Apple's Instagram Advertising Methods

Social Media Marketing and Instagram use by Apple

Introduction

As time and time goes on as of the past couple of decades, there has been a huge competition of the leading in the computer and smartphone industry. Currently, there is a competition between Apple (iOS) and Android OS. Apple and Andriod are the two leading operating systems that smartphones run on. Although there is a good amount of the population that chose to use Apple for their technology needs. Apple Inc., also known as Apple Computer, is a technology company that produces computers, smartphones, tablets, and accessories such as Bluetooth earbuds and headphones, and phone cases. On their personal computers, smartphones, and tablets, they run on special software. The personal computers run on macOS (with a place at the end). The smartphones run on an operating system called iOS (with a number at the end). The tablets, iPads, run on an operating system called iPad OS. According to the Encylopedia of Britannica, it started with Stephen G. Wozniak, who had a dream to one day build his computer so, in 1976, he recruited his high school classmate, Steve Jobs, and started the production of technology in Jobs’ garage. At the time, they also named their company Apple (Levy, 2021). The rest was history after that. Similar to other companies such as Google, Samsung, social media presence is pretty important in the commercial technology industry to help spread awareness of their products and their uses for their products both online and offline. Through the usage of social media platforms, more specifically, Instagram, Apple has maintained its importance and its audience following in the world of consumer technology by using specific marketing strategies. To promote interaction within the Instagram platform, Apple posts a lot of pictures and videos shot on their recently released devices while also showcasing some well-known photographers by using their photos. At the bottom of the caption of each post, there is the handle of the photographer and a #ShotoniPhone hashtag. Users are allowed to share, comment and like the post and read the caption as well. Social media is vital to the brand Apple, as a way to help online shoppers decide on what product to get, more specifically, smartphones.

General Summary of Apple’s SMM Uses and Purposes:

As similar to other technology companies, the purpose there is to make a profit with their products. The main goal of their social media is to spread awareness and influence desire. The desire is to purchase their products. Overall, Apple uses mostly the major social media platforms to influence consumers. They use Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. On Instagram, they post pictures and videos that are taken by photographers that use their products. On Facebook, Apple posts its new cover photos. Their cover photos are of people using their products, their products like their smartphones, and something that they designed relating to an event of releasing new products. On Twitter, The Apple account does not tweet. Although, on Twitter, Apple has other sections that they own like App Store, Support, iTunes, Apple TV, and on those accounts they tweet. On their Support account, they respond to users that are having trouble with their products. On all of their social platforms, they do not post the same things time and time again. For their Instagram profile, they post colorful pictures with captions that tell a story from a unique perspective. They also provide tutorials on how to perform certain unique tasks that not a lot of people know how to do. The whole Instagram profile looks almost professional. That is another reason why they gained a lot of followers and traction on their profiles.

Table of Platforms and Followers:

Platforms:

Total Amount Followers:

Instagram

26.9 Million Followers

Facebook

13,547,081 likes / 13,901,378 followers

Twitter

7.2 Million Followers

Pinterest

43,000 followers

On Instagram, Apple tries to post every day or every few days. For example, they posted on November 8th and the next post was on November 10th (apple, 2018). For Facebook, they changed their cover photo every month or twice a month. On Pinterest, they have the shop of their products but they do not save things to their folders often on Pinterest. So overall, they are more active on Instagram as compared to other social media platforms. For Instagram, they are using features such as hashtags, stories, story highlights, Reels, Videos, Guides, as well as comments and sharing (apple, 2018). Having all those features is important because they allow for users to interact with one another and with the company of Apple, itself. In conclusion, Apple is successful in using social media to market itself and its products.

Analysis of Instagram for Apple’s Marketing:

As well-known as Apple is, Apple tries to show its marketing skills on Instagram. Although, their marketing strategies are different and not like any other brand. Most brands like ones that are associated with fashion, would use famous celebrities to help promote their products. Apple does something different. On Apple’s Instagram, their social media campaigns consist of a series of posts using a feature of the latest iPhone. For example, in their Instagram feed, there is a couple of posts that are dedicated to the macro camera of the iPhone 13 Pro, with having an appropriate hashtag, #iPhone13Pro, in the caption and the #ShotOniPhone, hashtag at the end of the caption. Most of their pictures on their feed are of things that people take with the latest iPhone instead of the product itself. Although, in their tagged photos, people would tag apple and show the latest phone although, the pictures of the phone itself are not shown on Apple’s Instagram feed. The #iPhone13 campaign started around the time where the iPhone 13 product launch which was around September 10th. Ever since then, Apple has been adding posts relating to that campaign. They have been doing this for years on most of their new releases. This relates to the ‘Think Different’ campaign’ that they do. An article by author, Browyn Payne discusses the success of Apple’s marketing strategy of positioning and the usefulness for the brand. It says, “Marketers should focus on the emotional and self-expressive benefits of a brand by introducing the brand as an organization, a person, and a symbol. Apple’s ‘Think Different’ campaign did this by providing a message focused purely on a consumer self-image that transcended product features,” (Payne, 2017). As shown on Apple’s Instagram profile, Apple shows pictures and videos of what their new phones can do. That is targeting consumer self-image because they are showing what their phones can do and showing that anyone can use their phones and produce something like that. From the Purchase Processing model, Apple uses influencing desire and cement brand loyalty. As defined in the textbook, influencing desire is when social media uses promotions like advertisements, catalog marketing, and feature events to persuade consumers to have a sense of desire (Tuten & Solomon, 2020). Cement brand loyalty is when they use social media to offer engaging activities for their consumers to ensure they spend a lot of their time on their brand (Tuten & Solomon, 2020). These work with Apple’s advertising because Apple uses commercials as an example of advertising with their products in their commercials which gives people a sense of desire, also for showing people what they can do with their products is an engaging activity which can show them that people can spend a lot of time on their products. When apple makes their advertisements of their products for their consumers, they try to incorporate families and the meanings of family into their commercials. This brings up the term, demographic segmentation. Demographic segmentation is defined as when marketers utilize common characteristics like age, gender, income, ethnic background, educational fulfillment, family life cycle, and occupation, as a way to group certain consumers (Tuten & Solomon, 2020). This works with the advertising that Apple uses in its commercials and its presentations. In their commercials, they would show how useful their products are to family members. For example, in their commercial/presentation showing off the new their new Apple HomePod (smart speaker), they put it in a living room of a house and have all the family members of the household use it. They do this to show that anyone can use it no matter the technology experience one may have. The marketers of Apple are incorporating the characteristics of the family life cycle and maybe income. The family life cycle aspect, in this case, would be showing the uses of the Apple HomePod on all of the family members. In terms of income, that would be showing a middle-class family owning a house and owning an Apple HomePod. Those two aspects are shown in their commercials. Overall, Apple seems to have a social responsibility on social media platforms and their advertising. This is true because, on their commercials and Instagram posts, they use people from any age group and ethnic background to help advertise their products, which is a social responsibility. They include many types of people to show that anyone from any background can use their products for whatever they choose to do.

Discussions and Suggestions

No one is perfect and certainly not a big corporation like Apple. There are many strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats, that Apple has in terms of managing social media and their marketing. They have done a lot of good things that Apple has done well but there are also things that Apple needs to improve on. A way to analyze a company’s social media marketing strategy is to make a SWOT analysis chart. A SWOT analysis is a way to review the relevant aspects of a company’s internal and external environment that could affect the company’s choices, as well as, prospects, and resources. The acronym stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. Internal environment means the strengths and weaknesses of the company/organization. The external environment means the outside factors that are outside the company like threats and opportunities. In other words, internal environment factors are things that a company can control and external environmental factors are things that a company does not have control over (Tuten & Solomon, 2020).

Strengths

• Increased sales growth with a cash flow of $416.62 billion

• Strong recognition due to the aggressive nature of creativity and innovation

• Innovation helped increase their sales from $3.4 Billion to $4.5 Billion in a span of one year from 2012 to 2013.

• Overall, elevated sales and trustworthiness

Weaknesses

• Lacking behind in promotion of direct sales channels

• Direct sales locations in 13 countries

• Dependency on iPhone and iPod as their contribution toward overall sales is dominant.

• Since iOS main operating system, makes it hard to use because it’s restricting

• Claimed to be luxury products which make is a premium price.

Oppertunities

• Apple iPhone has had a lot of results since the invention

• Contract signed with China Mobile to open up abnormal opportunities in a growing market

• Apple might make wearable bendable glass

• Having talented human resources connects the company to creativity and innovation.

Threats

• Competitors have ample resources which could lead to low-profit margins

• Competitors do not have their software to be cost-effective.

• Apple would be in a listing market if they were not able to innovate continuously or simply reduce the price.

First, let’s start with strengths. Apple has done a lot of things well in the span of a few years. There has been an increase in cash flow due to terrific sales growth. They had a total of $416.62 Billion and were named the Number 1 brand at Forbes. The company had a strong recognition because of its aggressive nature towards innovation and creativity (Khan, Usman Ali, et al., 2015). With its existence of innovation and the culture surrounding that, it had an increase in Research & Development funds from $3.4 Billion in 2012 to $4.5 Billion in 2013. Overall, it all lead to elevated sales as well as trustworthiness. For example, people would line up in the freezing winter to get the latest phone (Khan, Usman Ali et al., 2015). With the number of strengths, there are also opportunities that Apple also got. Due to their passion for innovation, their iPhones had a plentiful result since their invention. Because everyone wants the latest iPhones, China Mobile signed a contract with Apple to open abnormal opportunities in this growing market. There also have been rumors that Apple would make wearables using bendable glasses. Also with Apple having talented human resources and personals, they make the company connected and open to creativity and innovation (Khan, Usman Ali et al., 2015).

Just like there are strengths, there are also weaknesses that Apple has. They are lacking behind in promotion in direct sales channels. Apple only has direct sales locations in 13 countries. Another weakness Apple has is that they are dependant on iPhones as their contribution towards their overall sales and that is dominant. Also, the hardware that Apple makes runs on a specific operating system, which could be difficult to use at times and competitors do not have that issue (Khan, Usman Ali et al., 2015). Another problem is that since they make premium products, they also come with a premium price and they are declining sales growth due to the death of Steve Jobs (Khan, Usman Ali et al., 2015). Sometimes, things do not go the way we want them and companies, call them threats. Apple, they have a lot of threats. One of their threats is that the competitors bring a lot of resources which attacks Apple’s profit margins. Another threat is that Apple’s competitors do not have their own software to be cost-effective which is why their prices are less expensive (Khan, Usman Ali et al., 2015). Apple has suppliers in Asian countries that means that if there is an issue across the world, then Apple would have to stop their productions. Apple can lose their market sales if they do not innovate or reduce their price consistently/continuously (Khan, Usman Ali et al., 2015).

Apple may be one of the biggest technological companies in the United States but its marketing is not always perfect. There are some suggestions that Apple can make to help promote their products better on their Instagram feed. A suggestion they can do is post pictures of their products on their Instagram feed so that consumers know what is being released and what they look like. Another suggestion is after that, then they should continue posting pictures that photographers take with their products and using a specific feature of that product. They should do that so that consumers have a better idea of what product they would want to purchase.

Bibliography

apple. (2018). Instagram.com. https://www.instagram.com/apple/

Khan, Usman Ali, Alam, Mohammd Noor, & Alam, S. (2015). A critical analysis of internal and external environment of Apple Inc. International Journal of Economics, Commerce and Management, 3(6), 955–961.

Lee, E., Lee, J.-A., & Sung, Y. (2015). Pictures Speak Louder than Words: Motivations for Using Instagram | Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking. In Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking. https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/10.1089/cyber.2015.0157

Levy, S. (2021). Apple Inc. | History, Products, Headquarters, & Facts | Britannica. In Encyclopædia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/topic/Apple-Inc

Payne, B. (2017). Brand Positioning and its Usefulness for Brand Management: the Case of Apple Inc. Newcastle Business School Student Journal, 1(1), 51–57.

Tuten, T. L., & Solomon, M. R. (2020). Social Media Marketing (4th ed.). Sage.