Posted on 07/13/2002 8:16:19 AM PDT by Dallas
Those who surf the Web using a Mac tend to be better educated and make more money than their PC-using counterparts, according to a report from Nielsen/NetRatings.
The study also said Mac users tend to be more Web savvy, with more than half having been online for at least five years. And the Mac faithful are 58 percent more likely than the overall online population to build their own Web page and also slightly more likely to buy goods online, according to the report.
"With above-average household income and education levels, the Mac population presents a very attractive target for marketers, both online and offline," the research group said.
TS Kelly, director and principal analyst at NetRatings, said that his company decided to publish the study after noticing the differences between the demographics of Mac owners compared with overall PC owners. Kelly said Apple Computer is a client, but he said Apple did not commission the study nor was it made aware of the results prior to the report's publication.
Kelly said the greater affluence and education level of those who surf using a Mac is attributable in part to the company's comparatively pricier machines, as well as to their perception as a status symbol and their greater market share among those in the publishing and design industries.
"Any time you lower a price point you always see a broadening of the audience that is probable to buy it," Kelly said.
"Apple customers may be educated, but our customers are smart enough to have chosen Gateway, which offers the best value," said Brad Williams, a spokesman for the PC maker.
Apple has been aggressively targeting PC owners in its latest ad campaign.
Although Apple sales typically represent less than 5 percent of the overall U.S. personal computer market, 8.2 percent of Americans who surf the Web at home do so using a Mac, according to the study. Nearly all the rest of those who go online--89.4 percent--do so using a Windows-based PC.
Nielsen/NetRatings said that 70.2 percent of Mac users online have a college degree, compared with 54.2 percent of all Web surfers. That, combined with their longer surfing histories and their greater willingness to buy products via the Web, makes Mac consumers a prime catch for marketers, Kelly said.
"In many cases that is a market advertisers are looking at when they are promoting new products or upscale products," Kelly said.
A representative for PC maker Dell noted that it doesn't seem to be lacking for customers and that half of those customers buy their PCs over the Web--a sign that Windows users are also adept online.
The study notes that although there are clear benefits to marketing to Mac owners, it can be tough to target them specifically.
Once upon a time, marketers could target personal computer users as a whole to reach a more-educated, higher-income base, however the demographics of those with a personal computer have become more similar to the demographics of the overall population as personal computer penetration has grown. Kelly said advertisers can still reach upscale crowds in other ways, such as targeting those who have a broadband connection.
The fundamental point -- are they WISER than PC users? I think not... more arrogant perhaps...
Speaking of help. Send me freepmail when you are ready to make the plunge.
Did Steve Jobs and his successors at Apple try to compete on price, license the sale of their software on non-Apple machines, to compete with the PC? Of course not, or 90%+ of us would be using Macs now, instead of Windows. Gates is a businessman, Jobs and Co are greedy perfectionists. You can argue who of the two had the better plan, but there is little argument over who was the more successful. Steve Jobs said once, "Windows puts out really trashy stuff." Partly true, as all of us long time Windows users attest, but it was cheaper, ran more software, and adapted to networking and the internet much faster and better than Apple did. So much so, in fact, that now Billy is in trouble with the law. Plus, the fact that free LINUX alternatives, as far as the non-server, average user market, have not made significant inroads into Windows share of that pie, after years and tremedous efforts on the part of the "open source" community, and businesses within it, (Red Hat, Caldera, etc), to do so.
Like or hate BG, you have to admit that he did bring an operating system of value to the market, one that was very successful. 2-3 years ago I like many had thought, because of all the above, that some other alternative would have either carved out more of the market away from Windows, or had displaced Microsoft altogether. I've since learned that it will be quite some time, unless the government steps in to destroy MS, before someone makes inroads into their market share. As wily as BG and those aroung him are, if he doesn't make any gross errors in judgement, that lessening market share of Windows make take a long time to realize.....
(* donning flame-suit *)
What other reason could there be for a clearly superior product (c'mon folks be honest, it is) to take onle 5% of the market place?
I am aPC user, and software engineer so I work with ALL of them. MACs priced themsleves out of the PC market 15 years ago and has never caught up, and still hasn't the marketing brains to figure out what happened.
And NOW they think they are going to get more market with THIS bone-headed campaign...LOL
Deep down we all wish Micorosft and PC's worked as well as MACS did from the start, but hey- the price was always HALF of that of a MAC and we leanred to live with that to the tune of 95% market share...
I'll second that.
I use both as well, a desktop PC for gaming/surfing and a iBook for writing, which is what pays the bills. I love MS Word for Mac OS X. How's that for straddling the fence? I haven't tried Word for XP (which is the OS I have on the PC, it came with the friggin' "Works" suite which I'm not fond of). The last Windows Word I used was 2000 and I prefer this. I'll also say that the Mac OS boots up, shuts down, sleeps/wakes better and is easier on the battery than Windows. I get a good deal more battery time out of the iBook than my old Compaq.
My iBook has "locked up" on me only once, and all I had to do was force quit on Sherlock. Maybe I've been lucky, but I've never had to yank the battery to restart, something I had to do now and then with my previous PC laptops. I did bump up the RAM on my iBook when I bought it, not that that should make a difference.
People sure get passionate about this. Rather like the Ford/Chevy arguments my dad still gets into with his brothers. A computer is a tool. Find the right tool that lets you produce your best work, IMO. Saying that one group is smarter than the other is bunk.
Translation: More people buy at lower prices. I nominate this guy for the Nobel Prize in Economics.
Actually, Mac buyers are educated above their levels of competency, just like liberals in general.;^)
I don't know about tax programs. You might Google "linux" and "taxes". There is an excellent personal finance package called "GNUCash" that is extremely powerful and flexible.
The amount of shrink-wrapped isn't as small as some people believe, but you'll find that most programs for Linux are free or have free versions of them. I have no problem paying for software (unlike some linux zealots out there), but most of the time find it to be unnecessary or actually impossible.
One thing that I do reccommend is a product called "KRUD" which is a variant of the RedHat distribution. If you buy their subscription (i think it's $60), you get the entire distribution mailed to you every month with all security and software fixes for the thousands of programs it contains. Nore: I'm not affiliated with them in any way. I just am a satisfied customer.
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