iPod: I Love (Hate) You

09Feb08

According to Seth Godin, all marketers use one of three levers to sell their products: love, hope or fear. He shared some familiar examples: purveyors of health insurance appeal to fear; the beauty industry counts on hope. But love is what throws me for a loop. There is one product I truly love, yet also hate with every fiber of my being. And that product is the iPod.

How I love thee, let me count the ways:

• you make my music, video and photos portable
• you have the most intuitive user interface of all mp3 players
• you help me drown out the screaming crazies on the streetcar
• your slim, sexy design makes me feel stylish

And why I regularly want to pitch you from the window of a moving vehicle:

• I have owned 5 of you in 4 short years
• 1 dead battery, 2 inexplicable breakdowns, 1 drowned in the washer
• customer support told me I have to reinstall Windows to bring you back
• you continually come up with new versions that I feel compelled to buy

In all fairness, the demise of 1 iPod Shuffle was my fault. When you make something that small, it’s bound to take a spin through the washing machine at some point. It was a gift from Google (another beloved brand) when I bought some media on behalf of one of my clients. Oddly, the inscription on the iPod said “ooGleg thanks you”. I wonder who got fired over that one? But I digress…

Seth says true love is when consumers get upset that you’ve changed the formula and demand that you bring it back (ie. Coke). But that’s not the case here. Apple comes up with new formulas that I love more! So much so that I feel like a social outcast for hanging on to last month’s model.

But I have to wonder how long this strategy of continual upgrades will be successful. Eventually consumers will get pissed off. It’s a waiting game – do I buy now or wait until the pink Nano comes out for Valentine’s day? If I buy now, for how long will I be the proud owner of the latest piece of technology before its cast aside by the masses?

Eventually, I just won’t buy one at all.

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Tags: apple, iPod, marketing, Nano, Seth Godin, Shuffle