Louis Roberts Blog: Scott Galloway Nails it on Key to Apple's Success

Scott Galloway is one of the few college professors you'll hear that actually understands branding in technology and he is able to articulate his vision masterfully. We never feel like we are wasting time listening to him speak and we envy his students.

His thoughts on Apple's largest creator of shareholder value is that it's the stores, not the phone.

It makes a lot of sense.

He goes on to say Samsung spends double on advertising than Apple while Apple has invested in leases.

He also points out the company has between $5-$6 billion in store leases which help customers consummate the relationship with the brand.

If we had to argue with the point at at all, we'd have to say that Apple was able to early on take the premium spot in the phone market. Their packaging, pricing and branding all screamed premium.

In fact, Apple's packaging has changed virtually all of the packaging in the entire market of products. It seems almost every company wants to make its product seem like it comes from an Apple-like box. Even the power adapters you purchase today come in a nice box.

These moves forced Android into second-tier status. Most people who don't buy Apple phones can't afford one or they don't want to be locked into a more closed ecosystem (Developers, etc). And Samsung is now competing not only with Apple but other Android phone-makers so the advertising spend needs to be larger to differentiate.

If you want a new iOS device, you HAVE to buy from Apple.

Apple did take a risk when they started opening stores. People did think they were crazy. Apple was correct with this decision proving once again that Steve Jobs had business vision which will likely never be matched by any other CEO.

He successfully mastered motion pictures, music, education, phones, computers, the GUI and he knew what the market wanted innately. It likely helped that he was fired and rehired allowing him far more latitude in controlling the destiny of a company which badly needed him the second-time around.

Forgive us for being politically incorrect and gender-antagonistic but the man had balls. He applied his vision to so many areas and made our lives better as a result. Even one wrong decision could have blown it all up.

Stores are just one area he touched but he altered retail for the better as a result... Likewise, he improved so many aspects of our lives. Even non-Apple customers have benefited greatly from the innovation he unleashed upon the world and the decisions he made for us.

So yes Scott, Apple was right - incredibly right to launch stores but as we learned when J.C. Penney hired Apple exec Ron Johnson and failed spectacularly, it takes more than a store to be a success; its about the experience the products create for consumers tied in with the level of support and sales which make customers want to part with their money.

In 2015, we shared another speech Scott gave. He is always entertaining. He was right about Apple but not perfect in all his predictions. He was wrong and somewhat right about Amazon. Watch for yourself to see.

Tags: amazon, android, apple, marketing, nyu, retail, samsung Related tags: scott galloway, apple, scott, right, stores, vision