Apple Marketshare Increasing?

[BenRoethig]

It's pretty remarkable that 1.3rd of the Macs out there are of the intel variety already.

 

[Eraserhead]

Imagine you're a company that's developing a big web-based marketing campaign. Would you find it acceptable if the developers told you that more than 6% of your audience will not only be unable to access your site, but also will be offended in the process?

Then there's the other 15% on Windows Firefox who will at the least be offended . 20% is a huge percentage to annoy.

 

[greenmeanie]

Is this the same way his STOCK was increasing too LOL

 

[BornAgainMac]

PC Surfing

So then means that when I use a PC for viewing web pages that I am actually messing up those statistics. I should slam sites with all my Macs to get those stats up.

 

[alansky]

Is grass green?

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that Apple's market share has to grow for two simple reasons: (1) Thanks largely to the iPod, Apple is currently one of the best-known brands on the planet and (2) Apple makes gorgeous, cutting-edge computer products that are also much easier to use than the competition.

How could Apple's market share not be growing? Impossible!

 

[DMann]

Momentum

Good for apple, especially in the face of Vista.

There is obviously room for both operating systems now, OS X won't go away. As long as steve continues to deliver the goods people won't switch back.

With such an extraordinarily stable and capable OS, elegantly styled hardware, seamless integration, stores booming with sales and new prospective customers, iPod draws, iPhone on the horizon, hardware which can run run neck and neck with PCs, the presence of Vista, and an ever increasing core of loyal consumers who appreciate style and reliablility, who greatly influence those who are on the fence, it's no wonder that marketshare will continue to "expand and expand.....(Monty Python, The Meaning of Life)

 

[Toe]

Thanks largely to the iPod, Apple is currently one of the best-known brands on the planet and...

For the record, Apple has always had some of the best brand recognition in the world. And the Apple logo has been one of the most recognized logos in the world since long before it went single-color.

 

[ingenious]

Ugh. I hate when I surf a site and they "helpfully" tell me that unless I use an outdated IE or Netscape with a Mac, I won't be able to see the site.

Or when you're locked out because you use Safari, so you switch your user-agent to Windows MSIE 6.0 and it works...

 

[derbazooka]

2% or 50%?

If hits accurately represent marketshare and Apple's total market share increased from 4% to 6%, then Apple increased it's total installed base by 50%. In 6 months. That means they're doubling the number of macs out there annually. I love Apple but that's just not realistic.

More hits from Safari users could mean nothing more than more mac users were surfing the web (say, talking about the iPhone.) Hard to believe we can draw conclusions about marketshare from this.

 

[FoxyKaye]

With such an extraordinarily stable and capable OS, elegantly styled hardware, seamless integration, stores booming with sales and new prospective customers, iPod draws, iPhone on the horizon, hardware which can run run neck and neck with PCs, the presence of Vista, and an ever increasing core of loyal consumers who appreciate style and reliablility, who greatly influence those who are on the fence, it's no wonder that marketshare will continue to "expand and expand.....(Monty Python, The Meaning of Life)

Indeed, my old boss, who took every pleasure in pointing out that he would forever be a "Windows Guy" just bought a 15" MacBook Pro (with my assistance, of course).

 

[DMann]

We've only just......

Up, Up, Up, when will the trend end?

End? This is only the beginning.......

 

[DMann]

Statistics

Also, always bear in mind: when 1% of consumers buy a Mac, they are purchasing both an OS and a computer made by Apple, yet Apple's market-share rises only 1%. When purchasing a Dell, however, Dell's market-share rises 1% while MS's market-share also rises 1%, giving the illusion of 2% being taken away from Apple. Installed user base percentages can also be deceiving, since many consumers are using Windows and Mac simultaneously, more-so now with the advent of the Intel Mac, and more and more Windows users are using Linux while having Windows installed, but not using Windows at all. Apple's marketshare percentage may actually be MUCH higher than they appear statistically, and will continue to grow exponentially with the iPod halo effect, retail stores' enormous volume of sales, Leopard's debut, new pro apps on the horizon, not to mention Vista's arrival. Also, the iPhone will likely create yet another halo effect during the long term.

 

[Rocksaurus]

Disco Stu: Did you know that disco record sales were up 400% for the year ending 1976? [points to a chart for the years 1973-1976] If these trends continue... aaaaaaay!

 

[Toe]

If hits accurately represent marketshare and Apple's total market share increased from 4% to 6%, then Apple increased it's total installed base by 50%. In 6 months. That means they're doubling the number of macs out there annually. I love Apple but that's just not realistic.

More hits from Safari users could mean nothing more than more mac users were surfing the web (say, talking about the iPhone.) Hard to believe we can draw conclusions about marketshare from this.

These numbers are not so easily fudged. The sites these people look at get millions of hits, so their statistics are pretty-much dead on.

Look at the trends for Mac browsers:
http://marketshare.hitslink.com/report.aspx?qprid=2
There is a nice steady, very strong upward progression over the last 6 months (and more).

This isn't some sort of anomaly. LOTs of people are buying Macs. Heck... I see them everywhere now, when just a year or two ago, mine was always the only PowerBook around in a public place.

 

[J Radical]

If hits accurately represent marketshare and Apple's total market share increased from 4% to 6%, then Apple increased it's total installed base by 50%. In 6 months. That means they're doubling the number of macs out there annually. I love Apple but that's just not realistic.

More hits from Safari users could mean nothing more than more mac users were surfing the web (say, talking about the iPhone.) Hard to believe we can draw conclusions about marketshare from this.

kgarner addressed this:

What I thought was interesting was that the PPC numbers are steady on the graph at around 4% while the Macintel number climb from near zero to over 2 in the same period.

This would seem to indicate a rise in actual market share. If it was just due to people upgrading their existing system there would be a decline in the PPC numbers.

These stats are nothing more than an indicator, we'll have to wait for apple to let their real numbers be known and then wait for an analyst to make a judgement on % market share.

It's easy to forget that the Mac is irrelevant in large parts of the world, outside of North America, Western Europe Australia & Japan the Mac has next to no presence. When we talk about the elusive 5%, do we mean world wide or just in the west?

Most of us won't ever care about this (because our way of life is largely based upon ignoring the rest of the world), but Apple has zero penetration in emerging markets such as Brazil, India and China.

The silver lining (if there is one) is that Linux is pretty big in these places, so at least the future programmers in these countries will know unix...

 

[Plutonius]

Go to adult swim fix if you want to see a site that is not mac compatable! I really think the web statistics are skewed since most of the world is forced to us PC's at work. Man I really want to stream ATHF. The guys at at adult swim need a wake up call. Or at least some sort of campaign to make them change.

They advertised last month that their site is mac compatible.

Robot chicken ftw.

 

[derbazooka]

Lies, Damned Lies and Stats

These numbers are not so easily fudged. The sites these people look at get millions of hits, so their statistics are pretty-much dead on.

I don't doubt the veracity of the statistics. It's the conclusions being drawn from them that are dubious.

If:
- Apple's marketshare increased from 4% to 6% in six months AND
- There are approximately 2 billion computers in service worldwide (ballparking from a 2005 Arstechnica article)

Then Apple sold (0.02 * 2000000000) = 40 Million computers in 6 months.

Apple shipped 1.6 million Macs in Q4 2006. And that represented strong growth.

In this case, the increase in Mac browser hits cannot possibly be used to predict market share increases. Apple doesn't have the production capacity nor the market to justify the figures.

 

[Maccus Aurelius]

Well, in either case, almost everyone I know is switching to mac hardware. A friend of mine who has used nothing but Wintel devices just got herself a Macbook Pro. I don't push mac only when helping people buy, but the majority of friends and family who I've helped shop around for computer systems have gone for macs after seeing the bundled software they come with and after test driving my macbook for a spell. There's a very large number of people who are definitely anti-apple and would never touch the computers, but they aren't to worry.

 

[seashellz2]

I convinced a Windows junkie, who thought that Apple 'was a small company going bankrupt', to go look at, to drool over, then buy a 13" black Macbook.
It was Garageband and the Intel that won her over-she HAS to be able to use MSIE 6 for her job-Real Estate-whose site is windows only.
She is using Crossover 6, and therfore doesnt even have to install Windows XP on her Mac-just MSIE.

 

[adamcz]

Wow, that's awesome! I think their marketshare will grow exponentially.

What does that mean? That if it's 6% now, it will soon become 36%?

 

[chrismcdowell25]

Fixed It

Go to adult swim fix if you want to see a site that is not mac compatable! I really think the web statistics are skewed since most of the world is forced to us PC's at work. Man I really want to stream ATHF. The guys at at adult swim need a wake up call. Or at least some sort of campaign to make them change.

They fixed ATHF. It works now. I saw them advertising it while they were showing Family Guy the other day. Something about the site is now mac compatible so stop bitching. One of those where it is all black with the white text ads.

 

[Maccus Aurelius]

I don't doubt the veracity of the statistics. It's the conclusions being drawn from them that are dubious.

If:
- Apple's marketshare increased from 4% to 6% in six months AND
- There are approximately 2 billion computers in service worldwide (ballparking from a 2005 Arstechnica article)

Then Apple sold (0.02 * 2000000000) = 40 Million computers in 6 months.

Apple shipped 1.6 million Macs in Q4 2006. And that represented strong growth.

In this case, the increase in Mac browser hits cannot possibly be used to predict market share increases. Apple doesn't have the production capacity nor the market to justify the figures.

What you have to consider are refurbished and preowned macs. Lots and lots of PPC systems are still being sold on Ebay and other sites and people buy those as well. I'm pretty sure this can account for the extra. Despite Macbook Pros, Powerbook G4's are still very desireable. A friend of mine just bought one cheap. Their prices have gotten pretty low too. I can buy a Powerbook G4 for the price of a macbook.

 

[dejo]

If:
- Apple's marketshare increased from 4% to 6% in six months AND
- There are approximately 2 billion computers in service worldwide (ballparking from a 2005 Arstechnica article)

Then Apple sold (0.02 * 2000000000) = 40 Million computers in 6 months.

Apple shipped 1.6 million Macs in Q4 2006. And that represented strong growth.

You are mixing up marketshare (which is a percentage of product sold/shipped during a time frame) with install-base. You simply can't do that. You either need to take 2% of the total number of computers sold during those 6 months (which is much less than 2 billion) or you need to find out the percent increase in install-base and multiply that with the 2 billion. Then you will get some figures with which to make proper judgements.

 

[splashman]

Someday Apple will be king. Microsoft will lose.

No, that will never happen and I doubt anyone at Apple wants it to happen.

Apple's whole business depends on ignoring the largest segment of the computer market. They ignore the entire low end. These are no $599 Apple notebooks and that's by design. You can't charge a premium price unless you have a premium product. Apple only sells at the high end where to margin is high. The bulk of the consumers will always buy basted on price and I doubt Apple wants to be the company with the cheapest product. I can see then ramping up to maybe as much as 15% in areas where they compete. But also they don't even try to get into the data centers or low end desktop markets.

I completely agree. Steve Jobs has no desire to see cubicle farms populated with Macs. He prefers to have only the high end of the market; to be seen as above all the rest. And for the stockholders, that's a good strategy: the high end is where the profits are. Look at Apple's margins compared with Dell's.

I've said for a long time that if/when Apple's market share approaches 15%, Apple will start raising prices. That trigger might actually be 10%, but I have no doubt the trigger exists -- if not on paper, at least in Steve's head.

With size comes inertia. Look where inertia has taken MS.

 

[SiliconAddict]

I actually don't find this to be good news. I'm not overly happy with the attitude of Apple right now. They are acting like cock of the walk and they are the underdog. I really would hate to see what Jobs and Apple would be like with even 15% market share. Admittedly that its years off, if ever. But their behavior is turning into more of an IBM\Microsoft company more then anything else. I really feel the phrase Think Different has been replaced with Think Corporate.
That being said I'm not one of these fanbois who:

1. Wants to keep the Mac market small to feel important and special.
2. Wants to keep Apple the way its always been.
3. wants Apple to cater to its fanbas first and new users second.

No I'm perfectly happy with Apple growing their market, but not at the cost of their for lack of a better term..."soul". I've said this time and again but I think it is worth repeating. I really think Jobs had a revelation when he went through that bout of cancer. For now...Apple is Jobs. Jobs is Apple. Without him the company's future would be questionable at best. I think in 2004 Jobs made the decision that they couldn't maintain the status quo in regards to where Apple's market share stood. And thus began the push to increase market share...at any cost.
To put it another way if Jobs left the company for whatever reason, good or bad, would you as a fan be more comfortable with him leaving at 3% market share or 15%.
For a while Apple, as a computer company has been teetering. No I'm not one of these MS fanbois who is screeching like a baboon that OMG OMG! Apple is going to go out of business tomorrow! LOL!!!11one1|| But they have been in a niche market that was iffy to say the least. To put it another way Apple before the Intel transition was more likely to loose market share then gain it. Or more then likely it was in the .01% range per year.
Loosing Jobs would have probably tipped the scales further into the sliding market share. And contrary to popular belief market share DOES matter. Without it software and hardware manufacturers don't make wares for your platform. (Observe iPod vs. Zune as an example.)

So yah. While I approve of the market share growth I'm not happy what appears to be happening to apple's "culture". Its being dragged through the mud all in the name of growing numbers.

Ps- flame away.