When the new iphone 5 came out the Jimmy Kimmel Live show took an iPhone 4s out onto the streets and told people it was an iPhone 5. You’ll see in the video everyone says how great it is. But obviously it was the old phone not the new one.
Clearly this is amusing, but what is happening here and what can we learn from this?
- Apple has reached the point where people just assume the new iPhone will be much better than the last. The expectation to deliver something revolutionary each time is huge. How do you manage that?
- People are sociable animals and contrary to what most people believe, we all want to fit in. So we don’t shout ‘The Emperor has no clothes on’ but instead we fit in and conform. No one said ‘this is the old phone’ out loud but I am sure some of them thought it was.
- Customers can be influenced by experience psychology. The reporter said ‘the new iphone has come out today and we want to see what you think of it’. Does the person being interviewed challenge them and say this phone is not new? In this case the reporter is an authority figure. This leads us onto the Milgram experiment.
- I wrote a while ago about the infamous Milgram experiment which took place at Yale University, USA in 1961. The purpose of the experiment was to show how people respect authority and follow orders when giving a lethal electric shock to a person despite being able to hear their excruciating screams – the theory is just proved again. The TV guys say this is an iPhone 5, so it must be.
- Apple now has a problem. I love Apple products, but I was disappointed in the iPhone 5. I really don’t see enough difference to change from my iPhone 4. The problem Apple have is, when you reach the top, how do you stay there? The expectation Apple has now created over the years is difficult to manage. It’s a long way down as Blackberry and Nokia will tell you!
