Steve Jobs was the co-founder of the famous and revolutionary company Apple.
He was a marketing genius. He believed in no research but focused more on the design and marketing of his products.
His products are sleek, unique, elegant and extremely simple, giving them a delicate and friendly look and feel to them. For example, the iPod Touch, iPad, iMac, or the iPhone.
He was obesessed of design and computers.
History
Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak started Apple in Job's garage on April 1st, 1976.
They launched Apple 1 in the same year and Apple 2 in 1977. This introduced personal computers to the public.
In 1981, IBM entered the personal computers market and Steve Jobs welcomed them in a newspaper article which gave the impression that IBM was Apple's competitor.
PepsiCo CEO John Sculley becomes Apple's CEO after having been persuaded by Steve Jobs for many months.
After his launch of the commercial "1984" for his Macintosh, Steve Jobs and Chiat/Day, their advertising team, were fired from Apple in 1997.
In 1988, Steve Jobs started another company called NEXT, which built computers for education purposes. Although it was not famous, Tim Burners-Lee, an employee of the company, invented the World Wide Web on a NEXT computer.
Steve Jobs also bought another company called LucasFilm Computer Division because they had an essential machine called the Pixar Image Computer.
From this company, an animator named John Lasseter wanted to create the first animated movie made completely on computers which had never been seen before. By raising money by making commercials for other companies, Pixar gained enough experience and released the first complete animated movie in history - Toy Story.
Meanwhile, in 1997, Apple was weeks away from bankrupcy, so they bought NEXT for $400 million and Steve Jobs took over Apple again.
Steve Jobs gave life to Apple by hiring back Chiat/Day and launching their "Think Different" campaign.
Later, Steve Jobs collaborated with designer Jonathan Ive to create and launch the amazing and colorful iMac. It was the fastest-selling computer in Apple's history.
Later on, Steve launched iTunes in January, the Mac OSX in March, Apple retail stores in May and the iPod in November which changed the way people listened to music.
The iTunes store in 2003
The iPhone in 2007. As Steve Jobs called it “Life in your pocket”
The iPad in 2010. It sold over a million iPads in one month!
These were launched soon after he was diagnosed with cancer. He died on October 5th, 2011.
A Marketing GENIUS
Steve Jobs revolutionized the computing world with his “1984” commercial to launch the new Macintosh created by his advertisement agency Chiat/Day. This commercial changed the advertising industry forever. It was claimed as the best commercial.
In their first animated movie - Toy Story, the main idea of the film was that lifeless objects have a soul and personality which is the foundation of Apple's products. Steve Jobs wanted his computers to be “friendly”.
To make his products look friendly, he demanded that the shape of the computer must be taller but narrow to look like a head, a curve at the bottom to create a chin and when turned on, instead of asking for a command, it simply said “hello”.
Their “Think Different” campaign featured pictures of Thomas Edison, Einstein and Lennon and many other Steve's heroes along with Apple's logo and the words : “Think Different”. This was a sneaky marketing attack on IBM whose campaigning words were “Think IBM”. The “Think Different” campaign changed the way people looked at Apple as it was a promise for the future.
The colourful iMac attracted millions of customers. Its bright and fun colors along with the elegant and simple design made it the fastest-selling computer in Apple's history.
Apple's retail stores attracted millions of customers but they were cutting-out the middleclass-men as the products were very expensive and still are.
The iTunes store allowed customers to purchase music as low as 99 cents! It gave popularity to singers in return. Soon, they were able to sell 6 million songs in 6 days!
Steve Job's product presentations were his ultimate showcase of his marketing genius side. He would present their present day sales and past products and then finish by saying “one more thing” and then introduce their brand new product. His “one more thing” strategy was the most anticipated part of his presentations.
