Marketing Strategy and Plan for Apple Watch Series 6 in Australia

This report provides a comprehensive marketing strategy and plan for the Apple Watch Series 6 in Australia, addressing key elements such as current situation analysis, SMART marketing objectives, segmentation, targeting, and positioning. The analysis includes organizational, environmental, customer, and competitor evaluations, identifying fashion lovers and office workers as primary and secondary target markets. The marketing mix elements of product, place, price, and promotion are discussed, with emphasis on product adaptation for the Australian market and digital marketing strategies. The report also addresses CSR value proposition and concludes that Apple can create a revolution in the smart wrist wearable market by meeting the emerging customer demands with smartwatches. References to academic articles and industry reports support the marketing plan.

Running head: MARKETING STRATEGY AND PLAN
Marketing Strategy and Plan for Apple Watch Series 6
[The Case Study: Apple Moves into Fashion Business with Watch Launch]
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1MARKETING STRATEGY AND PLAN
Table of Contents
A brief background..........................................................................................................................2
Discussion........................................................................................................................................2
1. Current situation analysis........................................................................................................2
2. Goals and SMART marketing objectives................................................................................3
3. Segmentation, targeting and positioning.................................................................................4
4. Marketing strategies.................................................................................................................5
4.1 Marketing mix elements....................................................................................................5
4.2 Standardization vs. adaptation...........................................................................................7
5. CSR value proposition.............................................................................................................7
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................8
References........................................................................................................................................9

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A brief background
The popularity of wearable devices such as traditional watches began to fall with the
growing popularity of smartphones across the globe. However, the global marketplace seems to
have changed again more in the recent few years. The wearable devices market is expanding
again with major companies such as Apple offering technologically advanced innovative fashion
watches. Therefore, this study is about constructing a marketing strategy and plan for Apple's
‘Watch Series 6’ to be sold in Australia.
Discussion
1. Current situation analysis
Organizational analysis
Apple already has a wider recognition in the Australian market, which should also be
advantageous for its new range of watches. Apple charges a premium for its products and
ensures that the customer has enough reasons to pay for it. As outlined in the case study, Apple’s
new watches are set to kill the market with its easy to use features and fashionable designs.
Environmental analysis
Smartwatches can affect the environment, human health and societies. Smartwatches
consume more power and utilize scarce resources. It generates large streams of electronic waste
that are hard to recycle. It may end up being another product of the consumer goods that is mass

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consumed and mass disposed of as fashionable smartwatches will have short-lived innovation
cycles (Rybakova, Doyko and Zobnina 2019).
Customer analysis
According to the data of the 'Worldometer', the current population of Australia is
25,435,124 (Worldometers.info 2020). As of 2019, Australia is second only to Switzerland in
terms of the largest median wealth per adult. As of Q2 2018, average Australian earnings stood
at A$85,982 per annum, inclusive of overtime and bonuses (Livingin-australia.com 2020).
Competitor analysis
The Australian Smart Wearables marketplace is occupied with many big names such as
Apple, Samsung, Fitbit, Fossil, Armani and Michael Kors. The smartwatches of Samsung and
FitBit are more suitable for tech-savvy people (Chuah et al. 2016). Contrary to the offerings of
Samsung and FitBit, Apple’s Watch Series 6 will be more appealing to a wider population of the
customer. Apple has taken the tough technology out of its watches for the ease of use for a large
population of the customer.
2. Goals and SMART marketing objectives
The ultimate goal will be to acquire the majority of shares in the fashionable watches
market as well as the overall smart wearables industry. The SMART objectives will be as
follows:

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 Disseminate information about watches through making it a piece of information in
popular men’s and women’s health magazines, and across social media networks like
Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.
 Increase sales and revenue by reaching the target market through multiple channels of
distribution such as selling fashion watches directly via Apple’s stores and indirectly via
popular e-commerce sites such as Amazon.com;
 Establish a brand image through participating in trade shows and endorsing celebrities
such as National and International Football stars, Hockey stars and others.
 Nurture customer trust through useful apps and smartwatch-friendly websites
Attractive apps such as the health metrics tracker can do the needful in the interest of the
brand provided if the app developer community delivers such apps. Apple can build more
customer trust by ensuring that many websites can be viewed easily on its new series of
fashion watches.
3. Segmentation, targeting and positioning
Segmentation
The smart wrist wearables market can be segmented into 1) Fashion lovers and 2)
Technology lovers. Fashion lovers should be the target market segment considering that Apple's
Watch Series 6 is for fashion lovers and that very few Australians are appropriately familiar with
the smart features of smartwatches.
Targeting

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Fashion lovers who have a stable income and explicit function needs would be the
primary target market. The secondary target market will comprise of office workers and college
students. To be very precise, a 25 to 44-year-old age group will give the best opportunity to sell
smartwatches.
Positioning
 For fashion purpose
 Tech-savvy people will find it useful
 Symbol of high status
4. Marketing strategies
The market for smartwatches is growing and so the number of smartwatches brands.
However, none of the brands have yet lived up to customer expectations entirely. For instance,
the fitness tracker feature of smartwatches is not something that many people expect from
smartwatches brands as it can also be accessed on many latest smartphones. Rather, people want
their smartwatches to tell them about their health and wellbeing. It is very crucial for Apple to
slowly and gradually invest in these areas to emerge the clear winner. Marketing activities
before, during and after the launch of watches can help Apple to stay ahead of the curve provided
it addresses the rising consumer demand with smartwatches (Dehghani, Kim and Dangelico
2018).
4.1 Marketing mix elements

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4.1.1 Product
The product to launch is a range of fashion watches. Apple's fashion watches will be
different from its rivals for ease of use and battery life. The product is made in such a way that it
can easily be operated by a wider audience, which is least possible with other brands’
smartwatches.
4.1.2 Place
Vending machines or pop-up shops can be used to generate curiosity. Users just by
interacting with a web app on their smartphone can interact with the chatbot of the vending
machines and end up buying a watch of Apple. The customer queries captured in the chatbot
should be tested on a regular basis to answer these queries and treat customers more specifically.
A pre-order campaign can be showcased on Apple's App Store to create the buzz (Zogaj, Olk and
Tscheulin 2019). Apple’s website can be useful for executing direct sales of watches. E-
commerce sites such as Amazon.com can also be used for sales purposes.
4.1.3 Price
Premium pricing should not be the barrier for the company to penetrate the market
considering its mobile phones and computer devices are already high priced and customers pay
for it for the value of money.
4.1.4 Digital marketing strategy in the Promotion strategies
Developing a video campaign to showcase how different is the Apple new watch from
rest others, should do the needful. The video could feature celebrities or famous entrepreneurs
ordering food for dinner. During the order making, the smart assistant in the watch will

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recommend a different option to keep his or her calorie level to the desired target. The videos
should be made available to play on the Apple App Store and across the major social sites such
as YouTube and Facebook (Zohra and Barman 2019).
4.2 Standardization vs. adaptation
‘Product Adaptation’ strategy is recommended for its further expansion in Australia.
Apple needs to overcome the barriers, which keep customers away from purchasing a
smartwatch despite being aware of it (Ansah 2016). For instance, Apple could consider
incorporating features like health and wellbeing trackers in its new series of fashion watches.
Web surfing in the form of useful apps is also an untapped area. For instance, a grocery retail
store could create, design and deploy a shopping list app easily customizable with smartwatches.
The email characters' size should be made customized with the screen size of watches. Apple by
showing an adaptation to these features can gain more market penetration and reach a wider
audience.
5. CSR value proposition
 Apple thinks about the people, the community and the environment.
 As of 2017, Apple tops the list of electronic products with better environmental
performance and closes second only to Samsung in the overall rating (Wareable 2020).
 Apple will keep using innovative ideas to improve its score on CSR performance and will
beat its arch-rival Samsung by miles.

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Conclusion
Therefore, it looks certain that Apple will create a revolution in the smart wrist wearable
market considering the company is the market leader in Australia and that the design and
features of its latest offering are appealing to a larger population of the customer. There are only
a very few companies in the fashion space that could rival the product excellence of Apple.
Apple should believably maintain high differentiation by meeting the emerging customer
demands with smartwatches.

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References
Ansah, M.O., 2016. Cultural Heterogeneity towards Standardization and Adaptation of
Marketing Mix: A study on Multinational Companies in Ghana. International Journal of
Business and Social Science, 7(3), pp.14-26.
Chuah, S.H.W., Rauschnabel, P.A., Krey, N., Nguyen, B., Ramayah, T. and Lade, S., 2016.
Wearable technologies: The role of usefulness and visibility in smartwatch adoption. Computers
in Human Behavior, 65, pp.276-284.
Dehghani, M., Kim, K.J. and Dangelico, R.M., 2018. Will smartwatches last? Factors
contributing to intention to keep using smart wearable technology. Telematics and Informatics,
35(2), pp.480-490.
Livingin-australia.com 2020. Average Salary Australia. [online] Livingin-australia.com.
Available at: <https://www.livingin-australia.com/salaries-australia/> [Accessed 14 April 2020].
Rybakova, G., Doyko, I. and Zobnina, I., 2019, November. A systematic approach to managing
the life cycle of innovative products in the framework of implementing the Concept of
Sustainability of Regions. In International Conference on Sustainable Development of Cross-
Border Regions: Economic, Social and Security Challenges (ICSDCBR 2019). Atlantis Press.
Wareable 2020. Can You Buy Eco-Friendly And Ethical Wearable Tech?. [online] Wareable.
Available at: <https://www.wareable.com/wearable-tech/eco-ethical-sustainable-tech-888>
[Accessed 14 April 2020].

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Worldometers.info 2020. Australia Population (2020) - Worldometer. [online]
Worldometers.info. Available at: <https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/australia-
population/> [Accessed 14 April 2020].
Zogaj, A., Olk, S. and Tscheulin, D.K., 2019. Go pop-up: Effects of temporary retail on product-
and brand-related consumer reactions. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 50, pp.111-
121.
Zohra, M.F. and Barman, A., 2019. Digital Marketing & It’s Campaigns.