Consultant Picks on Apple. Real News Asks, Why?

April 26, 2012

Short honk. Navigate to “Why has Forrester’s CEO Become an Apple Doomsayer?” A real journalistic operation asks this question. I was surprised. Here’s the key passage in the write up:

Colony, to a great extent, is following the classic formula of the provocateur:

Find a hook: Apple just had one heck of a quarter: the company blew past estimates on both earnings and how many iPhones it sold, while breaking other quarterly records in iPad and Mac sales.

Find something contrarian to say: Sure, things look good, but the fun times won’t last. He even puts a time frame on it.

Add a touch of obviousness: Everyone knows it’s a risk that Jobs no longer runs Apple. That’s hardly something people don’t know. The obviousness gives it credibility. Can you say that concern hasn’t crossed your mind?

Add some context: Hey folks, bad things happen when the founder leaves a tech company. Look at Apple when Jobs left the first time around. Microsoft hasn’t been the same since Bill Gates stepped down. Hewlett and Packard. The list goes on. Other than Intel, it takes some time to think of a big tech company that continued to thrive after the founder or founders left.

Actually, this is a lot of words. The reasons are incorrect.

When a consulting firm makes any type of controversial statement, several thoughts go through my mind.

Apple rejected a Forrester pitch to buy consulting services. Ouch.
The controversial statement is designed to sell the firm’s services. After all, coming off a pretty good quarter—although not as lucrative as some of the azure chip outfits’ earnings I surmise—the radical statement suggests that the former English teachers and graphics arts professionals have hot, new information.
Publicity.

I am delighted that “real” journalists have a formula for consulting services marketing. The capability may come in handy when another budget cut slashes through the erudite ranks.

Stephen E Arnold, April 26, 2012

Comments

One Response to “Consultant Picks on Apple. Real News Asks, Why?”

Gabriel Gheorghiu on April 26th, 2012 4:59 pm

Funny, the one thing that does not go through your mind when this happens is that they might be right…

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Stephen E. Arnold monitors search, content processing, text mining and related topics from his high-tech nerve center in rural Kentucky. He tries to winnow the goose feathers from the giblets. He works with colleagues worldwide to make this Web log useful to those who want to go "beyond search". Contact him at sa [at] arnoldit.com. His Web site with additional information about search is arnoldit.com.