The Cult of Apple – Part 3: Less is More
The popularity of Apple products has been skyrocketing in the past few years. New and returning Apple users stand in line for long hours, even days, in anticipation of the debut of the latest product. In fact, the Apple obsession has arguably developed into a new form. Recently, for example, over two-thousand-five-hundred fans waited in line for the opening of Apple’s latest retail outlet in Grand Central.
Though the last two blogs in this series discussed the social—perhaps even psychological—components of loyalty to the Apple brand, to claim that Apple users are attracted to the brand merely in order to form unique social identities or to gain membership into Apple’s welcoming technological family is an unfair statement that ignores the fact that Apple products are powerful, sturdy, innovative, and simply put, very cool. Even people who don’t like to admit it know that Apple products have a much stronger security infrastructure, making using them for web related activities much less threatening. People who use Apple iPhones, iPads, or MacBooks face far fewer Internet security problems. Apple technology also comes with slight but significant technical advantages like longer battery lives and rarer needs for virus removal efforts.
Still, beyond all this, the biggest advantage that Apple has over its competition is the fact that it has so few products. Yes, at first, it seems counterintuitive to attribute success to limitation in choice. In this age of intense materialism and capitalism, we have all come believe that variety means freedom, that multiplicity in smartphone models, for example, ensures something for everyone; and, most of all, that competition is good for the market. But when examined in depth, this too is a counterintuitive approach—why should we want a million different models and brands with scattered features? How is it a good thing to have one smartphone offer half of the features we want and need, but not the rest? Ideally, what we need is a smartphone (or tablet or computer, etc) that combines all our technological wants and desires. Oh wait…
Therefore, culture and identity aside, we’ve arrived at the other major component of Apple’s success—its ability to offer immensely sophisticated technology in such a simple consumer-ready package. The moment a user decides to buy Apple, he or she is practically done—there’s no need to spend endless hours researching choices. If you’ve been in a mobile phone story recently, you have probably seen the confusing and bombarding choice of smartphones! When it comes to iPhones, on the other hand, there are very few choices that you need to make—storage capacity and model generation. Occasionally you might have to choose between black and white, but that’s about it.
What makes falling in love with Apple products so easy is their simplicity. In a perfect example of “less is more,” Apple gives users everything they need in one product and takes the difficulty of deciding out of the equation.
As we approach the end of the series, we will shift back to discussing the non-technological component of Apple’s success: brand marketing. So read the entry on the 10th for the next blog in the series.
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