The battle for hearts and minds
Amid the mountain of products launched at Acer's big event earlier this week were a couple of announcements concerning Acer's overall strategy. The two key themes of this strategic overhaul were ‘the emotional purchase' and a ‘multibrand strategy'.
The emotional purchase angle seems to be an attempt to make itself a bit more Apple-like. Acer wants customers to make buying decisions based on desire and lifestyle choices rather than just viewing its products as commodities, to be assessed primarily on the basis of price versus spec.
Essentially this all adds up to a lot of rather vague marketing speak, but if you can sift through it a few telling details emerge. Take this passage from and Acer press release, for example:
"While the technical information is essential for rational consumers - such as the engineering of the product's performance and parts - for emotional consumer's values, history and experience are the plus points that distinguish the goods from other standardised and standardising ones."
Note the distinction between ‘rational' behavior and the ‘emotional' way Acer would like its customers to go about decision making. Acer appears to be trying to reverse the trend towards commoditisation that has made margins in the PC industry so small. The unacknowledged irony here is that Acer has been one of the companies most instrumental in perpetuating this trend with its aggressive pricing strategy.