Marketing Apple: Secrets of the World's Best Marketing Machine

One Billion Apps And Apple Earnings Hide a Surprise

You saw in yesterday's news that Apple had a good quarter in spite of the economy and doubled the number of iPod Touchs sold. (I helped; giving away four myself).  What's more, today Apple broke through 1 billion apps downloaded.  At the same time, Tim Cook declared that Apple isn't interested in building crappy netbooks with tiny screens and cramped keyboards.

What is hidden in plain sight is this: Apple already has.  It's called the iPod Touch.

A computer that fits in your pocket, runs any type of software imaginable, plays your songs, tracks your calendar, even does email and phone and Web when near WiFi.  This thing is a netbook!  (tiny screen and crappy keyboard notwithstanding)

This is typical Apple.  They tell us they aren't interested in a market, then they produce something just a little different and declare the market has changed "One Billion Apps!" and now they are leading it.

When I worked at Apple we used to tell a joke that went like this:

Q: "How many Microsoft engineers does it take to change a lightbulb?"
A: "None.  Microsoft will just declare darkness as the new standard."

How the times have changed.

Btw, I'm still giving away stuff.  Best chance ever to win something every day is right here.

Is Apple a Rave?

My good friend David Meerman Scott's great new book "World Wide Rave" is rising up the business book charts because its practical advice makes sense in today's economy. Put simply, Rave looks at what triggers a worldwide phenomenon and how any marketer can use modern tools like blogs, Twitter, and social media to have buyers notice and take action.

This is similar to one of my 5 Secrets of Apple Marketing in my free eBook: how to empower users to help you generate lift for your products or services. David has a whole case study in his book about how I launched this MarketingApple blog and explores other success stories in a clear, conversational style. He even made the book portable; it is small and easy to read, share, and in my case strongly recommend.

While David has not focused on Apple's amazing turnaround and the runaway success that started in 1997 with the launch of the iMac, I think it is fair to say that even though Apple pre-dates the social media tools David outlines in his book, Apple blazed the trail around exciting and connecting users via multiple World Wide Raves. Maybe that story deserves its own volume.

In the meantime buy this book (it's right there in the right side of this page in my sidebar) and learn even more secrets you can employ today. Enjoy!

Web Marketing just got easier

If you've been following my tweets and facebook profile you'll notice that Dimdim just launched version 5 today. In my spare time as their CMO, I'm attempting to use Apple's "5 Secrets" that I share in my free eBook to help Dimdim achieve success via better marketing.

One of those secrets discussed is "Empower Early Adopters."  To do this, good marketers must provide simple tools to help their early customers spread the word. YouTube is an excellent example of how a simple embed code and a watermark made it possible for anyone to post video on their website. Right now Facebook is using a similar tactic to encourage others to join. Search for a friend on Google and if they have a Facebook profile, Google will report that "Jane Doe is on Facebook" with their profile picture. Click it, and you are asked to join Facebook to reconnect.

Dimdim is taking a similar approach - making it possible for anyone to sign up for free to host web conferences with up to 20 people using our free hosted version. We've eliminated any need for extra software to be installed on attendee's computers so people join your meeting with one click. We've shipped open source versions so you can download and install it on your own servers. We even post an open API guide to create all kinds of mashups. And it is working. Now nearly 2 Million people are using Dimdim.

What I believe is really exciting about Dimdim is how it can help marketers spread their words for less. Want to host a webinar to get the word out but don't have much cash?  Sign up for Dimdim, schedule the event, grab our new Webinar Widget, and paste it on your site. People sign up just by entering their email address and you hold your event in Dimdim.  Now people can see and hear you, watch your presentation, ask live questions and get to know you and your product. Simple! I do a weekly live webinar on Dimdim; here is that new widget - I'd love to see you next week:

Enjoy using Dimdim and let me know how it helps you or what else you need. We're listening carefully to the needs of the market and innovating as fast as we can. That's one reason why this blog gets updated infrequently. Here is our embeddable launch video - there are many more on our site.