Mind your market
Which comes first? Mindshare or marketshare?
Recently, I was talking with a friend, and she said “I have to get an iPod.”
“Which one?”, I asked.
“Oh I don’t know anything about them. You play music on them don’t you?” was her reply.
I was stunned. Not by her wanting something without even knowing what it was. No, what amazed me, was that this hit home to me, how much mindshare Apple has captured with the iPod. Sure they might have 75% or so of the portable music player marketshare, but I’d suggest they have quite a significant percentage of the mindshare of the populous.
But what is mindshare?
Dictionary.com identifies mindshare in the Webster’s New Millenium Dictionary as:
The development of consumer awareness about a specific product or brand in hopes that they will buy the product or brand
Technically speaking, mindshare is a percent of the total potential market whereas marketshare is a percent of the sales in that market.
In other words, mindshare is the market you have before you have the market.
Apple has this in spades with the iPod. Put your hand up if you felt or feel compelled to buy an iPod because everyone else has? Because they are cool? Even though you haven’t proved a need? Even though you don’t listen to music all that much and your CD collection scores about one new friend a year?
Ok. Guilty. That was me. And I have no doubt I’m not alone. I know my friend is with me.
I have an iPod now. A wonderful going away present from my work mates at my job I lost recently . “Only” a Shuffle but which surprisingly, I have found exceptionally useful - able to store some 7 hours of music in its 512Mb.
That gift saved me several hundred dollars though, as it has satiated my irrational desire for an iPod. If it had have been left to me, I would have bought the top of the range 60Gb iPod photo. I may yet buy that one, but if I do, it will be with a clear head and logical thought processes… well that’s what I’ll try to convince my wife.
If Apple could ever capture that kind of mindshare with the Mac, you might be asking “Bill who?” in a few years.
And Apple are making some small inroads into mindshare with the Mac. The Switcher campaign was somewhat successful but what’s really helping now is the security problems facing Windows. People are looking and starting to get a sniff that there is an alternative.
Apple just has to keep waving the carrot in front of Windows users. Let them know that not only is there a viable alternative, and not only develop that consumer awareness, but sow the seeds that they have to get a Mac, they need a Mac.
Apple isn’t quite there yet. I don’t meet people yet who are saying “I have to get a Mac. I don’t know why, I just have to because everyone else is.” But things are going in the right direction.
Which leads us back to the opening question. Which does comes first? Well, the answer is mindshare. And you thought I was going to say marketshare. Even though they feed off each other.
When Steve gets up and espouses the wonders of the latest Mac, what is he doing? He’s buying mindshare among a small part of that potential buying public. On a good day, the PC writing industry gets on board as well and expands that mindshare. But on most days, they are more interested in raving on about how good an alternative Linux is.
But when the media do get on board, things really start to happen. Linux would be nowhere today without all those articles about it. You can’t pickup a PC mag without seeing an article about Linux. That’s doing wonders for their mindshare. That’s what we need for Macs. It has been better lately. The press has been favorable.
So how does Apple reach the tipping point where the mindshare and marketshare become self generating, as has happened with the iPod? That point where people impulse-buy Macs? Without considering that they will have to repurchase much of their software? Maybe it will be security. Maybe people will become irrational and say “I have to have a Mac. I hear they don’t have any viruses or spyware. And I’ll work the rest out when I get one.”
It’s not going to happen as fast as it did for the iPod. But we can all help with the mindshare. You don’t have to be in your face about it. Subtlety works wonders. “No I don’t know any good tech guys for your PC. I have a Mac. Rarely need to spend money on tech support.” or “Viruses? Spyware? Not a problem, I’ve got a Mac.”
It’s not about trying to sell Macs. Or trying to convince your friends and family they must switch. It’s just about getting them thinking they need to. Give them that gnawing thought, like my friend who wants the iPod, that they should.
Even if they never do, it doesn’t matter, because the greater the mindshare, the greater the marketshare will become. And then the greater the mindshare. And then it will snowball.
del.icio.us
Digg
Facebook
Slashdot
StumbleUpon
Comments
I take you point, but your “No I don’t know any good tech guys for your PC. I have a Mac. Rarely need to spend money on tech support.” or “Viruses? Spyware? Not a problem, I’ve got a Mac.” gambit misses the mark.
Why? Because They. Don’t. Believe. You.
I know. I’ve tried.
However, something that might work is to increase awareness of the Apple stores (not that we have one where I live, you understand).
Insinuate a visit to an Apple store into a conversation:
“You need some lighting ideas? Lets go over to the Apple store and have a look. Some of the best lighting I’ve seen.”
Or even more deviously:
“Oh look. There’s the Apple store. Do you mind if we go have a quick look?”
Or more directly:
“No software for the Mac. Gee, that’s not my experience. Let’s go over to the Apple store and have a look.”
Let the store do its job.
I’ve always contended that the 95% marketshare for Windows is one of the biggest selling points, which is always met with some derision from those with the minority marketshare, like Mac or Linux. But it’s good to see that rationale backed up in some way by the argument here, even if somewhat unevenly applied. That reasoning also led me to the Mac mini so that I could run FCP, which I also purchased because of the marketshare in non-linear editing, and why I would purchase an Ipod if I were remotely interested in a portable music player.
So I heartily agree that uiquity and a wide user base are reasons to buy one brand over another, but that seems to be more of an argument FOR Windows than against it.
Heheh - you’re right M.T. MacPhee, they don’t don’t believe you, but that doesn’t matter, because you’ve sown the seed.
And I like your deviousness. Good thinking. :D
I agree with you Beeblebrox, the marketshare of Windows is a sound reason to buy a Windows box. But nowadays, it is a lot easier to co-exist in this Windows world if you have a Mac or Linux machine. So you’re not putting yourself out on a limb so much buying them anymore.
It’s absolutely mindshare first. Of course, cost and perceived convenience/inconvenience plays a part into it. You can convince people to try a $5 coffee drink with less difficulty than you can to sell a gadget at $249 (pre Shuffle pricing). Of course, the gadgeteers and tech heads don’t need much pushing but the mass ... here is their general perceptions and thinking:
1990 to 1997: Must get personal computers, I’ll be left behind, my kids will be mocked. And of course, the perception was that if corporations are choosing PC’s over Macs, they must be the way to go and how can anyone be worth $25 billion be wrong (Bill Gates)?
1997 to 2000: Must buy faster and faster Pentium - Intel is telling me every night on TV - every sell’s PC’s - that must be the way to go. The internet economy, it’s all related to the PC - Bill Gates is richer & richer and Michael Dell - if they’re still flogging PC’s, that must be the way to go.
2000 to 2003: Hey, I don’t need to buy a PC every year or every two years ... wow, that iMac looks nice ... Steve Jobs, hey didn’t he invent computers or something - those Pixar movies are great. iPod? You mean I can load thousands of songs onto this tiny thing - easily? I don’t really believe you. Show me. I’ve been burned - my PC is full of crap, I don’t know why I bought my 8-year old a PDA 2 years ago ...
2004 to Now: My PC is still full of crap - is there anything better?
It took 20 years of battering from MS, Intel, IBM, Sony, Toshiba, Compaq, Dell, Gateway, Tandy, Packard-Bell, etc but Apple is still standing. It takes a while to change the direction of the mindshare battle. Apple has landed almost direct hits on everything from the design to pricing to retail (obviously there are some mistakes but no one is perfect) and the tide is shifting.
With the mass popularity of the internet and the 900 lawsuits, MS has lost control of the conusmer desktop from the browser choice to itunes to even a desktop search - MS has to stand and prove its worth to consumers and whiel journalists are slow to catch on, when conusmers have a choice, they rarely choose MS #1 (MSN, WebTV, evben Xbox as some examples).
MS has to stand and prove its worth to consumers and whiel journalists are slow to catch on, when conusmers have a choice, they rarely choose MS
Are they any more likely to choose Apple? A 3-5% marketshare in OS and desktop computers would hardly suggest so. Of course, Apple does control 75% of the Ipod market, but then MS controls 95% of the OS market. While MS and Apple have both had their share of product failures, it’s a bit of a stretch to say that consumers rarely choose MS.