Nokia sells more handsets than any other manufacturer in the world

Nokia sells more handsets than any other manufacturer in the world. Who has not ever had a Nokia? Look at your chargers drawer and you will find one or two Nokia chargers. They have been very successful so far but there is a “but” here, they do not seem to be the industry visionary, they look more like the big fish who will follow other's innovation trend and mirror their successful products. I am sure some bells are ringing in Nokia's strategy steering committees, they do need Marketing driver, something that makes customers to feel identified to the brand, something that makes a difference and keep customers loyal to their products.

Maybe, a key differentiator is one can buy and use all Apple's products (iPod, iPhone, Mac, …) but there is no way you will do same with all Nokia products, unless you are manager of a mobile's shop ;-) When Nokia launches a new product there is not big expectation unlike Apple's product launch big shows chaired by the great Steve Jobs.

Nokia products are, most of the time, excellent quality and worth the price but customers don't come the shop with the purpose of buying a Nokia but the one they favourite, happens to be a Nokia handset. That makes Nokia their own worst competitor, the quality / price ratio is the measure of the their success and if they launch a handset with that ratio lower than average, it will become an immediate failure.

Apple is the fashionable company

Apple is the fashionable company, the trendy, the one to imitate and follow when we talk about design and usability. They launched the iPod, the iPhone, the iPad and are probably designing the iWho-knows-what-else.

Their business model is shocking and very very successful, based on a few principles: a) scarcity marketing, b) high quality hardware and wide offer of software applications through the App Store and c) high edge prices. They sell a expensive product but customers perceive it is worth the price. Reason for that is not easy to explain but very real though.

We all know where Apple comes from, they were defeated by Microsoft in the PC software market and, as a side effect, in the hardware market too on the 80's. In those days, using an Apple product, namely, a Macintosh computer, was only for a minority and rare (strange?) group. They even had specific group names (Maqueros in Spain) and they became the “indie” version of the personal computer's users, they did differently for years because they did believe their product was the best. That conviction makes a difference on marketing.

When an Appler pays for an Apple's device, they purchase something more than the product itself, they buy the right to be part of a group of people who deserve the best devices on earth, who will enjoy the best customer experience ever imagined, who will consume the most creative applications and trendiest content offered by the App Store and who do not mind to pay a higher price for that.

Is it all against all ?

It just came to my mind when some time ago (wow, almost two years already passed) I launched a blog to gather posts on how mobile, internet and software industries were nearing each other and creating a wider market where the competition was more open and less constrained to their respective vertical markets.

After the two years have passed – so quick and nice – I would like to come back to the topic and see who is competing to whom and in what markets.

Let me limit the scope of this and upcoming posts on the big players: Nokia, Google, Yahoo, Vodafone, Microsoft, Amazon, Apple and Dell – although maybe Samsung could be a better one to follow.

... more posts to come on this topic ... stay tuned ...

hahaha

.... price was 4, he cheated and said 5, I gave 7 and asked him to take only 6 but he took 7 so I left 75% tip at the end. ...