Apple’s App Store messaging tries to put developers first

Apple’s most pressing messaging challenges have little to do with driving product sales. iPhones, iPads, Macs, accessories, and services revenues are all thriving. Apple faces a more complex communications landscape as it navigates societal and governmental challenges. Such are the side effects of growth and prosperity.

Apple is gearing up for a May court battle with Epic Games, Inc., the maker of the hit game Fortnight.

Apple removed Fortnite from the App Store after Epic tried to use its own in-app payment system to sidestep Apple’s 30% revenue cut. Epic’s position is that Apple’s policy of only allowing apps onto iPhones via the App Store is anti-competitive and drives up consumer costs.

In advance of the court case, Apple is placing its development partners at the forefront of its messaging to highlight the economic opportunities created by the App Store.

Apple’s core message strategy was evident in a recent virtual roundtable meeting with four Canadian developers, as reported in the Toronto Star:

[CEO Tim] Cook calls the company’s app ecosystem an “economic miracle,” saying that in 2020, “economic activity from the App Store around the world” totalled $500 billion (U.S.).

Cook positioned Apple as fighting for share in a highly competitive market:

There’s fierce competition everywhere,” Cook told the Star. He said there is a “street fight” for market share in the smartphone world, adding “Worldwide, our (market) share is in the teens. Hardly what anybody would say is dominant.”

Those are compelling numbers. But Apple’s messaging wobbles on the issue of allowing companies to use their own payment systems, and allowing customers to install apps via competitive app stores—sometimes referred to as “side loading:”

“At the heart of the Epic complaint is they’d like developers to each put in their own payment information. But that would make the App Store a flea market and you know the confidence level you have at the flea market,” Cook said.

Cook emphasizes user safety here, and he does have a point. But using analogies in comm strategies can be dicey. Sometimes less-than-perfect examples create logic leaks. And the drippings can fuel doubt in the reader.

The flea market analogy doesn’t quite land. People visiting a flea market understand they will need to barter, and that the merchandise can be suspect. Most people choose not to shop at flea markets for those reasons. They go to Target or Walmart instead. But flea markets aren’t banned. And Apple is saying it won’t allow customers a similar choice on the iPhone, for the user’s own good. That’s a problem for a global behemoth trying to keep developers and customers at the center of it story as it positions itself as having less market power than some believe.

Bonus observation: The Star’s story didn’t use a single quote from any developer at the roundtable, which I can assume Apple was hoping for. That’s the struggle of using a celebrity CEO in these situations; you’re more likely to get press, but the voices you most want heard can be drowned out by the star power of the CEO.