Apple announced late last year that 2009 would be the last year it would participate in Macworld Expo, a show built around Apple’s own brand aficionados. Apple is one of the world’s most loved companies, often cited as a leader in everything from brand cachet and product development, to revenue generation and stock price performance. Why did they take so long to shut down their participation at Macworld Expo, a worldwide tradeshow?
That is of course a rhetorical question. Although the show bears the name of Apple’s own brand, it needed to be cut from Apple’s marketing program. It simply doesn’t show a return on marketing dollars spent. Although Macworld is a thriving show in its own right, Apple does better dollar-for-dollar with its marketing efforts in numerous other areas. Sure, consumer tribes go to tradeshows. But it’s a small cultish subset of the overall tribal community. Apple is acknowledging that it can stay closer to its consumer tribe by pulling out of its own tradeshow.
And to us it seems an overdue decision. But as we’ve seen over and over with our corporate clients and colleagues, traditional marketing beliefs and behaviors are hard to change.
My agency has been working for years to extend the reach of tradeshows through the Internet. Although this makes good incremental use of digital media, it misses the point, and the opportunity. Today there are much better ways (and uses of marketing budgets) to connect with customer tribes than tradeshows.
Tribaling says it simply: the job of a brand is not to sell products to consumers, but to support the links between consumers, as they connect to each other within social tribes. How can it be relevant to stage a huge event, once a year, inconveniently located in one city, and expect your consumers to attend in market-meaningful numbers…even if they do blog and twitter about it for weeks afterwards?
But here’s what’s really going on with Apple’s consumer tribe. They are creative and hard-working people who delight in details and elegant design, solving real problems, meeting real needs in the context of their daily lives and communities. Apple touches hundreds of millions of consumers around the world in a variety of ways. Their retail presence is second to none, a place to get genius technical support, discover new products, and develop enthusiasm for the badge brand. They are newsmakers with their iTunes community and countless other digital forums, worldwide. In the context of these tribal communities, Apple’s tradeshow is no longer a justifiable expense.
So for this company, so often lauded for its insight into consumer needs, and its innovative way to deliver the next great thing, it’s about time to stop the symbolic and traditional tradeshow exercise. It’s time for Apple to focus on connecting in more meaningful ways with their customer tribe, helping them connect to each other, and to enjoy the business growth that follows.
It’s likely Macworld Expo won’t continue for much longer without Apple. And it’s very possible other big shows will see the exodus of their most savvy (and largest) marketers, as they follow suit, to pursue their own consumer tribes in relevant ways.
