Digital Marketing Campaign for Apple: Analysis and Recommendations

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Apple's digital marketing strategies, focusing on its brand positioning within the UK market. It begins with an executive summary and table of contents, followed by an introduction highlighting the evolving landscape of marketing in the digital age. The report then delves into Apple's company background, a SWOT analysis specific to the UK market, and an examination of its segmentation and targeting approaches. A detailed analysis of Apple's current brand positioning is presented, followed by proposed brand positioning objectives and brand communication objectives to address current challenges such as declining sales and increased competition. The report also outlines a digital campaign strategy, covering specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound (SMART) objectives. Finally, the report concludes with a summary of the objectives and recommendations for Apple to maintain its market position and adapt to the changing consumer landscape. This report analyzes Apple's digital marketing campaign, brand positioning, and challenges in the UK market, including a SWOT analysis and strategic recommendations. The report also outlines a digital campaign strategy, covering specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound (SMART) objectives.

Running head: MARKETING IN THE DIGITAL AGE
MARKETING IN THE DIGITAL AGE
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1MARKETING IN THE DIGITAL AGE
Executive Summary:
The purpose of the report is to construct a new digital communication campaign on the basis
of the evaluation of existent brand positioning. The brand selected for this report is Apple.
The paper presented current challenges and issues faced by Apple in regards with the current
market. In this paper, the responses for the current challenges were formulated by
constructing the positioning objectives. The paper concluded by presenting a summary of the
constructed objectives and recommendations.

2MARKETING IN THE DIGITAL AGE
Table of Contents
Introduction:...............................................................................................................................3
Discussion..................................................................................................................................3
Company background:...........................................................................................................3
SWOT Analysis of Apple for UK market:.............................................................................4
Segmentation and Targeting:.................................................................................................5
Current brand positioning:.....................................................................................................6
Brand positioning objective:..................................................................................................8
Brand Communication objectives:.........................................................................................9
Digital campaign:.................................................................................................................10
Conclusion................................................................................................................................13

3MARKETING IN THE DIGITAL AGE
Introduction:
Marketing is becoming complex by expanding the ability of facilitating customer
journey effectively. The marketers of brand are utilizing machine technology for the purpose
of building complex marketing programs and strategies which will be implemented
effectively for engaging and capturing customer interest. It is believed that 80 percent
customers’ interactions will be facilitated by the year 2020 without human effort (Palmatier
and Steinhoff, 2019, pp.13). The functions and theory of Marketing have evolved from
traditional word-of-mouth marketing to the concept of hand written to the print media and
finally transformed to existing digital as well as in electronic forms of media/channel
(Yasmin, Tasneem and Fatema, 2015, pp.69). The sole purpose of marketing is to be aligned
with the consumer requirements as well as motivations for the process of fostering
relationships (Ryan, 2016, pp.25). The main aim of the report is to construct a new digital
communication campaign on the basis of the evaluation of existent brand positioning. The
brand selected for this report is Apple. The paper will be presenting current challenges and
issues faced by Apple in regards with the current market. In this paper, the responses for the
current challenges will be formulated by constructing the positioning objectives. The paper
will be concluded by presenting a summary of the constructed objectives and
recommendations.
Discussion
Company background:
The American multinational company Apple Inc. specializes in constructing,
developing and selling consumer electronics, online services as well as computer software
and hardware products. The company was founded by Steve Jobs, Ronald Wayne and Steve
Wozinak in the year 1976 (Hsu et al., 2019, pp.323). The hardware products of Apple

4MARKETING IN THE DIGITAL AGE
includes iPad tablet, iPhone smartphone, iPod portable media player, Apple TV, HomePod
and the Apple Watch (Gettemy et al., 2018, pp.879). The software includes operating systems
iOS, media player iTunes, macOS, Safari web browser and iWork creativity (apple.com,
2019). The brand reaches its customers from all around the world by its stores and brand
communication. It was reported that the first store in United Kingdom was started in 2009,
which was very profitable in consideration of the size.
SWOT Analysis of Apple for UK market:
Strengths-
 The brand value of Apple grew around 16 percent from 200 billion dollars to 214.5
billion dollars globally in the year 2018.
 The market share of Apple in the mobile phone category in United Kingdom is 51.46
percent (Khan, Alam and Alam, 2015, pp.955).
 Efficient supply chain network.
 Strong and effective marketing as well as the advertising capabilities (Hennessy and
Najjar, 2017, pp.7).
Weaknesses-
 Incompatibility of the products of Apple with the other services and products.
 The brand offers a higher price than the existing competitors in UK (Bird et al.,
2017).
Opportunities-
 Increased focus on Apple services segment
 Product diversification
 Improvement in product compatibility
 Construction of strategic alliances/partnerships in UK (Rogers and Lee, 2016, pp.40).

5MARKETING IN THE DIGITAL AGE
Threats-
 Pushing more expensive products with every product launch and declining the sale of
older products.
 Decreasing sales in UK.
Segmentation and Targeting:
Segmentation-
Segmentation depicts the division of population in various homogeneous groups
depending on specific demand and characteristics. The common characteristics which are
shared by the target market of Apple includes performance and quality, design and
technology as well as the segment of services in regards with the pricing structure.
The segmentation criteria of Apple Inc. can be divided in following bases:
Geographic segmentation-
 Region-The segmentation of the products are divided based on the needs in each
geographical region of United Kingdom. Like the demand of iTunes, iPad, operating
system iOS and Apple Watch (Al-Refaie and Bata, 2016, pp.1138).
 Density- Urban population (Al-Refaie and Bata, 2016, pp.1138).
Demographic segmentation-
The demographic segmentation of Apple can be divided on the basis of-
 Age- For devices like iPad, MacBook, iPhone and iPod the age group segment is 20
to 45, for services like iTunes, iCloud, Apple Pay and Mac App Store is around 18 to
30. For the software and operating system offerings like OSX, iOS, iLife and iWork,
the age group segment is 20 to 35. For the accessories like Apple Watch and Apple
TV, the age group segment is 20 to 50 years old (Heracleous and Papachroni, 2016).

6MARKETING IN THE DIGITAL AGE
 Income- All the products and services of the brand will be targeted to the segment of
medium and high earning population.
 Occupation- The product and service variants of Apple Inc. are targeted on the basis
of functionality requirements of specific occupational groups like students, working
professionals, managers and executives.
 Family Size- The family size of UK will determine the kind of product offerings like
a play station PC set.
Psychographic-
 Social Class- The social class which is targeted by Apple Inc. are middle and upper
class social groups.
 Lifestyle- The population with the lifestyle choices of an aspirer and explorer.
Behavioural segmentation-
 Loyalty- The degree of loyalty for new product development as well as product
diversification (Burke et al., 2017, pp.77).
 Personality traits- Ambitious and Innovators as the company introduces new version
of iPhones and MacBook by restricting the development in the older models
(Hoangova, 2018).
Benefits sought- Efficiency, sense of achievement and self-expression.
The major target market of Apple Inc. in UK is based on the demographic and
psychographic segments.
Current brand positioning:
The brand strategy of Apple Inc. is about creating an experience. The brand adopted
an emotional branding approach. The positioning targets the core beliefs regarding design,
imagination and innovation (Dolata, 2017). The brand position of a company can be reflected

7MARKETING IN THE DIGITAL AGE
by the strong and effective humanistic organizational culture as well as the ability to connect
with the audience. The functional and social status benefits of Apple products creates the
factor of brand loyalty.
The current brand position of Apple Inc. can be reflected from the financial status of
the company. In the year 2018, the revenue of Apple Inc. decreased to 84.32 billion dollars,
which is a 5 percent decrease. The net income before the extraordinary items reduced to 12
percent, amounting up to 19.97 billion dollars (Heding, Knudtzen and Bjerre, 2015). The
unfavourable market condition of United Kingdom resulted in the decrease of demand for
Apple products and services in 2018, in return reflecting the cause of decreasing revenue. Net
income reflects the corporate segment loss elevation by 20 percent, which is 5.4 billion
dollars (Heding, Knudtzen and Bjerre, 2015).
Challenges of Apple Inc.-
 Production cut of new iPhone cut: The Company experienced poor sales figures for
iPhone in the year 2018, which resulted in the decision of cutting back the supply
orders on the production of new handsets. Apple Inc. have strategically formed the
decision of cutting the production plan of new phones by approximately 10 percent
(Lockamy, 2017, pp.117).
 The transforming perception of the UK consumer market reflects the presumption that
Apple is attempting to hide the declining sales of the existing models (Ma et al., 2016,
pp.387).
 Increasing competition in the UK market for the mobile phone segment as well as in
the desktop category. Competitors like OnePlus 6T and Google Pixel 3 (Paugam et
al., 2016).
 The company had to respond to the increasing challenges by cutting the price of the
current iPhones, which might not be reflected in the final pricing structure of the

8MARKETING IN THE DIGITAL AGE
products as the cuts will be implemented distributor prices (Blenko et al., 2016,
pp.15).
Fig. Apple Inc. Net Income
(Source: Blenko et al., 2016, pp.15)
Brand positioning objective:
The conceptual position a brand thrives to own in the minds of the target market is
known as brand positioning. The brand positioning communicate the benefits and
characteristics which a brand needs the potential customers to perceive. The construction of
an effective strategy of brand positioning will contribute towards maximizing consumer
relevancy as well as towards maximizing the brand value.
The brand positioning strategy of Apple Inc. should change in the next 12 months for
responding to the increasing challenges of the brands. The new brand positioning objective of
Apple Inc. can be:

9MARKETING IN THE DIGITAL AGE
 The brand positioning of Apple Inc. can be focused on the service offerings of the
brand to maintain a balance between the product losses.
 Another objective of the company can be a changed customer perception about the
new product, which is to be launched in the UK markets.
 The brand positioning objective can be the communication of the value addition
through improved versions of products and services.
 Improvement in the mobile segment by differentiating the value offerings in
comparison with the existing competitors, which can be achieved by the incorporation
of innovative measures as it will result in the improvement of revenue rates.
The current brand positioning of Apple Inc. is focused on the purpose of building
experience for the target consumers but the new brand position objective requires the need for
incorporating positioning communication depicting the value additions and characteristics of
the new product and service development. The company can incorporate effective
repositioning communication strategy by the means of various mediums, which can respond
to the increasing loss of iPhone segment. The brand positioning strategies of Apple Inc.
Brand Communication objectives:
The most important tool which helps in informing, persuading, teaching, reminding
and enriching the preference and knowledge of the potential customers/stakeholders about a
specific brand is known as brand communication. The communication content and media
covers the values, offerings and strength of the services and product. The key components of
brand communication strategy are audiences, creative practices/approach, brand message as
well as the effectiveness of media, which will implement the brand communication strategy
in the selected platforms.
The brand communication plan can be implemented by following the underlined steps:

10MARKETING IN THE DIGITAL AGE
 The initiation of the implementation will include understanding the buyer persona of
UK target population.
 The next step can be the understanding of the Apple features and benefits which needs
to be communicated to the consumers.
 The reflection of the brand personality of Apple is very important for effective brand
communication.
 Restructuring the elements of the marketing mix is another step for implementing
brand communication strategies.
S-Specific To increase the reach and stimulating
demand for the new product
development by 5 percent in every
month up to 12th month and restructuring
of brand positioning for changing the
existing brand perception.
M-Measurable The goal of changing the perception of
customers and increasing sales for the
new is 110 percent. The reach will
increase by 20 percent.
A-Achievable By the implementation of brand
communication strategies in selected
media channels by changing the content
in content in every 2 months will
contribute towards the achievement of
the goal.
R-Relevant Increasing the sales and changing the

11MARKETING IN THE DIGITAL AGE
perception of the potential consumers in
UK will contribute towards the increase
in revenue of Apple Inc.
T-Time bound The objective will be strategically
facilitated in the time period of 12
months.
Digital campaign:
The digital campaign which can be recommended to Apple is Social media marketing:
Social media marketing helps in facilitating the Internet marketing by utilizing social
networking websites as the tool for marketing communication. The main objective of the
social media marketing is to change the depleting brand perception of Apple and in return
increase the sales volume of existing as well as the future product development (Luxton, Reid
and Mavondo, 2015, pp.37).
The social media marketing campaign of Apple Inc. will contribute towards-
 Increasing brand awareness for the new product launches: Social media campaign for
Apple Inc. will contribute towards spreading awareness for the features and added
values in the new product launches by the use of imageries and video content (Kumar
et al., 2016, pp.9).
 Improving the conversion rates: The conversion rates from the potential consumer
market will increase due to the implementation of interactive media content through
social media sites.