OK, more technology-savvy heads than mine will be writing about the Apple launch now confirmed as happening on 9 September. It's almost certain to be an iPhone, probably called the iPhone 6 or something equally imaginative, and you can Google for speculation about what's going to be included as much as you wish - there's nothing official confirmed as yet.
But there's a lot that can be learned by other entrepreneurs from Apple's approach. I mean, it's a phone company making a phone, right? There is no longer anything revolutionary in this (unless the much-predicted iWatch is finally launched. I've given up waiting for the Apple TV, and yes I know there's a product of the same name but I mean an actual television with all the bits built in).
Anatomy of an Apple launch
Let's have a look at how the company makes a completely unsurprising launch look like something utterly revolutionary and exciting. There are a number of elements.
Track record: Apple has successfully built the expectation that its launches will be cool events somehow. It wasn't always thus; when it invented the PDA with a device called the Newton, it wasn't so much that nobody noticed but it didn't take the market by storm. Whatever people's opinion of the late Steve Jobs, he set the pace for corporate presentations.
Cool appearance: Granted, you don't want a near-50-year-old like me telling you what's cool. Nonetheless, making a product look like something you'd like to own has been part of Apple's schtick for a while now. All credit to Jony Ive for that. Apple did not make the first music phone, the first camera phone, the first smartphone - all those things were already in place. It made the first one the kids wanted to be seen with and that enthusiasm spread like wildfire.
Critics: People criticise the Apple and Android (and in the old days Apple v PC) brigade as unconstructive: not if you're Apple or one of the Android manufacturers and can see sales going up just because people want to support you by being in your gang, they're not.
Build-up: An attractive invitation, a huge build-up, it's no wonder Apple gets to be popular - Tim Cook may not have all the charisma of Steve Jobs but he does the job well enough on the day. However, by the time 'on the day' comes round Apple's marketing has seen to it that the world is crazy for these new phones already. The fact that they may be half-decent in the end is almost an irrelevance. Remember the 'death grip' on the iPhone 4 so if you held it 'wrongly' you couldn't make a call? It still sold...
It's a fine piece of marketing. Some would argue it's style over substance but building the anticipation is what marketing people are supposed to do. It takes a lot of ingredients but there is a lot to learn from Apple's launches, no matter what you do or in what business.
If the company wanted to surprise people they could just not launch a phone on the 9th - and see whether the enthusiasts really cared. My guess is they'd still get some plaudits somewhere.
