Learning Lessons from the Mac

In the struggle between Apple and Microsoft for the minds and hearts of computer users, clearly Microsoft has come out ahead. Despite its second-place finish in the operating-system race, however, Apple continues to fight and win key popularity battles on the secondary hardware and music fronts.

To its credit, Apple continues to defy certain "expert" predictions that it will fail, particularly with the company setting the industry standard for music downloads and portable music players. In addition, with analysts estimating that as many as 500,000 Windows users have switched to Mac under what observers call the "iPod halo effect," the reports of Apple's demise clearly have been overstated.

What lessons can we all learn from the company's success? According to technology experts, the differences between Apple and other manufacturers can be summed up in one phrase: Keep it simple and innovate.

Geek Factor

One major difference between Apple and Microsoft might be the type of person that each company perceives its users to be. "It's almost like Microsoft is designing for geeks and Apple is designing for real people," said Joe Wilcox, a senior analyst at Jupiter Research.

Wilcox said that, in terms of functionality, Microsoft's approach produces interfaces that are too complicated. You have to plug in something that launches a wizard, he explained. Then you have to go through several steps to get a device to complete a first-time configuration. "Whereas Apple's common-man approach is 'you plug it in and it works,'" said Wilcox.

"If you look at the iPod shuffle, at the start other manufacturers said stuff like 'there's no display, no FM radio,'" he said. "No, there isn't. But it is very simple, and in that simplicity it is very distinctive."

This approach to simplicity is evident in the design of Apple's stores as well as in the user interface for the latest version of the operating system, said Wilcox. In both the store and the OS, Apple has adopted a design principle that pushes for the very clean and the uncluttered.

By contrast, Microsoft's products continue to defy simplicity, Wilcox went on to say. For instance, he said, the color-filled often requires a lot of configuration and tinkering. And the upcoming Windows Vista, he said, will integrate more and more tools into the OS. But for the average user, he said, the bells and whistles will only serve to add more complexity.

New Ideas Sell

In terms of innovation, experts point not only to the iPod, but also to other Apple innovations, such as the search capability embedded in the latest version of the Mac operating system. Apple succeeds with these innovations, observers have said, because they generate excitement.

"Apple innovates faster than Microsoft," said Ted Schadler, vice president and principal analyst at Forrester Research. He pointed to two examples to illustrate his point: the iPod and the built-in search functionality of . He said Apple's most recent operating system is 18 months ahead of Microsoft's technology.

For average computer users, the company that satisfies wins the prize. In that regard, Apple wins the marketing battle in two very important areas, said Laura DiDio, an analyst and research fellow at the Yankee Group. What it comes down to is Apple being able to satisfy the consumer and turn out a top-notch product, said DiDio.

"Apple does a very good job satisfying the constituencies they do have," DiDio said. "They do that by being best of class."

She compared consumer satisfaction with Apple to that of people who had and refused to trade anything for it because it was the ultimate in reliability and uptime. Apple, in terms of graphics features, simplicity, ease of use, and ease of administration, is the best, she said. "User friendliness and the administration capabilities are the core of their success."

That "core" has been evident in Apple's design strategies from the company's earliest days, a saga that began in 1976 with the introduction of the Apple I, a computer that gave rise to the concept of personal computing. Twelve months later, Apple created a sensation with the Apple II, the first PC in a plastic case with color graphics.

Even then, Apple seemed to have a knack for making a good idea better. After one more generation of the Apple computer line, the company introduced a graphical user interface in a new computer line called the Macintosh. It was this and other innovations at the time that led Microsoft to develop its own graphical user interface as the fist installment of Windows.

Today, with several computer makers -- from IBM to Gateway to Dell -- taking cues from Apple's lead, clearly the technology world is learning a great deal from the Mac.

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