Apple just released its new versions of iPhone – as known as iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus. It should be an exciting moment for all the Apple fans to upgrade their iPhones! However, this time, a controversial issue seems to become bigger and bigger that iPhone 6 Plus is easy to bend?! On Wednesday, owners of iPhone 6 Plus took to social media to complain that iPhone 6 Plus unexpectedly bent when they put their phones in their pockets. Afterwards, the mass show an extremely high attention on this topic, especially on social media level. Not only the regular audience, who may the current users of iPhone 6 Plus or potential buyers of the phone show their concerns on the iPhone 6 Plus bendgate issue, but also many competitors of Apple and popular websites try to make fun of the product in a very sarcastic way on social media. Personally, I found the most interesting case is how 9GAG, which is a famous social media website, reacts to the issue. Going to 9GAG Facebook page, since this Wednesday, which is 24th of September, there have been around 10 posts regarding to this bendgate issue. In 2 days, half of the 9GAG posts are related with the iPhone 6 Plus bendgate issue. Moreover, LG, Nokia and Samsung are also involved in the topic discussions. LG even posts a picture to respond the issue in a very funny way.
Afterwards, I am very curious about how Apple reacts to such an issue after reviewing so many anti-voices. Therefore, I went to Apple’s official page to check it out. Surprisingly, the website does not have any official declarations on the page. The only place you can find out the issue is under the SUPPORT column that some users made a post in the community and anyone can contribute to the answers. However, it is really hard to find a very authentic answer responding to the topic. Apart from Apple Website, there are actually quite a lot of blogs talking about the issue. They quoted some statements from Apple’s official responses, while those ‘statements’ also come from other blogs’ contents. So it is a bit weird for me that Apple hasn’t offer any official statements from its own channel yet. Also as everyone knows that Apple does not really own any official social media channels. It is maybe a tricky part for Apple to deal with this situation. In the most blogs, the opinions on the iPhone 6 Plus bendgate issue are not very positive. Regarding from the blog post of Forbes recently, the title of the article is ‘Apple responds to the iPhone 6 bendgate but questions remains’. The other blog post from 9to5Mac even indicates that 30% of readers are concerned about this bendgate issue based on their own poll results.
I think Apple really needs to come up with good social media strategies to subside the issue, but on the other hand, what would you do if you are market risk manager of Apple?
In the end, I want to share some heated posts on 9GAG with you. 😀
Reference：
http://www.forbes.com/sites/ewanspence/2014/09/25/apple-does-not-say-sorry-over-bendgate/
http://online.wsj.com/articles/apple-defends-against-complaints-of-bending-iphones-1411668618
http://www.zdnet.com/apple-to-replace-bent-iphone-6-plus-models-7000034040/
Apple responds to iPhone 6 Bendgate controversy, says only 9 customers have complained
https://twitter.com/CNBCtech
http://www.cnbc.com/id/102034087
Apple says some bent iPhone 6/Plus phones will be replaced under warranty
This will be a tough one for Apple, as they don’t have a very active social media strategy at this point. However, I find it interesting to see how competitors use this so called ‘Bendgate’. There are a lot of pictures on the internet, making fun of the new iPhones. These are made by creative people on the internet. However, I also saw some official advertisements of big companies, like LG and even Heineken (which is, obviously, not a competitor of Apple), using the bendgate to make fun of Apple. For instance:
https://www.facebook.com/heineken/photos/a.218011977354.135140.7174672354/10155274696032355/?type=1&theater
http://9gag.com/gag/a9MpnGW (a collection of some companies using the bendgate on social media)
In my opinion this bendgate is used very cleverly by those companies, and social media is the perfect place to use these kind of advertisements. As these pictures go viral on the internet, it’s getting harder for Apple to solve this problem. As for a social media strategy, I don’t think that would help Apple a lot, they just need to admit their mistake and try to help those who bought the 6 plus. I think they should alter the design of the iPhone 6 plus and replace the fragile ones.
for those who read Dutch: http://www.nu.nl/gadgets/3888834/consumentenbond-vs-vindt-ophef-verbogen-iphones-overtrokken.html
The iPhone doesn’t bend that easily, this test shows that the iPhone 6 plus is even stronger than the iPhone 6. The 6 bends at a force of 31kg, the 6 plus at 40kg. This means that your phone won’t bend if you use it normally.