iPhone. It's here. Ready, Set Market.

I received an email today about the new release of the Apple iPhone. There is a lot of hype about today’s release and even a strong grassroots demand, so I decided to post a blog about marketing potential for today’s on demand customers. If your looking for an iPhone marketing plan, visit iphonechat.com.

The iPhone targets consumers who need to store information and communicate or people who want entertainment on the go. Apples target segments consist of professionals, students, corporate users, entrepreneurs, and health care workers. Currently, the market for high-end phones like the Apple iPhone is small. Few people want Internet, video, and PDA features in one device because of the high price. The smart phone market is still relatively small compared with general phone market. The market will rapidly increase in coming years due to lower prices and greater power.

So is this hope or hype? The overall consensus is that product will change the face of online marketing and SEO as we know, and may even lead to the demise of traditional SEO. The release is so significant that the expected combined impact with the rollout of Google Universe, has people rethinking their online marketing strategies.

This past week (June 17-23) a search on Google News shows that over 10,000 news stories discussed the iPhone, so the question here is What Marketers Can Learn From the iPhone Marketing Hype. Well for marketers there is a lot to learn from Apple’s efforts to build buzz for the launch of this product.

Here are a few:

• Understand the Needs of Different Media - Building hype requires a full-out media blitz. However, what is offered to each media must be different. For instance, television media need access to important company personnel for on-air interviews either by having these people visit in-studio or via satellite broadcast. Print publications need statistics and graphics that can be displayed on their pages. Online media want multi-media content, such as Flash presentations, YouTube style video or other forms, that is linkable within their websites.
• Give the Product a Recognizable Brand Name - It is easier to build interest if customers have some amount of awareness of a company or product. An easy way to do this for a new product is to give the product a brand name that appears connected to an existing well-respected brand. For Apple it can be argued that the brand that people are most familiar with is not the Apple name but the iPod name. In fact, just the prefix “i” may evoke brand awareness that is associated with Apple products. So naming the product iPhone, while initially a challenging legal issue for Apple, is clearly the right move for establishing early product interest.
• Spread Word-of-Mouth Through Pre-Announcements - Announcing a new product well in advance of bringing it to market can get customers to withhold a decision to purchase competitors’ products until they see what the new product can do for them. The major implication of postponing purchase decisions is that people are happy to tell others that they are waiting to see what the new product has in store. This heightens word-of-mouth advertising and stirs interest in those who may face similar purchase decisions. Apple announced the iPhone in January and in the five months between announcement and launch there are potentially hundreds of thousands of cellphone customers whose contracts expired and are looking to make a purchase decision so the word-of-mouth potential is huge.
• Whether the iPhone will be a long-term success will have more to do with the value of the product itself and not with the factors that help generate early hype. But if any product is guaranteed to get off to a fast start it is this one.

Check out the details of the new release here