How Dr. Dre's Beats Became The Most Popular Headphones

Everyone loves a business success story, they make us feel good and provide inspiration to keep going with our own business endeavors.

Beats is a company that was able to rise to excellent success, and it’s important to take note of the things that led them to achieve it. Noting how others obtain their successes can lead to superb pointers for your own company.

So here is how Beats came to be one of the best and most well-known brands in the world, and one of the most popular headphone brands that people buy.

Finding a niche – especially one that's willing to spend more for perceived quality

Dr Dre noted that Apple was selling £600 iPhones with cheap headphones that were low durability and had considerably poor quality. He found it to be a shame that people could not listen to his work, and the work of others, in the quality that was intended.

So he decided to create a pair of headphones that could be used with the iPhone to give a better quality of sound. There was a gap in the market and he had a plan to fill it.

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Ignore the Critics – be willing to be different and charge more for it

From the start Beats faced a great deal of criticism. The headphones were not tuned like regular ones, they were made to make the sound more dramatic and to recreate the excitement when in the studio recording.

Not only this, but the price was far higher than the cheap earbuds provided by places like Apple. In their words, “bad audio is free”. Your clients will pay for something if they think it is worth it.

Talk to your customers – Use focus groups to find out what they want, and give it to them

You need prototypes and people to come and test them. When people come and use your product (just as they did with Beats headphones) they will be able to give you feedback and talk to you about the areas you can make improvements on.

You get a lot of excellent and constructive criticism to help you improve your product before you go on to release it. Plus, you get to learn more about what the consumer is looking for you,and you can try to incorporate that into it.

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Endorsements and Advertising – Beats gave away free headphones to athletes at the Olympics to get tonnes of exposure

At the 2012 Olympics, Beats did some clever guerrilla marketing – they gave away headphones to top athletes,who'd listen to music to prepare themselves before their events. This gave them almost-free exposure at one of the most televised events in human history.

Since then they've had artists like Lil' Wayne use them. And yes, those are diamond-encrusted headphones that cost $1,000,000:

Do everything you can to get some kind of celebrity endorsement or one from another company that relates to your product. You can also work cooperatively with other companies to create ad campaigns that will help to boost your sales.

Effectively, never be afraid to ride on the shoulders of giants. The boost they give you can mean everything, it can be the difference between a huge success and a rocky start. Never be afraid to ask for endorsements and cooperation.

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To Conclude

Any product has the potential to rise from the ground and become an international success. Beats headphones are an excellent example of this. What's critical is the quality of your idea, and the desire you have to work on it and expand it into something that appeals to people.

Make sure you have your focus groups to test your products, always take constructive criticism on board, and do your best to get as many endorsements and cooperative agreements as you can. With enough faith and hard work you’ll be off the ground in no time.

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