Apple special event held on the 9th September 2013, Apple's share increased for a bit before the event but decrease dramatically after. Two new iPhones have been introduced in the event - the iPhone 5S, and the iPhone 5C. Having two new products coming up in a week sounds like an opportunity of the company, what is e key of pulling the share goes down then?
There are some news and articles said it's because customers are expecting iWatch but they couldn't see anything for the watch during the event; someone said it's because the 5C is not cheap enough for its main target market - China. I didn't think about the effect of not introducing iWatch before I read the article, I do think this could be one of the reasons that pull Apple down - although I don't think that is the main reason to disappoint their customers. Instead, I strongly agree with the late statement - it is not cheap enough for China.
The 16MB iPhone 5C is told to be sold in USD 99 (= HKD 77.2) with a two years contract, that's why media guess the "C" implicates "cheap" before the event. HOWEVER. The 5C is gonna sell HKD 4688 in retail without any contract.
Selling in USD 99 with a two year contract means cheap? Oh please. There are much more choice if customers are willing to pay that much. What is more, I have to mention - there are some smartphones with famous brands and good quality are selling $0 with contract - not to mention a phone that is selling with HKD 4688 and call itself cheap. It is such a joke.
The failure of the "cheap cheap strategy" does not merely fail to attract price sensitive customers, but fail to maintain their current customers as well. The brand of Apple is paraded as luxurious that sells premium products, but the 5C doesn't looks really like premium products, but normal goods (/even inferior goods), that pull down the value of Apple's brand - which makes their current customers feel they're down graded, and refuse to use Apple's products in the future.
Now, from Apple's official website, we can see that 5C's "C" is stands for "Colour" now - definitely because Apple knows it is not cheap enough to put it in the position of Cheap.
Someone say that Apple is going to place 5C in a lower price as they heard our complaints, but I am not sure if that is real. Or, I am not sure how cheap would they adjust to - we shall see.
