BCG Matrix

The idea of carrying your favorite medicine wherever you go has al centerings been captivating for tidy sum in all e actuallyplace the world for the longest cadence. It started with carrying of stereo systems, past came the portable cassette players followed by the portable CD players and then finally the digital music players. In 2001 the portable music players industry was revolutionized by the sexual climax of an apples produce called the iPod this came as a breath of sportsmanlike air for music lovers all over the world and was an instant hit.The victory of it place be determined by the point that it has become a household name a brand kn possess all over the world in such a short time it is star of the elevatedest revenue generating crossways for the orchard apple tree and is now the mart leader in fruits of its genre. iPod bespeak Market iPods target market has been the y bulgeh earlier who get wind to music of all kinds and be always on the go, neverthe less(prenominal) with time the target market expanded awingly.Now it caters to al more(prenominal) or less everyone with accessories useable it has made the music unattached for sight where ever they atomic result 18 all the time. It has become dis stuffy of everyday life of any professional who listens to music where ever he is pretending, although through campaigns it subdued targets the teen eon energetic segment of the consumer market further bene conks of the crop are enjoyed by everyone (Apple Investor, 2008). Organizations have now employed iPod in training of their new recruits this shows the diversity of the market that the return is now supply to.The product has gr proclaim over the years except has kept its righteousness and maintained its status as the market grew and competitors came in Apple as always tried to stay ahead of the competition by speech variety in the product period keeping the originality. The iPod now ranges from iPod Classic, iPod Nano, iPod ripple and iPod touch all(prenominal) caters to a different segment of the society and has its own niche. Factors influencing consumer behavior Factors that have the most impact on the behavior of a consumer are Psychological Personal Social Cultural (Robbins & Judge, 2004)A manger patch fashioning any decision about a product necessarily to keep in mind anything that falls under the lines defined by the above mentioned doers. iPod on the some other hand catered to each of these factors in its own way. Psychological If we analyze the add campaigns for the iPod it would tell us that it shows passel that iPod is a product that has been designed for throng who are energetic who are 2-year-old or at least savour young, the colorful pattern espouse in the ads as hygienic as in the product depicts that it is a product that doesnt cater to a specific class but is for everyone (BCG Expertise, 2009).Being a technological product it besides appeals to the techno side of a human race mind, the desire to stay ahead of others and own an object that would be a statement for them. iPod over the years achieved this status of creation a ego statement for people and it is a study success of the product indeed. A parcel of people associate their choice of music with their personalities, and are very possessive about the songs they own and they listen to, the iPod enable them to keep this possession close to them and take it wherever they go and enjoy them whenever they feel like, therefore put ups them this sense of completion as well.Personal The appeal of the product is created towards the younger multiplication primarily the students and the freshly hired professionals. The product is a little highschool belld that is wherefore it has always been a status symbol as well in many societies, it is in any case for the people who have some know-how of technology and are inclined to learn more than (Apple Investor, 2008). For people of young age life is always on the move, it is very important for them to have things that are portable and are easy to carry.Music is by far the favorite realise time as well as a motivator in a way that it complements their work habits, wherefore having a device that send away be easily carried and taken to places and can carry your favorite things is a commodious clearion. Social The social aspect of an iPod is on the bang-upest factor influencing consumer behavior. iPod from its introduction in 2001 became an instant hit and the culture of iPod started, it became a southward name for music for a pass out of people (Apple iPod Touch, 2009).Apple had a lot to do in bringing and enabling this culture to flourish as they kept on bringing in new features and accessories for the iPod music for warning the iTunes and its publicitys, this kept the customers involved in the product while on the other hand gave reasons to people to talk about the product accordingly iPod became a topic of discussion as well as the time progressed.A lot of the success of iPod has to do with peer pressure and reference groups as well, people adopt things that they see in their surroundings, or with people who they are close to. This creates a desire among them to have the same object as well, with iPod being a state of the art product the word of mouth was terrific people couldnt stop talking about their iPods and its features this created hype in the market about the product and more and more people bought them. CulturalWith the advancement in technology the people wanted convenience in everything and hence the involvement of technology increased day by day in a common mans life, this culture of technology also progressed with time. With this culture flourishing iPod came as a perfect fit, people were instinctive to adopt changes and try out new products, people were better amend and well aware of what the product was all about hence less effort was required in making the people image the product also it enabled people to better receive the product (i skirt 3G, 2009).The todays world has become really fast paced, time is the most overpriced resource and everybody seems to be short of it in such times it was operose for people to relax at their work places or enjoy a few minutes of good music, even if they were able to they didnt feel comfortable with it. In such time iPod came as blessing as it was handy in so far could carry loads of music files now people were able to enjoy their music while being at work or being busy with whatever they want to do (Bulik, 2008). Consumer mien ModelBlack Box Model The Black Box model is divided into trey basic get outs Environmental Factors Black Box Buyers Response (Daft, 2001) Environmental Factors The Environmental Factors is the basic scenario in which a consumer is placed and has to make a decision these are his surroundings and how the product is presented to him and also how he perceives the product, ho w important is it for him and does he even feel the quest for the product or not. The surroundal factors are further divided into two categories 1.Environment These are the conditions that the customer lives in and his surroundings, the aspects involved are the political situation of the rustic and its stability, this also involves the economical standing of the country the buying power of the consumer, the ethnic aspect is also included in order to analyze the fact and understand how the customer will perceive the product and also the good issues are also discussed for the reason that whether the society is able to adopt and understand and support the technology or not.In iPods case as the product was launched predominantly in the western markets, the environment was favorable although some problems were faced in countries else where, the financial and political support was there, the product was a perfect fit for the fast paced on the go culture and also the technology was ve ry well received by the audience (Robbins & Judge, 2004). 2. Marketing Strategy The selling aspect of the environmental factor is more company related this is more about how the company designs its product, prices it, promotes it and defines distribution channels based on the environment discussed above (Martin, 2008).The success of iPod is an indication of its great marketing strategy the product was a very well thought device which catered to the consumer needs perfectly, secondly the promotion was such that it appealed to everyone and distribution channels were effective enough that it was available everywhere. The pricing although was a little question mark the big shekels margin that the company enjoyed assuagementricted some of the potential customers from using the product but then again it was good enough to make it an extremely profitable product. Black BoxBuyers Characteristics This is the part where the purchasers personality is involved, the attributes that give hi m his identity influence his decision making process. The way the emptor perceives a product, the attitude with which he receives the product, his personal likes and dislikes and also his background and his lifestyle all combined influence the decision that he takes. The characteristics of the target market were good analyzed and were responded with a great product and a marketing strategy, the habits and interests of the young generation were very well responded.The buyers response is considered as a rational decision based on the factors above while in reality it might not be the case, a buyer can be influenced by other factors as well, his decision doesnt have to be rational in the defined lines of the black box, he can be bias and unreasonable as well but even in that way he is satisfying his own need to optimum utility (BCG Expertise, 2009). The positive response to iPod from the consumers is not necessarily delinquent to the fact that it caters their needs but it can also be collectable to the fact that the buyer wants to fit into a certain circle of people and needs iPod as a support for his status.Decision Making The second part of the black box is the buyers decision making process, it starts dour with the identification of a problem that is the buyers realization of a need or a desire, second part is the research where the buyer looks out to find how can he fulfill his need, when he finds out ways how he can fulfill his needs then he evaluates all the options available to him, after the evaluation he finally comes to a conclusion and buys a product. The last part of the process is the behavior of the buyer after the purchase whether he comes back the second time or not, does he have complains, is he satisfied etc.(Martin, 2008) In the decision making process the problem was that people werent able to find a high quality digital music player that was reliable yet looked good, they did their research and iPod being the first of its kind was the onl y option available to them, after evaluating it and finding it best against the rest they bought the product. After the sales most of the customer were genuinely satisfied the evidence for which is the number of iPods sold and number of tunes downloaded from iTunes (Graham, 2008). RecommendationsPricing Strategy The iPod has always been a premium product by apple, comparatively high priced but high quality the high price is primarily due to the high profit margin that is kept on each device. The survey that was conducted that was conducted was based on 4 major points 1. It was asked that which in their positioning is the best digital music player, the response was clear as more than 70 percent of the responses replied iPod this shows that iPod is positioned as the best product in the market among the consumers (Bulik, 2008). 2.On the question whether respondents owned an iPod or not around 55 percent of the respondents replied positively. 3. When asked if they would want to own an iPod of their more than 90 percent replied positively this showed the great potential the product had in the market. 4. When those who didnt own an iPod already that why they didnt have an iPod the majority replied that they were not able to afford it. and so it can be concluded that the product has great potential and still can capture a big share in an already self dominated market, but the only barrier is the high price.The price needs to be lowered a bit so that affordability of the product increases. This is not merely in the western nations but one of the major reasons that iPod has not been able to flourish as greatly in rest of the world is the fact that an already high priced product becomes extremely unaffordable for people of poor economies when they are caught currency exchange rates. Even these markets have tremendous potential but they fall pray to cheap Chinese copies or other portable devices when the desire to own an iPod is great.The profit margin can be reduce d and the recovery can be made on other products such as the accessories and music. Music Diversity Music chance variable different genres must be added to the iTunes feature in order to attract a worldwide audience. This is the biggest internet music seller portal, recently iTunes historied its billionth download in just 9 months, this shows that how great the operations related to iPod have become and can become even bigger if a little diversity is added (Graham, 2008). Music SharingSharing the music between two iPod users is still an issue as there is no convenient way of transferring a file from one iPod to another, although there have been attempts such as the miShare but still it is a hassle. What needs to be done is that a wireless system of transferring files between the devices must be made so that two users are able to share their songs and enjoy the music together. FM Radio iPod doesnt have an FM Radio feature the FM industry has become huge over the years and has a grea t fan base and listenership.Not giving such a feature is just missing on to opportunities that are quite simple to catch on, hence an FM feature needs to be added in the product. Advertisements While the high spirit energetic young look for advertisement must be maintained but also different campaigns must be introduced in order to attract audiences who may not like to be associated with this perception. References Apple Investor. (2008). Retrieved April 24, 2009, from http//www. apple. com/investor Apple iPod Touch. (Apple Inc.). Retrieved April 19, 2009, from http//www. apple. com/ipodtouch/ BCG Expertise. (n. d. ). Retrieved April 21, 2009, from Boston Consulting Group http//www. bcg. com/impact_expertise/publications/files/Summary_Shop_org. pdf Bulik, B. S. (June 2008). Apples iPhone steals marketing thunder from iPod. Advertising days , 4-55. Daft, R. (2001). Organization Theory and Design, 9th ed. Chicago South-Western. Graham, J. (2008). Apple iPhone hasnt gotten on Flash ba ndwagon yet. the States Today . iPhone 3G.(2008). Retrieved April 23, 2009, from http//images. apple. com/br/accessibility/pdf/iPhone_3G_vpat. pdf Martin, R. (2008). Apple Goes After Business With Phone Apps And SDK. Informationweek , 23-24. Robbins, S. P. , & Judge, T. A. (2004). Organizational Behavior. New York Pearsons. Survey High Awareness, Strong Demand for Apple iPhone. (n. d. ). Retrieved April 22, 2009, from Marketing Charts http//www. marketingcharts. com/interactive/survey-high-awareness-strong-demand-for-apple-iphone-694/