Saying Goodbye to Steve Jobs

October 9, 2011 By Simren Deogun Leave a Comment

Steve Jobs - 1955-2011

It’s a little strange: feeling so close to someone you’ve never met. I’ve read countless tweets, posts and articles all expressing much of the same sentiments — that Steve was a genius, a leader, an innovator, a risk-taker, an admirable human being that throngs of people felt intrinsically connected to.

I’ve had the misfortune (or fortune depending on how you like to see the glass) of experiencing a lot of loss and heartache. That’s part of my personal story. But your perspective becomes markedly different when a community of strangers suffers a loss together.

In Canada, Jack Layton was taken from us in August — by Cancer. Steve Jobs suffered the same, horrifying fate. To be stripped of your life by something so cruel and unforgiving is equally as unbearable to experience as it is to watch, I think.

I recall the announcement of Steve’s resignation — walking into work the next day, I was inundated with everyone’s thoughts, both business and personal. I’m your quintessential Machead and have never hid it. Steve said that if he felt he could no longer perform at his standard as the head of Apple he would step down, and when he did we could all almost hear the ominous clock counting down.

It hasn’t sunk in for me yet. Reading through everyone else’s personal stories about how Steve inspired them, about how Steve was the only reason they were who they were today, about how Steve had irrevocably changed the world showed me how deeply rooted he was in people’s lives. He wasn’t just a businessman or a technologist.

Steve is no doubt a legend. And I believe he’s one of those indescribable people we will hold in high reverence always.

As my jaw dropped when I read that first tweet from Forbes on Wednesday, October 5 announcing his death, I could only think how sad it is to lose. But I remind myself always how much sadder it would be to never have had at all.

Goodbye Steve. And to those of you staring hardship and loss in its dark, bottomless eyes, remember him, because he took his “3 months to live” sentence and transformed it into 7 glorious years of incomparable global impact.

Filed Under: Business, Digital, News, Technology Tagged With: ,

So You Think You Know Everything About iPhone 4?

June 13, 2010 By Simren Deogun Leave a Comment

So you’ve perused the features, perhaps drooled a bit at the imagery and maybe hailed Jobs the all-time, hall-of-fame tech guru? But have you considered Apple’s business strategy? Or better yet, its marketing strategy?

Apple expertly understands the market, what they want, when to give it to them and, most importantly, when to hold back. Aptly put in this National Post article, Apple harvests targeted strategy, Apple is not the quintessential inventor but rather, as I like to put it, the re-innovator!

Let’s extrapolate now on the strategy of Mr. Jobs and his crew of Merry Geniuses:

Hardware Design
It’s different. And yes, Apple is all “think different”, all the time. But it’s not exactly an ogre to prince transformation here [side Shrek reference!]. Some may perceive this negatively, positing why Apple hasn’t pushed the design limits further like some of its competitors, Sony, namely.

Apple keeps it fresh, simple and innovative. The team balances clean design with full-featured ferocity. Plus, Apple only offers one mobile device — unlike ALL of its competitors, who release a multitude of options to the consuming public. By doing this, Apple focuses your attention, simplifying the purchase decision while simultaneously offering the benefit of continuous improvement for that single device, the iPhone.

iMovie
Strategy is easy here. You have to pay for it, a measly $4.99, I believe. It’s not much. But picture this, every consumer who makes the iPhone 4 purchase cannot possibly go without iMovie, it essentially renders the movie-editing prowess of the device useless. Thus, Apple instantaneously pulls in another $5 per iPhone sold, it may sound small but just multiply that 5 by millions and it’s nothing but profit heaven.

iBooks
Strategy here is also easy. This app comes with the phone. No need to pay — though you will pay for the books you want to read, but only once because of the ultimate syncing capabilities.

So, Apple gives you iBooks, but asks you kindly to purchase iMovie (an app that ships free with iLife on all Mac computers). I see this as an interesting and creative tradeoff. You give some and you take some. Kudos, Apple!

The Screen
Apple’s newly-dubbed “retina display” with more pixels than the human eye can detect is a huge leap, but the screen itself has actually stayed the same size. The focus, however, is not on size but on quality. And Apple has always relied heavily on emphasizing quality with a hard-to-beat no-fail attitude. Another trade-off? Perhaps.

There are a plethora of other features, enhancements and Apple idiosyncrasies I could pick apart, but what I want to stress is the strategic importance that backs each of these. Apple is the powerhouse when it comes to product announcements and releases, and it’s significant to understand the implications of their every move and the careful thought that is most certainly poured into every decision.

Filed Under: Business, News Tagged With: , , , ,

Hardship And Heartache: Why Emotion Matters In Marketing

May 16, 2010 By Simren Deogun 1 Comment

Marketing is every definition you’ll find in a textbook. Every single linear explanation of good/service, want/need, and satisfaction. But making marketing matter, making marketing powerful must come from a deeper place.

In any environment, under any circumstance, my work as a marketer matters to me. I care about it, all of it. No word, no colour, no decision exists without a little bit of me inside of it. Many will say this is foolish. Business is business, right? It’s not personal. For me, that’s where the real foolishness resides.

Take a moment to ponder the great successes of our time (marketing and otherwise). Do you not think those products and successes were personal? Making your work personal, instilling emotion, when necessary, is a means to success.

When that end product is not just a derivative of tasked work created from monotonous thoughts and movements, it holds you inside of it. And because it holds you, it also holds your emotions — passion, praise, weakness and strength. And emotion is powerful.

As marketing moves away from interruptive strategies and towards compelling storytelling, marketers will rely more and more on emotion. On evoking a particular emotional response from the recipient of the marketing message. It’s because that emotional response weaves a bond. A bond which can lead to a purchase, to loyalty, to advocacy.

Gates, Jobs, Page and Brin — some of the geniuses of our time — channel the hardship and heartache they are forced to endure into positive emotion — because when it matters to you, the marketer, there’s a greater chance it will matter to you, the consumer.

Filed Under: Business, Thoughts Tagged With: , , , , ,