Mobilized Marketing: How to Drive Sales, Engagement, and Loyalty Through Mobile Devices

Chapter 28

Innovation

Emergence of Multiscreen Marketing

The Introduction of Tablets

For a company that oozes innovation, Apple was behaving fairly generically when it came to its marketing messaging surrounding the introduction of the iPad in January 2010.

“Magical & Revolutionary Device at an Unbelievable Price” read the subhead on the press release.

Given that it was distributed during the month of the enormous and noisy International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada, there were surely thousands of press releases that were making a similar claim.

But Apple may have been the only one that delivered.

Years after Apple chief executive officer (CEO) Steve Jobs dismissed the idea of bringing a tablet to market, Apple launched the device with what it called a “responsive high-resolution Multi-Touch™ display” that allowed users to physically interact with applications and content. The iPad was just 0.5-inch thick and weighed just 1.5 pounds—thinner and lighter than any laptop or netbook.

Connectivity was made possible through Wi-Fi or via a mobile operator’s network. Every application, with the total nearly 140,000, worked in portrait and landscape, reacting to the movement of the user.

The price was $499.

“iPad creates and defines an entirely new category of devices that will connect users with their apps [applications] and content in a much more intimate, intuitive, and fun way than ever before,” Jobs said.

What quickly became clear was that young, old, and everywhere ...