Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

They Got Me....

S

scott99

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Oct 30, 2007
714
51
Went to an Apple Store to try on an Apple Watch sport, space gray, black strap, 5 minutes later I'm ordering the watch.

Since the announcement a few months back, I've been saying, over and over, that I'm not getting the watch, it's overrated, I hate square watches, etc. And all it took was 5 minutes with the watch.

Apple got me again, $426 later, they got me. Damn you Apple, why do you make such great products and market them so well ? They can sell ice cubes to an Eskimo.
 
S'okay. Welcome to the club! :)

As I and many others have been saying, seeing this product is what really sells you on it. A lot of people that have claimed they don't want one are going to change their minds when they see it in action.
 
Similar story, but I was a little easier to reel in. After the initial September 9 unveiling, I didn't have much interest in it. After the Spring Forward event, tour videos, real-life pictures, and reviews, I had to have it before even trying one on!
 
It is not the sales staff. It is the product. A lot of the analysts say that once these first ones are in our hands and people see them the sales will seriously take off. The iPhone was similar at first. People thought I was crazy wanting internet on my phone. People saw it and had to have it.
 
KauaiBruce said:
It is not the sales staff. It is the product. A lot of the analysts say that once these first ones are in our hands and people see them the sales will seriously take off. The iPhone was similar at first. People thought I was crazy wanting internet on my phone. People saw it and had to have it.
Click to expand...

Yeah, the sales staff in the Apple Store didn't do any work to reel me in, just had to show me the watch.
 
siurpeeman said:
may i ask what it was that got you?
Click to expand...

Well, I'm a tech geek to begin with, so reading about it, seeing videos, also, in my mind I justified the $400 price tag because I know I will use it a lot. In fact, I wish I had it last night. I was texting someone about the watch after ordering it, and she kept texting me asking questions, after I had put my phone in my pocket, had to take it out 100 times, answering the text on my wrist would have been so much easier. So already, I know it will be very useful. Just a cool piece of tech. Don't need it, but the want kept growing about it after reading it and seeing it.

Same thing happened with the original iPhone. After seeing it, I thought, how stupid, who wants a virtual keyboard (I had a Palm Treo at the time). After investingating the iPhone, I became obsessed. A few months later, I had one. Have had the iPhone, iPhone 3G, iPhone 4, iPhone 5, and now the iPhone 6+.

----------
Bryan Bowler said:
Congrats! It's a cool feeling isn't it?
Click to expand...

Oh yeah.
 
scott99 said:
Went to an Apple Store to try on an Apple Watch sport, space gray, black strap, 5 minutes later I'm ordering the watch.

Since the announcement a few months back, I've been saying, over and over, that I'm not getting the watch, it's overrated, I hate square watches, etc. And all it took was 5 minutes with the watch.

Apple got me again, $426 later, they got me. Damn you Apple, why do you make such great products and market them so well ? They can sell ice cubes to an Eskimo.
Click to expand...

For enthusiasts with even the slightest interest, a well trained Apple specialist can sell a watch without the prospect even suspecting he or she is hearing a very well scripted dialog. Although many people say they had no intention of buying, yet they made a mindful deliberate decision to look at them. The emotions run high in an Apple store. Pre-sold beforehand, the chances of the prospect saying no is very low as Apple is proving.
 
They got me too... deep down I am pretty resigned to the fact that this thing is going to be barely useful. I'll either just have to reach into my pocket for my phone when I see the alert, or maybe sometimes it will save me a fractional amount of time, and thats it. Then after about 2 years of neurotically trying to avoid scratches (likely failing within the first week), I'll have to shell out another $600 for a new one.

But still. I'm bought one. And I can't wait to see the new models in 2 years when its time to upgrade.
 
Reminds me of when I was trying to convince my wife that I needed to get an iPad (1) for us to share. Took her to an Apple Store after she swore up and down that it was a waste of money. Thirty minutes later, we're leaving the store with two of them (she decided she needed her own).
 
KauaiBruce said:
It is not the sales staff. It is the product.
Click to expand...

Nah. The real secret is all that damn buffing. Lulls customers into a must-have-that trance. They tested a "no buffing" policy for 2 days in Des Moines and conversion rates tanked.

Jokes aside, staff only made my experience uncomfortably awkward. Zero help - aside from allowing me hands-on time with the product. Which I guess could be considered a form of "help." My Apple Store rep was so focussed on buffing, at one point I asked if he minded buffing my phone. The question threw him for a second. I smiled and said, "just kidding." But did compliment his smudge-free product. Nice work, sir. I'm sure management would be proud.

Seriously, very awkward experience. Very unApple. Unless there is a deliberate attempt at growing their target audience, the Apple audience is not the "buff my product" type. We do happen to be the "pre-order product and get it on launch day" type. Which I thought was well understood by the Apple machine. What happened?? :p
 
scott99 said:
Went to an Apple Store to try on an Apple Watch sport, space gray, black strap, 5 minutes later I'm ordering the watch.

Since the announcement a few months back, I've been saying, over and over, that I'm not getting the watch, it's overrated, I hate square watches, etc. And all it took was 5 minutes with the watch.

Apple got me again, $426 later, they got me. Damn you Apple, why do you make such great products and market them so well ? They can sell ice cubes to an Eskimo.
Click to expand...

So when will you get the Watch? August or September? :D
 
lazyrighteye said:
Nah. The real secret is all that damn buffing. Lulls customers into a must-have-that trance. They tested a "no buffing" policy for 2 days in Des Moines and conversion rates tanked.



Jokes aside, staff only made my experience uncomfortably awkward. Zero help - aside from allowing me hands-on time with the product. Which I guess could be considered a form of "help." My Apple Store rep was so focussed on buffing, at one point I asked if he minded buffing my phone. The question threw him for a second. I smiled and said, "just kidding." But did compliment his smudge-free product. Nice work, sir. I'm sure management would be proud.



Seriously, very awkward experience. Very unApple. Unless there is a deliberate attempt at growing their target audience, the Apple audience is not the "buff my product" type. We do happen to be the "pre-order product and get it on launch day" type. Which I thought was well understood by the Apple machine. What happened?? :p
Click to expand...


Yessss. This was very much my experience. I'm in and out of my local Apple Store a lot, and it wasn't until they talked me into a try-on that they turned into Creepy Apple Pod People. I wasn't even allowed to put the watch on myself or adjust the strap. And God forbid I moved so that my wrist wasn't perfectly centered over the cushioned pad. It was like that scene from Dune with the Gom Jabbar.
 
jrlepage said:
Reminds me of when I was trying to convince my wife that I needed to get an iPad (1) for us to share. Took her to an Apple Store after she swore up and down that it was a waste of money. Thirty minutes later, we're leaving the store with two of them (she decided she needed her own).
Click to expand...

That was a great launch, went in the Monday after release just to check them out and they had plenty of stock to purchase instore... Why can't it be like that anymore :rolleyes:
 
siurpeeman said:
may i ask what it was that got you?
Click to expand...

For me..it wasn't even so much the watch itself. I have a few classic watches that are timeless in design, and to me these will always trump any digital watch in terms of style, including the Watch. But it's the ecosystem with my iPhone and MacBook that sold me. Continuity is a beautiful thing....
 
It still doesn't get me. I played with one. Looked at them. Still doing nothing for me. Thats ok because if I come up with why and whats missing I can feed it back to apple :)
 
gwynne said:
Yessss. This was very much my experience. I'm in and out of my local Apple Store a lot, and it wasn't until they talked me into a try-on that they turned into Creepy Apple Pod People. I wasn't even allowed to put the watch on myself or adjust the strap. And God forbid I moved so that my wrist wasn't perfectly centered over the cushioned pad. It was like that scene from Dune with the Gom Jabbar.
Click to expand...

I guess it all depends on the store that you go to. My local store the guy was great...he did do the whole buffing thing, but it was before I put it on and as he put it away. He allowed me to swap bands to see different looks and so that I could get the "feel" of how easy it was to interchange them. Store was somewhat quiet so I spent a little over 20 minutes trying on every conceivable option. I dropped back in yesterday and the same guy was working and he asked if I wanted to take any other "models for a spin". He also remembered I was a Tottenham fan and asked if I had heard the MLS All Stars would be playing them in Colorado. Couldn't have been a better experience for me.
 
malone18 said:
I guess it all depends on the store that you go to. My local store the guy was great...he did do the whole buffing thing, but it was before I put it on and as he put it away. He allowed me to swap bands to see different looks and so that I could get the "feel" of how easy it was to interchange them. Store was somewhat quiet so I spent a little over 20 minutes trying on every conceivable option. I dropped back in yesterday and the same guy was working and he asked if I wanted to take any other "models for a spin". He also remembered I was a Tottenham fan and asked if I had heard the MLS All Stars would be playing them in Colorado. Couldn't have been a better experience for me.
Click to expand...

I should clarify that I really love my local store, and I saw some other reps during try-ons (on a previous day) who were allowing people to actually, you know, touch the watch attached to their wrist. I think I just got a drill-sergeant type who took the training very, very seriously.
 
mobidutch said:
For me..it wasn't even so much the watch itself. I have a few classic watches that are timeless in design, and to me these will always trump any digital watch in terms of style, including the Watch. But it's the ecosystem with my iPhone and MacBook that sold me. Continuity is a beautiful thing....
Click to expand...

I agree, it's really going to compliment my Iphone 6+. I think the things it can do right now are just the tip of the iceberg. And like all Apple products, they say it's trumping all smartwatches already (sales wise), and it hasn't even been technically released.

----------
malone18 said:
I guess it all depends on the store that you go to. My local store the guy was great...he did do the whole buffing thing, but it was before I put it on and as he put it away. He allowed me to swap bands to see different looks and so that I could get the "feel" of how easy it was to interchange them. Store was somewhat quiet so I spent a little over 20 minutes trying on every conceivable option. I dropped back in yesterday and the same guy was working and he asked if I wanted to take any other "models for a spin". He also remembered I was a Tottenham fan and asked if I had heard the MLS All Stars would be playing them in Colorado. Couldn't have been a better experience for me.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I went to the Apple Store on 14th street in Manhattan, and they were great. Extremely helpful, showed me everything, and they had me put the watch on myself, let me try different bands, even let me swap out a band myself. The guy knew his stuff too. And they did some very un-Apple stuff. When I took my Moto 360 off to try on the watch, one of the Apple workers said, "I really like your watch", even though it was the competition. Also, the guy showing me the watch, when I said the bands were ridiculously expensive, said "you know 3rd parties will be releasing watch bands too". So it was a great experience.

----------
matrix07 said:
So when will you get the Watch? August or September? :D
Click to expand...

It said shipping June when I ordered it.
 
jrlepage said:
Reminds me of when I was trying to convince my wife that I needed to get an iPad (1) for us to share. Took her to an Apple Store after she swore up and down that it was a waste of money. Thirty minutes later, we're leaving the store with two of them (she decided she needed her own).
Click to expand...

I know that feeling. When I met my, now, wife she had some cruddy Samsung non smart phone. Swore blind she would never be interested in anything Apple or "fancy" as she put it. Fast forward 6 years of living with me and she has an iPhone 6, an iPad mini and has already hinted she wouldn't mind an  Watch edition.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back