Apple customer sat rating leads India tech biz, survey says

Taking a selfie with iPhone

Apple’s long work nurturing the growing market for tech products in India is slowly generating results, a recent survey shows. Apple products now generate the most consumer satisfaction in the industry, closely followed by Samsung.

India unleashed

India is an interesting market. It is a dynamic and highly-educated nation with a range of unresolved dichotomies. Median salaries sit at around $400/month, which means half the population earn less.

It’s a market with a strong set of local tech brands (Realme in particular). One in which mainstream tech provender such as that from Apple or Samsung can be seen as aspirational. That means they must work harder – as they are.

Samsung has operated in the market for years, but following lengthy negotiation and big investment in India, Apple is also now a player and is growing market share.

Consider recent reports claiming record iPhone sales in the country, for example. The apply that in a context in which GfK India recently claimed online premium smartphone sales in India climbed to 43% this year.

Keeping the customer satisfied

But market share means very little without loyalty – and consumer satisfaction is a key pillar to building that. That’s where fresh insights from a local CMR India tech industry survey reveal some good news for Apple. It seems Apple users in India are the most satisfied (96%) with Samsung (94%) snipping at its heels.

Apple still has work to do, but is now the third most trusted brand in smartphones and IoT products with 49%. That’s just behind Samsung (51%) and India’s Realme, with 55%. The latter seems to be the one to beat in terms of awareness and brand pester appeal in India, with Xiaomi and Samsung also peer players in the tech brandscape.

Apple’s iPads have the second highest brand awareness in tablets, but the truth is that Apple has space to grow all its business in India, including in laptops, smart watches and earphones. One recent data point I’ve found suggest the company at present holds 4.4% of the local PC market, just behind Samsung (4.7%, driven by tablet sales to government), Dell (15.3%),vHP (21.6%) and Lenovo (25.2%).

Can Apple now translate its growing customer satisfaction rankings in India into the kind of word-of-mouth recommendation that is massively building its business in more established markets? I think it can.

The CMR Connected Consumer Survey covered 2,010 consumers

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