It’s safe to say that Apple destroys its competitors in the consumer electronics industry. Sure, Windows is more popular than OS X, but Apple stands strong with it’s zero debt, recession-proof quarterly earnings increases, iand Pod, iPhone, iPad, and Mac sales.
Not to mention the totally-subjective-but-you-know-it’s-true sexiness and superiority of the hardware design. You don’t have to be a Mac fanboy to appreciate the quality.
There’s a few simple reasons as to why Apple destroys competitors. And those reasons are 3 lessons you can use for your own stuff: products, business, web design, art, whatever.
But first, it’s interesting to see some competing companies trying to figure out Apple’s secret. However, the secret is: there is no secret. Apple’s way of doing things is pretty simple and public to see by anyone. Here are the 3 lessons I saw from how Apple operates and dominates:
1. Follow your gut instinct.
Apple goes against common business practices. They do their own thing, don’t jump into trends, and they inevitably end up setting trends instead. Just look at how late in the mp3 player and phone games Apple came in, yet they set the standards for both. The same goes for them not jumping into the “hot” netbook market and instead releasing the trend-setting iPad a year later. Apple also ships without
“important” features, don’t do industry-standard things that they don’t want to (pre-release info, social media), and limit the number of product releases a year. The lesson here is to have the courage to follow your gut instinct, not what the trend and market dictates.
2. Care about details no one else does.
From the industrial design to especially the software interfaces, Apple simply pays attention to getting certain details right – details that most competitors don’t pay attention to. And while it’s hard to quantify why this works, it really does in a subconscious consumer-turning-into-a-passionate-fan way.
3. Passion really does fuel a leading business.
Yep, it sounds so corny. And it’s forehead-slapping common sense to some. But it really is true, and a lot of entrepreneurs get caught up in numbers and market this and that and forget this simple fact. Again, another intangible thing, but it’s a part of Apple’s success. It shows in the presentations Steve Jobs gives, the commercials, the packaging, even the intro video you see when you first turn your new Mac on. Jobs was quoted as saying (paraphrased): “Why do we do what we do? We create consumer products we’d be proud to recommend to our family and friends.”
Jeremy Toeman and Greg Franzese said that “the real secret to Apple’s success is that there are no secrets”. But John Gruber of Daring Fireball put it best when he added: “It’s that simple: Apple cares about details that no other company cares about, and these details matter.”
So whatever it is you do, simply care about details that none of your competitors care about.
