Marketing Report: Analysis of Apple Inc.'s Strategies and Mix

This report provides a comprehensive marketing analysis of Apple Inc., covering key aspects such as the marketing mix (product, price, place, and promotion) and its evolution. It examines the company's product portfolio, pricing strategies, distribution channels, and promotional activities. The report also includes a marketing analysis using the BCG matrix to evaluate Apple's business units and a discussion of the Ansoff matrix to identify growth strategies like market penetration, product development, and diversification. Furthermore, it explores Apple's customer-driven strategy, including segmentation, targeting, positioning, and differentiation. The report concludes with recommendations for improving market share and addressing challenges related to product lines, pricing, and promotional strategies.

PRINCIPLES OF
MARKETING

Table of Contents
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY.............................................................................................................3
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
MARKETING MIX.........................................................................................................................4
MARKETING ANALYSIS.............................................................................................................6
MARKETING DEVELOPING STRATEGIES..............................................................................8
CUSTOMER DRIVEN STRATEGY..............................................................................................9
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................11
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................1

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Apple Inc. is an information and communication technology company which offers wide
variety of products and services which includes mobile phones, tablets, computers, television
products as well as other wearable devices. The company is highly committed towards providing
the best possible innovations and advanced technologies among the world. The company is also
highly committed to protecting the external environment with making sure about the great health
and safety for company employees. However, the company is dealing with certain issues that are
related to adopt certain practices which help them to improve their market share and growth by
overcoming the issues that are related to providing solutions against computer viruses,
opportunity to grow market rapidly and possibility to gain financial benefits.
INTRODUCTION
The Apple Inc. is highly known for its innovations into the personal computer as well as
electronics market. Even after experiencing great level of competition among the market space,
the company capitalizes over its core competencies to stay ahead of its competitors. The Apple
designs and develops their own operating system and hardware like its varied competitors who
uses Google operating system known as Android (Hole, Pawar and Bhaskar, 2018). However,
the company faces certain issues that are related to narrow product line, high prices of offered
goods and poor utilization of promotional strategies. Thus, in order to overcome from such
challenges, the objectives that have been prepared by the company are:
 Increase user traffic to Apple’s website through social media advertisements to boosts
new products purchase by minimum 5%.
 Track relevant performances of their employees to measure conversion rates, customer
satisfaction and competitive advantages along with disadvantages.
 Utilization of social media platform to reach maximum customers for announcing new
releases and updates.
 Usage of social media platform to reach maximum number of customers and increase
sales by 10%.
 Launching new products and track set goals within six months of time duration.

MARKETING MIX
The existing 4P’s of Apple Inc are:
 Product: From the initial times when the company introduces within the market place the
Apple Inc. introduces new and advanced products as well as services with unique benefits
and features. The company has offered large portfolio of technological products. The
product strategy is solely based upon the product offerings of Apple (Upadhyaya, Hughes
and Houston, 2019). Existing goods and services are considered as a part of the portfolio
of Apple products which are currently sold into the market. It consists of wearable,
software, computers, Apple music, Apple TV, etc.
 Price: The pricing strategy of the company offers premium range for their products and
offered services. It does not compete with the competitors. They offered the price range
which is much higher than their competitors which illustrates that such products are only
for the premium range people among the society.
 Place: The company is headquartered in California having space of six buildings of
approximately 850000sq ft (789.68 a). Currently the company has 500 stores in around
20 countries. The stores build strong position within the US and UK but remained weak
in Asian countries.
 Promotion: In order to promote their products, the Apple Inc. uses online media which
includes their own website, newspapers and magazines. The company also uses point of
sales to advertise their products and educate their consumers. Moreover, the company
does not invest into promotional activities like their competitors.
New 4P’s which will assist the company in order to improve market share and growth are:
 Product: It is one of the best feature of the company Apple Inc. that they comes up with
new and innovative products and services that amaze the whole world. Hence, the good
quality products play a major role into business marketing. In order to grab the market
share and expand their business, the company focuses towards introducing new products
such as Mac., Apple watches, iPod, iPhone with innovative touch screen features,
continuously releases new models and versions of smart phones, etc. (Kovalchuk and
et.al., 2019). The company also develops its own operating system known as iOS. In
regards to service, Apple offers products and services to their users through which they

allows their customers to purchase and download stream music and TV shows, rent
movies and download free podcasts. Also, they offer cashless payment services known as
Apple pay which is available in certain countries. This is the easy, secure and private way
to pay along with the Apple care which is a fee based service that provides users with
technical assistance and repairs.
 Price: Apple needs to promote their products and give their users the value for money by
offering good quality products as the success of the company is solely depend upon its
pricing strategies as this determines their profit and loss statements. Company enjoys
reputable position in the market due to high quality of their products. Irrespective of their
expensive products people are willing to purchase them. The premium pricing strategy
generates large amount of profits for the company along with increase their brand value.
On the other hand, from various studies it also have been illustrated that it is possible for
Apple to generate higher revenues even by manufacturing cheaper versions of their
products for low income customers.
 Place: The Apple Inc. sells their offered goods and services through their retail stores,
online stores and direct sales along with third party cellular network carriers, retailers,
wholesalers and resellers. Moreover, with the increased demand into market, the
company also introduces their retail stores specifically in Africa where the company has
fewer stores. In addition to that, the company partners with third party cellular network in
other countries of America in order to make products easily available to their users
(Behera and et.al., 2022).
 Promotion: This activity belongs to generate and creating awareness regarding the
products offered by the company. Company promotes their goods with various platforms
which includes relations and personal selling actions. With regard to personal selling, the
highly informative sells representatives into Apple store provide their consumers with all
the significant information about the company goods and services (Tokarev, Shkarovskiy
and Soldatova, 2020). These sales representatives also convince potential consumers to
buy their products. Moreover, in order to advance their business, the company partnering
with other brand influencers or celebrities to promote their offerings. The Apple Inc, have
their set and established audience which can promote their products and services to next
level.

MARKETING ANALYSIS
BCG matrix which is also known as growth share matrix is a type of chart which provide
assistance to evaluate the business units which includes the product lines of the Apple Inc.
offered goods and services.
BCG Matrix of Apple Inc.
 Cash cows: According to the above represented diagram, it has been evaluated that the
products and services that comes under the category of cash cows brings in much more
money than the money they require to invest within themselves to grow and expand. The
products within this have large volume of market share and bring high sales for the
company (Wanda and Razak, 2018). This includes Apple laptops which caters the
changing requirements and consumer needs.
 Star: Apple Inc. iPhone are the star of the company and having high market share in a
very high growth market. In this high paced industry, the company invests great amount
Cash
Cow
Star
Question
Mark
Dog

of their revenue in research and development in their mobile phone business and comes
up with innovative products.
 Question mark: It includes those products who are into high growth market but shows
low market share. The small share of the products within the market space makes the
future outlook for the products highly uncertain in nature and thus investing into such
kind of products are extremely risky for the firm. In context of Apple Inc. Apple TV and
Apple air pods are comes under this specific category (Pavenkov and Rubtcova, 2019).
Moreover, varied other competitive firms as well as other small players also added a lot
of pressure over the company to gain competitive advantages and the market share as
well.
 Dogs: In this category the products exists who have high potential to expand and grow
but somehow failed to create their value among the minds of customers. After
considering the performances of the offered goods by the Apple Inc (Guenthner, 2020).
Apple iPods is one of the products that can be replaced in the question mark quadrant of
the BCG matrix. This product has been fallen into this sector because of the decreasing
demand and high innovation in the music sharing industry.
In order to achieve success, the strategies that requires to be followed by the company is
to be constantly innovative and must be able to design new products that meet market demand.
The ability of Apple Inc. in order to compete is totally based upon new technology and product
development, quality and well designs (Lim, 2021). In addition to that, in order to stay successful
in the market space it is required for the company to increase existing products and invest into
research and development in order to expand the range of their offerings.
MARKETING DEVELOPING STRATEGIES
The Ansoff matrix is a strategic planning tool which assist in order to provide as structure
in order to help managers and executives to devise strategies for the future growth and expansion
of the company. It is based upon four elements which has been elaborated below in brief:

 Market penetration strategies: This refers to the selling of existing products into
existing market as it is less risky strategy along with having primary aim of pursuing in
order to increase their market share.
 Market development strategies: This specific market development element refers to
selling of existing products into the new and advanced market place (Al Hadi, Cahyo and
Budi, 2021). Although, the Apple continuously developing their market presence in
global world.
 Product development strategy: Development of new products and selling them into
existing market space are comes under product development category. However, the
Apple is highly able to develop their products and services into more innovative manner.
 Diversification strategies: This strategy refers to selling of new products into the new
market place (Solieva and Karimjanova, 2020). It is one of the riskiest growth and
expansion strategy as both the market as well as product are new to customers and the
company also unfamiliar with the external environment of the market.
In order to identify the current issues and provide appropriate strategy for the Apple Inc.
to make them used by them includes the product development strategy as it helps the company to
overcome from narrow product line issues. With the advancement of products range, the
Ansoff Matrix of Apple

company is able to approach various customers and also able to offer the product at diversified
range which also includes the normal and economical range products as well. No doubt, the
Apple Inc. is brilliant in designing and developing new products but this time they have to focus
towards providing economical products at affordable prices to their users. Moreover, the firm
have to adopt various promotional activities in order to make people understand the offerings
that has been provided by the Apple Inc. for their users (Kos, Kutsen and Ladutska, 2021).
Although, the company has various range of products which are highly able to address the
demand of the customers but the company requires to launch certain new and advanced products
with innovative features which are not of premium range and covers medium sector of customers
into existing market.
CUSTOMER DRIVEN STRATEGY
Segmentation, targeting, positioning and differentiation is the core concept that has been
used into the marketing aspects. Without this specific concept, no company will able to survive
or even able to fulfil the requirements of their customers. It is a model which helps to examine
products and services and the way their benefits are communicated to target consumers. In
context of Segmentation, the Apple Inc. segment or divide the audience into smaller groups
which are based upon certain features such as gender, age, occupation and other individual
person preferences. For these, the company needs to have strategies in measurable, accessible
and actionable format. In context of Targeting, the company highly target their audience with the
help of technology products (Radchenko and et.al., 2021). The firm target the customers who are
ready to pay few extra for their offered goods and services along with getting advanced functions
at an additional cost. As a result, Apple target consumers who appreciate their high quality
services and products along with willing to pay extra for them. Moreover, in context of
Positioning, the company select products and services which are highly appealing to each and
every segment and present in front of their users. For Apple, this includes tailoring products,
services along with overall business approach to appeal from each consumer segment.
Traditionally the company uses mono segment type and focuses towards specific customer
segment. In terms of Differentiate their products, they price them higher than their competitors
and imply that the products are of better quality as well as incorporated with the latest
technology (Yule, 2019). In addition to this, the company also stimulates the consumers interest

in providing hype before even product launches with the help of appropriate marketing and
distribution strategies.
In order to adopt future strategies which helps the Apple Inc. to resolve their issues in
most successful manner includes the company requires to target middle and upper income
consumers usually those having high purchasing power, consumers who enjoy using technology,
students as well as professionals into media and designing. Moreover, in order to position their
products among the minds of consumers, the Apple Inc. have to adopt various advertising
strategies along with provide certain benefits to their users so that they can easily able to grab the
attention of middle income people as well. In segmentation wise, the company can also
experiment to get enter into the new market space (Majchrzak and Weber, 2019). Along with
approaching new potential buyers. Moreover, already they have shifted from their mono
segment approach and adopts multi segment approach as it implies focuses towards multiple
segment customers with different offerings into products and service offerings. It becomes and
effectual approach as nobody will use products for long duration of time and the Apple have the
privilege of having consumers who only uses their products. Thus., with more and more
innovations into the product, the company will able to approach more consumers.
CONCLUSION
From the above report, it has been concluded that preparing business plan is highly
significant in order to overcome from certain challenges that has been faced by the Apple Inc.
From various research it had been evaluated that the company is facing issues in context of
narrow product line, poor promotional strategies and high prices. Thus, the above report is the
marketing plan for the company so that they can easily able to overcome from such challenges in
smooth manner. Apart from this, the study also highlighted certain objectives over which the
whole concept exists as it is the ultimate goals of the company that required to be achieved by
them during certain stipulated time period.

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