Apple’s Social Media Hell – Why it Needs to Repent

Oh, I thought this would be a serious article, but you make so many overstatements, generalizations, and use Scoble as your benchmark for objectivity that it must be a joke? Are your seriously attempting to make a reasonable point by using this kind of writing? I assume you are pretty young, with limited experience with corporate policy with regards to public discussions? Not being a fan of Apple corporate, myself, I can’t really speak to the ‘social networking’ need you seem to feel is obvious. But I would guess that if Apple, MS, HP, IBM, and others decide to join MySpace, we might as well all start buying Euros.

By the way, Apple doesn’t even take part in their own forums, but I do understand they employ a number of people that know how to read and they apparently do so. So don’t hold your breath if you think they are going to market themselves differently just because so many new customers are showing up. I doubt many of them were really Windows loyalists. Remember, most people use Windows because it’s there. The average computer user world wide is more and more agnostic when it comes to the operating system itself. This helps Apple, indirectly, because they are a small percent of the overall OS landscape. If they can market their name positively, then people will buy the name, not really caring so much what’s under the hood so long as it takes them where they want to go and gives them the ‘experience’ they feel they need, want, deserve.

As you so rightly pointed out, Apple has its own customers to participate in blogs and the like on its behalf. I would simply add that they are enormously more credible than Apple’s paid shills would be.

Apple has an enormous advantage over Dell in that they have a truly unique product that their customers prefer over the competition by an enormous margin.

Seems to me that Apple’s doing things like this just fine. They probably realize that speaking PR-speak through a blog isn’t going to get them nearly as far as letting their customers do the heavy lifting for them.

After all, there are always going to be a lot more Apple customers than hired Apple bloggers … even if Apple did want to hire bloggers.

D

“Apple would rather win through excellent products and services than through dishonest marketing.”

dishonest marketing ≠ simply acknowledging the community around them

I hate the term “stakeholder.” It’s right out the Socialist’s Guide to Politically-Correct Language.

Just because you use a certain company’s products doesn’t give you ANY kind of equity interest in the company. If you want an equity interest, buy stock in Apple. If you don’t won’t to buy their products, don’t buy them.

If you had been an Apple STOCKHOLDER over the past 5 years, then I imagine your opinion would be different than it now is.

Andy,
Why do you believe Apple (or any company for that matter) has to join the social media phenomenon? What evidence do you have it does any good (increased profits, customer loyalty, etc.)? Ford tried this a year ago with its Bold Moves site. They tried to act like they were exposing themselves in regards to who they were behind the scenes, and they failed. They closed the site down after less than a year.

Apple on the other hand has the best customer loyalty on the planet. They have realized long ago, about the time Jobs came back, that if they micro-manage the marketing and PR, and produce fantastic products with great design and usability, they don’t need an outlet for their customer’s opinions/rants/feedback. You think they care about what someone thinks they need to design and build? Ha! Jobs knows what a lot of people want, even if they don’t realize it. Doesn’t mean he doesn’t fail, and it doesn’t mean his products are for everyone. But after 120M iPods, the most Macs sold in any quarter and millions of iPhones sold, who is going to argue with him? The facts are Apple’s market share, market cap and stock price, though it has fallen a bit with the rest of the market, is at an all-time high. And you think now they need to blog?

I can tell you they monitor a lot of the Mac-centric sites. They know what their customers want and how they feel. Apple is not a closed ecosystem. And the only reason MSFT has been so open lately is because they have close to the worst consumer brand image in the tech industry. They have to talk about upcoming products because their consumer offerings are financial failures. Even the XBox has yet to make a profit when you include the $1B they had to fork out to fix a third of the devices. When a company is failing, of course they want to do whatever they can to make themselves look better.

Frankly, when you look at the numbers, Apple doesn’t need to. And they won’t. The exception is the iPhone rebate. And even that was closely managed to appear to be a “sorry” when in reality it was also a slick plan to get their customers back in the store. Not saying it was right or wrong. Just that it was pure genius.

If you look back at 1997, a year when Apple lost over $1B, they still had lots of people who wanted Macs. The problem was the lack of product focus, logistics issues and selling crappy Macs at Sears. Jobs has fixed that. Now they are a company that is bringing great new technology to the consumer, and they are being rewarded.

Just because they don’t blog doesn’t mean they don’t listen, that they don’t “get it,” and that they are shooting themselves in the foot in the long run.

And how certain are you that corporate blogging isn’t just a fad? It sure was with Ford.

Apple isn’t going to jump into social networking until it’s proven there’s a market there and they can come in and apply the “Apple touch” to that market and dominate the inferior competition. Take the iPod – Apple was not first to release the Mp3 player – they let other companies do the groundbreaking, and when all of their players didn’t do the job, Apple saw that they could improve on the Mp3 player and do it “right”. Same with the iPhone. I don’t think they will make a blatant social Web 2.0 whatever play until it’s a proven revenue platform. Despite all the web 2.0 hype that has definitely not been established yet – all money is from advertising and huge buyouts which are not businesses apple is in.

Andy- I enjoyed your points during your Blog World session and several more good points here. I am also a Mac user and have to agree with you.

I know this opinion isn’t popular in the Apple community, but Apple is a very closed company. Being involved with social media wouldn’t allow their m/o to work. Yes, they make outstanding products, but they don’t nourish this raving group of fans. To have a conversation, you must have two parts and Apple prefers to keep it one-sided. They keep us waiting on the edge of our seats to “unveil” their mystery products and could build even more hype/press with at least some small conversations.

Again, I love many of their products and today they still have cachet, but any company is fallible… including Apple and especially, Microsoft.

I, and I suspect many others regard “blogs” with the viewpoint that they share commonality with opinions and anus’s, IE that everybody has one.

Wow – the personal attacks in these comments are simply ridiculous.

re: scoble … with friends like him, who needs enemies?!

andy beal presumes that apple is heading for trouble cuz a genius like scoble doesnt know mac 101 basics (like the decades-old firmware-based startup options used for trouble-shooting).

wrong.

scoble is not a genius; he is a dolt (and yes, apple doesnt need or want customers like that – but that is a separate brand issue).

scoble’s lack of rudimentary knowledge –which is inexcusable for a supposed technorati– should come as no surprise to anyone who watched his baleful performances on the microsoft video blog, where the scope of his technical ignorance was just breathtaking.

[edited - irrelevant and just an attack on Scoble]

If he cant even get at the basic issues when he is using other people’s money (as an interviewer), can we really expect him to make even a half-hearted effort to learn the basic 101 info when he using his own money?

nope.

he is [edited - refrain from personal attacks]

no one takes him seriously.

[edited - again please stay on topic]

I think Steve Jobs’ open letters show that Apple is aware of what’s going on and responds, when appropriate, with something other than products.

But the success of their products alone is a darn good argument that they’re listening isn’t it? Are Nokia and Motorola listening? If so, why didn’t they come up with Visual Voice Mail?

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Google, Apple slip from “loved” to “well-liked”

http://svextra.com/blogs/gmsv/2007/08/google_apple_slip_from_loved_to_ well-liked.html
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Recent anecdotal evidence from some un-choreographed & unscripted Mac/ipod owners I know seems to confirm the slip in Apple’s standing.

But as for corporate blogs…
Andy, I read online in order to continue to make a living online. Out of the hundreds of sources I have in my reading list, not one is a corporate blog …unless you count the likes of MP.

Given the choice between between profits and disclosure, companies lie.

You hit the nail on the head with the statement, “It’s simple: Apple’s customers embrace social media on behalf of the company.”

Apple is to social network as Coca Cola is to distribution in convenience stores.

Are there ANY convenience stores open that doesn’t sell Coke or wouldn’t think of selling Coke?

That’s not to say they can ignore their custoer base but clearly, Apple IS the ULTIMATE social network and needs no more. Maybe as a consultant, you hate anyone who you can’t sell more services to but that’s the bottom line.

Why do you do social marketing? Because your current methods are too inefficent to tell your message or you want people to think differently about you like MS (we are not monopolist copycats and boring … when you are in that postion in mindshare YOU NEED SOCIAL …) when you have an army of a tens of millions, how much more social do you need? In fact, at that point, your anti-social adds cachet …

Well put Andy… er, did I just say that out loud?

I’m an Apple fan. Drank the kool-aid, worn the black t-necks, waited breathlessly for “one more thing”. It was a unifying thing to be the downtrodden, made fun of everywhere for still using a toy, holding firm to the thought that we would be proven right by “the Steve” and his return. Those were the days…

Truly though, many of Apple’s products rock. And some have seriously sucked. They have winners/losers and problems like most successful companies.

Apple has somehow allowed (put up with grudgingly really) that love of Apple to just keep going, without nurturing it at all. It’s worked for a long time, hasn’t it? I don’t think Steve thinks there needs to be another way.

I agree with you, that will prove to be a mistake.

But don’t you love the iPod touch?

@ Andy

Your claim is that Apple doesn’t get social media, and then you choose to arbitrarily define what “getting” social media means.

I assert that they get social media quite well. In fact, they get it so well, they have created a huge repository that champions the Apple message: iTunes + Podcasts.

That they don’t produce their own AppleCast is irrelevant, unless we choose to narrow the definition in ways such as you presuppose. Apple doesn’t make it’s own personal cast because it has created a giant warehouse for everyone to not only do it for them (free of charge no less), but to do so in an environment completely set up by Apple.

So, between you and Apple, it really seems to me like the latter “gets” the concept of social media a tad more than the former.

You do realize that iTunes is about far more than downloading music, correct?

I hate to sound snarky, but you seem to be overlooking the giant podcast resource it has become.

To be more concise, Andy, in my opinion you expose the answer to your own question without even realizing it.

Q: So, why doesn’t Apple embrace social media?

A: It’s simple: Apple’s customers embrace social media on behalf of the company.

That’s exactly the genius of it; Through podcasts Apple employs, free of charge, a plethora of evangelists and provides them their pulpit.

I wasn’t aware you were attacking Apple. Nor was I aware I was touchy regarding them.

I have a different opinion on what they’re doing than you do. That no more makes me an Apple fanboy than it makes you a Microsoft fanboy or Dell freak.

There’s no need for labels beyond “two adults that disagree.”

I’m sorry I can’t carry on a spirited conversation with you. Adieu.

Amazing. You attack Apple for poor marketing because they don’t jump onto the type of marketing that YOU prefer. What incredible arrogance.

Apple is highly regarded as one of the best marketing companies on the planet. The success of their marketing speaks for itself. Look at the adoption rate of the iPod – the fastest uptake of any electronic device EVER.

Apple doesn’t do social marketing the way you want them to. Big deal. That doesn’t make them inept or incompetent.

And, no, that’s not accusing you of Apple bashing. It’s simply pointing out the fact that saying that Apple is incompetent at marketing is ridiculous.

These are some of the reasons brought to the table so far that emphasize Apple is already engaging its customers sufficiently enough to negate the need for Social Media engagement:

“By the way, Apple doesn’t even take part in their own forums, but I do understand they employ a number of people that know how to read and they apparently do so.”

“Apple has its own customers to participate in blogs and the like on its behalf.”

“As a matter of fact Jobs himself engages them twice a year through his keynote speeches at Macworld and the Mac Developers’ Conference”

“I assert that they get social media quite well. In fact, they get it so well, they have created a huge repository that champions the Apple message: iTunes + Podcasts.”

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Engagement – Requires TWO sides to interact. This can be facilitated through social media channels.

Apple is simply negating any interaction. Keynote speeches are one sided. Apple forums are one sided. Itunes and podcasts, thats not even either, was a bit confused when that was brought to the table.

“Apple is to social network as Coca Cola is to distribution in convenience stores.

Are there ANY convenience stores open that doesn’t sell Coke or wouldn’t think of selling Coke?”

Here is a prime example. As of late, apples rep got a little tainted with the Ipod pricing, and have not done much to amend.

Coca Cola is a staple as you said, I bet if a store took Coca Cola of its shelves you would see some Coke reps negotiating with the store owners to get them to sell it again. They wouldn’t sit on the asses waiting for some coke fans to come in the store and complain about it not being on sale anymore.

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If this is all you guys have to bring to the table then it is clear that Apple needs help. They simply cannot rely on their fans to be their only means of communicating with the public.