How to Succeed Like Apple

Why does Apple dominate all aspects of the digital music market — hardware, software and content deals? For example, more than two-thirds of every media player sold in the world is an Apple product.

That’s amazing when you consider the company’s reputation as one that doesn’t listen to customers. Come to think of it, Google Search, Facebook and Twitter are all dominant products created without customer input.

Is ignoring customers Apple’s secret to success in consumer technology?

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About the author

Mike Elgan is a Silicon Valley-based columnist who writes about technology and culture. His work appears in a variety of publications, including Computerworld, Datamation, PC World, InfoWorld, MacWorld, ITWorld, CIO, the San Francisco Chronicle. Subscribe to Mike's e-mail newsletter, Mike's List, and follow him on Twitter, Facebook, Digg and elsewhere by visiting http://elgan.com.

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Posted in Apple, iPod, iPod Touch, iTunes, News, Top stories |

http://www.virtustructure.com Matt Davis
This is a funny article. I got rich by stop listening to customers. Theres too many of them, you need to use the product yourself figure out the best way to do it, make it for the mass like apples 80-20 rule. You make smart decisions not business obligations for features, and just keep adding features in to please all customers. Then you get feature bloat and you become the next icq, or whoever is next.
http://www.octoberskiespro.com/ David Robinson
If I’d asked customers what they wanted, they would have said “a faster horse”. – Henry Ford
http://elgan.com Mike Elgan
Wow. I wish I had known about that Henry Ford quote. I would have used it in the column. : )
Joseph
“That’s amazing when you consider the company’s reputation as one that doesn’t listen to customers.”
That may be Apple’s reputation among people who don’t have a clue. Because based on units sold, ultra-high customer satisfaction ratings, and brand loyalty, it’s indisputable that Apple builds products its customers love. And building products your customers love is, by any reasonable definition, “listening to your customers”.
People who think that Apple has a reputation for not listening believe, foolishly, that “listening to your customers” means building whatever crap consumers unreflectively say they want.
http://elgan.com Mike Elgan
Are you saying that Apple designed, say, the iPhone after conducting focus groups and studies on what people wanted in a new phone?
http://www.virtustructure.com Matt Davis
Think for yourself people. It’s fine to get idea somewhere else but in the end you have to think for yourself. People can’t see the future like I and others can, they see simular products and what they want out of those. Be revolutionary, be innovative, think for yourself and make your products great by doing it your own way. I’m not saying don’t ever listen to your customers. I’m just saying don’t pack it all in that everyone wants. Use your products, and make it great, add very value you add features that work well within your product.
Brooke
I think, on the whole, that a lot of us want the same stuff. Some people are really able to take that thing they (and others) want and push the idea out of its current box and invent cars, assembly lines, iPhones, and that benefits quite a few of us, if not everyone. As a barely-related case in point, I made a t-shirt for my daughter on Zazzle. It had an attitude-filled motto about being a soccer goalie. A year after I made it, people started buying the design on Zazzle and I made almost $15 in little royalty payments. Not a lot, but I made something I wanted, and other people wanted it too. Who knew? I think a lot of products are like that.
Liam
I don’t think it’s fair to say that the company succeeds without listening to their customers. Some of the best innovations in the iOS have been features long available on jailbroken phones. Folders. Multitasking. Search. Other features have come later than sooner. Take the ipod touch for example. The external speaker didn’t come until the 2nd gen. Consumers griped about it’s nonexistence. It made gaming more akward, and alerts virtually useless. Surely they requested the camera too. One of the first criticisms of the iPad was that there was no front facing camera. Perhaps they took the idea from that notice.
Apple is ahead of a lot of companies in terms of meeting demands for things, but it’s not by ignoring their customers that they innovate. It’s by paying very close attention to those customers who speak freely and those coders who innovate on jail-broken equipment.
http://theiloop.com Zaib Ali
So that’s what others should do as well?
http://retromaccast.ning.com/profile/JamesWages James Wages
While I like this article on the outset, it is somewhat misleading. The full truth of the matter is that only companies that truly have great product concepts will succeed by not listening to their customers. The vast majority of companies out there, however, are utterly lacking in vision and have no choice but to move forward by caving in to the specific demands of their customers.
So it is not that “ignoring customers” alone makes a company a success. Rather, it is a “great mind” that generates long term riches.
charli
Apple does work by not listening to the masses. in two ways
1. They wait until they can do something well rather than just slamming it in there the second someone yells for it. It may not be perfect on day one but it will be better than it might have been
2. The most vocal masses are technogeeks who represent perhaps 10% (at most) of the audience for their products. And what they are yelling for is something only technogeeks care about or would need. Including it typically just ups costs, which leads to higher retail prices and/or lower profit margins. And often it is things the geeks can get in other ways. Like a 3rd party blu-ray drive and software.