China is increasingly important for Apple. In this third quarter of 2015, Apple sold 47.53 million sets of iPhone; iPhone brought US$31.4 billion revenue for Apple, more than 60% of total revenue. Apple needs to understand the real preferences of Chinese consumers to clearly get how to sell more iPhones.
On Sep 9 2015, Apple announced iPhones 6s; on Sep 12, iPhone 6s begin to accept pre-orders in China; and on Sep 25, iPhone 6s is available in China. As of Sep 30 2015, iPhone 6s sales reached 13 million according to Apple; and China market accounts for 30%.
Tencent conducted a research which reveals some insights on iPhone 6s purchase intentions in China. About 60% users will not buy the old iPhones even if the price was reduced after the new model is released. Only 19.3% respondents will buy old models.
Women are more fond of the new and tired of the old. Up to 60.9% of women will not buy old fashioned iPhone in China.
About 38.5% of informants are certain to buy iPhone 6s in the future, and 32.2% are staying on the sidelines; however, these may be the future backbone of Apple’s long development.
Over 40% of women indicate that they will buy iPhone 6s while men determine to buy only 36.1%.
Two major factors for not buying iPhone 6s are “no need for changing new sets” (30.0%) and “lack of money” (28.9%). The primary reason that women do not buy is lack of money, and the primary reason for men is that no replacement demand for new sets.
Large storage version of 64G handsets are attracting more iPhone fans in China. As high as 71.7% respondents choose 64G if they buy iPhones 6s in the future. Only 18.5% hope to buy storage version of 16G.
Men are less tolerable at low storage capacity. Only 16.7% men may buy 16G version while women 20.5%.
Apple buyers in China tend to have more consciousness towards legitimate and original handsets. 68.2% will buy in Apple official website and retail stores, 10.4% in business hall of smartphones. More women buy iPhone 6s in Apple official site and retail stores compared with men.
Also read: China Smartphone Shipments 2015: Only 1.2% Growth