Amazon Kindle Fire vs Apple’s iPad 2: Fire to burn iPad off?
Note: For anybody who doesn’t think that the Amazon kindle Fire is a competitor to Apple’s iPad you are wrong. Read on to find out why.
It’s official. Amazon finally unveiled their Kindle Fire tablet on Wednesday, and I’ll bet you didn’t miss it (what with the media coverage being insanely vast). Upon its announcement though I instantly thought back to before the Kindle e-reader was released and how Amazon managed to wedge their place in to a market. With their original e-readers, Amazon managed to competely overtake and smoke the competition with thanks to one very simple rule – a good solid pricing strategy.
Consumers love affordable technology, and especially when it is good. So with the Amazon Kindle being Amazon’s best selling product, and with their proven results for entering markets, one has to question whether or not the Amazon Kindle Fire is going to sell better than Apple’s iPad.
If the price is right…
I for one love it when I can get some tech at a discount or with massive savings. One could also call me a bit of a hound when it comes to sniffing out voucher codes and the best prices for deals online, however one thing I can never find at a fair discount is an Apple iPad 2. Sure, you can get free cases with them with certain companies, but who ever said I wanted a case? I’d rather you smack off the £20 GBP, please.
This is one of the reasons the Kindle Fire will sell amazingly well. The price of the Amazon Kindle Fire is $199 (£126 using a currency converter) and that is one seriously tempting price tag considering the cheapest iPad 2 is £399, a whole £273 pounds more expensive.
I play apps too
One of the key reasons to Apple’s success within the tablet market has been their ability to sell a previous service, the app store, within the iPad. This is a fantastic feature, as Apple’s App Store is in my opinion the best of its type currently, but when you merge the price above with the fact that Angry Birds, Plants vs Zombies and numerous other good solid apps will be on the Amazon Kindle Fire you can’t argue with the fact that Amazon’s Kindle Fire offers some very competitive functionality, what with it also having access to the Android Market.
I’m much more portable
Alas, here comes the reason as to why many people will instantly assume the Kindle Fire isn’t a competitor to the iPad – display size. With two different products with two different display sizes come two perks for each product; one will be more portable, whilst the other will be better for media. The iPad 2 is almost certainly better for media with the screen real-estate it has (engadget states a 10-inch Kindle Fire is coming).
The Kindle Fire’s display is 7 inches of IPS gorgeousness, which allows it to be wholly portable and also gives it the ability to save battery life. The Kindle Fire, with the help of the 7 inch display, stands at 8 hours.
Amazon is slick at marketing
Apple isn’t the only consumer electronics company who has their marketing sussed you know. The Amazon Kindle 3 is Amazon’s best selling product ever, and with it being such an established brand with a clear identity within the e-reader market, the Kindle Fire will be automatically familiar with practically all consumers.
On the humor side, Amazon released a fair few television adverts in 2010 and early 2011 surrounding the Kindle 3, and how you can read it outdoors with clear hints at how you could not with the iPad. This type of marketing if employed by Amazon would be great. Note to Amazon: Create an advert surrounding two friends with one buying your tablet and one buying a different one. Then lead on to all the books you could buy with the left over money, or all the weekly shops you could do with £250 extra.
Some specifications
Conclusion
It’s hard to not think about what Amazon has done with the e-reader market, what with them literally owning it, and in many ways this brand awareness is similar to Apple’s. Sure, Apple’s products are more in demand due to a larger portfolio with the iPod, iPhone and iPad being key culprits, but the Kindle brand still hasn’t yet hit the place where it ought to be and their recent release of the Kindle Fire tablet could almost certainly mark a new era for Amazon, especially considering the Kindle is the premium of the e-reader market.
As stated, if the price is right people will buy it. Keen to wedge their place in to the tablet market, Amazon has almost certainly followed this strategy with the Kindle Fire and with it being over £250 cheaper than an iPad and offering the majority of its functionality, would anybody in their right mind argue against the growth of Amazon’s Kindle Fire?
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