed 28 Mar. 2019].

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Romanenko, Y.A. and Chaplay, I.V., 2017. THEORETICAL AND
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