Stefan Mileschin

Cargo cult less of a hotbed of loyalty

The days of Apple depending on Android users to defect while maintaining its own loyal fanbase are over, according to a new survey.

Consumer Intelligence Research Partners (CIRP) have been asking around and discovered that Android users are more more loyal to their brand than Apple these days. The research firm found that Android brand loyalty has been remaining steadily high since early 2016, and remains at the highest levels ever seen.

Android has a 91 percent loyalty rate, compared with 86 percent for iOS. The figure is measured as the percentage of US customers who stayed with their operating system when they upgraded their phone in 2017.

From January 2016 through December 2017, Android loyalty ranged from 89 to 91 percent (ending at 91 percent), while iOS loyalty was several percentage points lower, ranging from 85 to 88 percent.

Mike Levin, partner and co-founder of CIRP said that most users have settled on their brand of choice and are not going to change.

“With only two mobile operating systems at this point, it appears users now pick one, learn it, invest in apps and storage, and stick with it."

What this means is that Apple and Google should not be really wasting time fighting each other and should just figure out how to sell products and services to these loyal customer bases.

Android users, the higher brand loyalty could be chalked up to their ability to switch to different styles of new phones, without having to leave Android — thanks to its distribution across a variety of manufacturers’ handsets. That gives users the freedom to try out new experiences, without giving up their investments in purchased apps, or the time they’ve spent learning their way around Android, for that matter.

This is a change from 2013 when iPhone owners were found to be more loyal than Android users. But that shifted the following year, and Android has risen ever since.

https://fudzilla.com/news/mobile/457...-apple-fanboys