iPod Touch: Apple’s Secret Weapon to Foster Loyalty?

While everyone is busy discussing whether the recently joined Motorola Droid can wear iPhone down, another Apple’s gadget, iPod Touch, is slowly building up a younger but loyal consumer base for Apple, according to mobile application analysis firm Flurry.

As the firm pointed out, 24 million of the 58 million iPhone OS-based devices sold worldwide as of September 2009 were iPod Touches, which made up over 40 percent of all. Meanwhile, Flurry’s study reveals that iPod Touch’s market share of mobile device sessions by users has grown from 31 percent to 35 percent in the last six months. Its gain in share partly compensates iPhone’s drop from 57 to 50 percent and offset Android‘s increase from 10 to 14 percent.

According to Flurry, these findings imply that the portable media player is quietly building a loyal base among teens and pre-teens, who represent the next generation of iPhone users. These iPod Touch young users soon will become familiar with the iPhone OS user interface, iTunes and the App Store. As a result, they are likely to buy an iPhone as an iPod Touch replacement some years later.

"This translates into loyalty and switching costs, allowing Apple to seamlessly ‘graduate’ young users from the iPod Touch to the iPhone. For OEMs hoping to challenge Apple, we believe an even greater sense of urgency must be adopted," Flurry notes.

In addition, Apple also outpaces its competitors in social networking and gaming, categories that are driven by the youth demographic. Although Google’s Android platform is gaining momentum in the mobile industry, it does not appeal in these fields like the iPhone and iPod Touch do.

While the overall sales of iPod products slightly declined, those of iPod Touch showed a growth instead. Enhanced with the new 64GB iPod Touch released in September, this small but powerful asset of the company is set to continue to provide long-term strategic value to its smartphone sibling throughout the coming year.

Tags: iPhone Accessories, Apple iPhone 3G S Accessories, MP3 / Apple Ipod Accessory, Apple iPod touch (3rd generation) Accessories - 32GB, 64GB, Motorola DROID (A855) Accessories, Motorola Accessories