âMarketing is about valuesâ - Steve Jobs
For investors understanding how companies are run and how they sell is key and it can mean 
or 
.
There is this video from 1997 when Steve returned to 
, as it was running out of cash and, possibly, ideas. Between being ousted from and coming back to Apple, he started NeXTâwhich was acquired by Apple for its techâand invested in Pixar (now part of Disney).
Here he is wearing shorts and sharing some 
ideas:
âWhen you think of Nike you feel something different than a shoe company⌠They donât ever talk about the product⌠They honour great athletes and they honour great athletics.â
Both Nike an Apple sell commodities (and commoditised services).
But Nike has a market cap of over $100 billion and Apple - over $980 billion.
The Apples of this world sell commoditised products and services so well, they have very few real competitors.
Note that Steve refers to the audience, as people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world. Heâs not talking about customers as people who need a new machine that can calculate P&L.
H&M, Apple, Nike, LVMH, Amazon etc are good at connecting their products/services with basic human instincts. Prof Scott Gallowayâs slide from his TED talk captures this idea here:
There is an interesting book called Insanely Simple by Ken Segall. The chap worked with Steve on marketing and ad campaigns:
âA blueprint for running a company the Steve Jobs way ⌠should be required reading for anyone interested in management and marketingâ The Times
âPunchy ⌠Segall gets inside Appleâs branding and marketing to explain its directness and powerâ Financial Times
Ken Segall worked closely with Steve Jobs as ad agency creative director for NeXT and Apple. He was a member of the team that created Appleâs legendary âThink Differentâ campaign, and heâs responsible for that little âiâ thatâs a part of Appleâs most popular products. Segall has also served as creative director for IBM, Intel, Dell, and BMW.
