AirPods are popular now and arguably one of the best products Apple introduced over the last few years. It’s estimated that AirPods account for as much as $4.3 billion in Apple’s revenues in 2018.
This lets me wonder: how can Apple sell AirPods (1st generation product) like a hot cake? To feed my curiosity, I checked out the AirPods introductory video and found it really worth learning for those who need to introduce products and services. The below is an excerpt of the video transcript. Let see what we can learn, shall we?
Apple starts by talking to your Emotions
Apple starts with the following sentences:“We believe in a wireless future. A future where all of your devices intuitively connect. This belief drove the design of our new wireless AirPods.”
These 2 sentences talk to our emotional mind. They introduce their vision, the promises, the wonderful destination to our mind. They create in our mind the picture of having intuitively connected devices all around, which we are not enjoying right now.
Most importantly, the sentences tell us why this upcoming product has to happen, why the product has to exist.
Then they talk to our Logic
“They have been made possible with the development of the new Apple-designed W1 chip. It is the first of its kind to produce intelligent, high-efficiency playback, while delivering a consistent and reliable connection. Infrared sensors detect when each AirPod is in your ear, so they only play once you're ready to listen…”
Apple continues by talking to our logical mind, the mind that needs hard facts, proofs to be persuaded. That’s why you see “new Apple-designed W1 chip”, “intelligent, high-efficiency playback”, “delivering a consistent and reliable connection”, “Infrared sensors”. These elements describe how the details of this product actually work and how in reality, logically bring you the wireless future.
These facts provide the reasons for our Logic to trust this product.
Finally they end with the promised destination
“We're just at the beginning of a truly wireless future we've been working towards for many years, where technology enables the seamless and automatic connection between you and your devices.”
Finally Apple ends the introduction by reintroducing the promises destination they want to you to. They end by talking again to our Emotions.
*Why does Apple introduce AirPods in this way?* Talk to our emotion, then logic, then back again to emotion?
It’s because Apple wants to position this product as a unique and valuable product, not a me-too product. One of the best ways to achieve this is to introduce it by telling the product’s own story, and complement the story with some easy-to-understand technical specs. Competitors can easily copy the specs, but very few can successfully copy the story.
This is why in the first few lines, Apple tells you why this particular product, not any others, has to exist. They talk about the promising destination that this product is supposed to bring you to and why this is meaningful to us. These talks create a meaningful story for the product. In turn, we as audience can relate ourselves with it and build up trust towards it.
Emotional talks without a solid base are just beautiful but hollow words. To support the emotional talks, Apple then talk about the facts about how this product works to persuade our logical, critical mind. More importantly, the facts provide the ground for us to trust the product more.
In the end, Apple understands that emotions do drive customers to buy things. Of course some customers are convinced by product’s technical specs. However, on top of these specs, most people care more about whether a new product can add meaning to their lives.
Bonus: What if Apple just talks about the specs?
Imagine the above texts do not exist, and you are just reading this paragraph. This time, Apple skips all others paragraphs in the introduction and just jumps to the fact part:
“AirPods have been made possible with the development of the new Apple-designed W1 chip. It is the first of its kind to produce intelligent, high-efficiency playback, while delivering a consistent and reliable connection. Infrared sensors detect when each AirPod is in your ear, so they only play once you're ready to listen…”
How do you feel about this introduction?
When I read the introduction this way, 2 questions came to my mind: “Why should I care about all these specs?” and “Why should I even read this?”.
Without the emotional talks, the product introduction becomes like a butch of numbers and texts to me, but not a vivid image in my mind. The product seems to be very good on paper, but it does not seem to be built for me, the user.
The user is then less likely to know more about the product, and this is the worst nightmare for anyone trying to introduce a product or service.
