Apple's Marketing and International Entry Strategies

International entry strategies
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Introduction
What is the best strategy for entering a foreign market? Should a business organization gain a competitive advantage in a foreign market by licensing its products or should it engage in direct exportation of its products? Or does a company adopt a daring strategy such as establishing a subsidiary, forging alliances, or making acquisitions due to the advantages linked to first-movers? Generally, many business organizations start with exportation and licensing strategies and use them as learning curves before making decisions regarding higher investment strategies. Like other companies, Apple, which is defined by its exceptional and innovative line of products, has relied on acquisitions, contract manufacturing and outsourcing, and Foreign Direct Investments (FDI) to enter and conquer foreign markets. The efficiency by which these strategies have been employed by the company has created a loyal foreign customer base that is willing to pay a premium. This paper examines Apple’s marketing strategy and how the company has consistently used acquisitions, Foreign Direct Investments (FDI), and contract manufacturing and outsourcing to enter foreign markets.
Apple’s marketing strategy
Apple’s marketing strategy is based on simplicity, both in terms of the company’s products, their names, and how they are delivered in domestic and foreign markets. The company’s focus on simplicity starts with its products, services, and extends to marketing efforts. For instance, the company’s products are sleek yet minimal, with clean color schemes and easy names such as iPhone and iPad. Apart from being simple, Apple’s products are uniquely stationed in foreign markets because the company focuses on UVP (unique value proposition), which enhances the performance of products. Due to the simplicity but luxurious nature of Apple products, the company’s marketing strategy has been likened to something that consistently creates juice on social media platforms while maintaining the company’s competitive advantage (Johnson et al., 2012). Although this is true, Apple’s strategy is best understood using the concept of Purple Cow, which indicates that traditional marketing strategies are inefficient in the modern world because of the changes introduced by technology (Gordin, 2004). Therefore, business organizations should not focus on creating remarkable products but rather, target groups of people that are likely to remain loyal and spread the word. Just like how people would stare at a dangerous purple cow standing in the field, Apple’s customers are loyal and even brag about the company despite its products being expensive.
Apple international entry mode strategies
* Acquisitions
An acquisition is a business deal where one company (usually a multinational company) takes over the control of another company (usually small companies or start-ups with huge potential) by buying its stock, paying the owners a price, or giving out its own stock to the shareholders of the company intended to be acquired. Since the 2000s, foreign acquisitions became more appealing to multinational companies because they provide access to ready and established markets (Madhok and Keyhani, 2018). Like other multinational companies, Apple has made countless acquisitions as a means of entering into foreign markets. Some of Apple’s acquisitions have been of low profile, such as its acquisition of Anobit Technologies (U.K) for $500 million in 2012, Voysis (Ireland), Dialog (U.K) for $ 600 million, and PrimeSence (Israel) for $350 million. However, other acquisitions such as that of Intel’s Smar...