A recent report indicates only One Percent will Pay $500 for iPhone.
Let’s take a closer look
The Online Market research firm Compete, Inc. found that only one percent of the likely customers for an Apple iPhone would pay US$500 for one. Computerworld cited the results on Friday.
OK, everything I know about economics I learned from one book but here’s one of the important things that I learned…. Ready?
There is a difference between what people say they will do and what they will actually do.
This may come as a surprise to anyone under the age of…. 18? 16? 10? At what age do we figure out that some people say that they will do something or won’t do something, and then do the opposite?
The survey consisted of 379 people in the U.S., most of who had heard of the iPhone and had shopped for an iPod. Of the 26 percent who said they would likely buy an iPhone, only one percent responded that they would pay US$500.00. However, for a range of $200 to $299, the number jumped to 42 percent.
Again, I’m not a pollster, but 379 people hardly seems like a weighty number. And I have more problems: “most of who had heard of the iPhone” Wait. Most of the 379 people had heard of the iPhone. I wonder how many of the 379 had seen the demo at Macworld. I wonder how many knew nothing more than “Apple is making an iPod that’s also a cell phone” and were then asked “Would you pay $200-$299 for that? Would you pay $300-$399 for that? Would you pay $400-499 for that?”
Also, in what world do people who are “likely” to buy something get to set what price it is? Can I say that I am “likely” to buy a MacBook Pro but I won’t pay more than $1000 for it? How does that work exactly? What does the word “likely” mean?
Apparently they took a group of people, told them this, and then gave them a range at which they would buy it.
People don’t even have a good idea of what they will do financially when they retire, which (one assumes) they will give more thought to than what cell phone they will buy. Asking 379 people what they think they’d pay for a device they’ve heard of but may-or-may-not have ever seen…. I simply doubt its accuracy or meaningfulness.
The sponsor of the survey has not been revealed.
I’m not sure why this would matter unless it was found to have been sponsored by “Gatesy McZune” in which case we might have some questions.
This result is very different than the one conducted by ChangeWAVE Research and reported here at TMO on Wednesday. In that survey, about 67 percent of those surveyed had no concern over the US$500 price.
One can then assume about 43% were married.
The analysts discussing both results, however, agreed on one thing. Early adopters will pay a high a price for a terrific new gadget, and Apple knows that. So the real question is not whether the initial price is too high but rather how fast Apple must bring the price down to maintain the momentum of the product and reach their stated goal of 1% of the mobile phone market by mid 2008.
We should also ask how long it will take for the Rev A bugs to appear, the Rev A complaints to begin, and the Rev A Class Action lawsuit to be filed, not to mention the hoards of Forum Gurus who will berate everyone who bought a Rev A device.