Olympus is doing a great branding job.

ahaslett wrote:

bobn2 wrote:

ahaslett wrote:

gary0319 wrote:

ahaslett wrote:

I like Olympus products too, but:

1) Sneering at other OEMs, in this case Panasonic, doesn't sit well with me

2) Branding is much more than product naming

3) The mirrorless market is very turbulent at the moment, so it's no good resting on historic product lines

4) The "small, cheap and innovative" box is held by phone cameras at present

So, what in your view does the Olympus brand tell me about what an Olympus camera is and can do that is different from the 6 other mirrorless brands and 4 mounts? Please don't bash the others again.

In my view, they have an excellent reputation for firmware updates; they have a build quality problem, maybe solved; they have excellent after sales service in Europe; MFT OEMs have a good range of reasonably affordable lenses; Olympus are working on innovative capture and processing of RAWs, but keeping processing in camera is always going to add cost and weight; they are slipping for the most demanding landscape shots but weight and weather sealing are good. I happen to like Olympus ergonomics and design choices.

It's not clear who their target market segments are - well-off hobbyists, Pro sports shooters, hikers and holiday-makers?

I seem to remember that in a recent financial report Olympus stated that the Imaging Division (cameras), going forward, would concentrate on "High Margin, Specialty " market segments. This was the before the announcement of the E-M1X, which seems to fit that stated target market.

I note that a lot of Sony FF owners see MFT as an excellent second camera, maybe the new EM1.2 firmware will address the perception of an AF gap.

Andrew

High margin specialty means low volumes, exquisite segment targeting and a platform approach to technology. Branding is important to both margins and product communication.

I think you reversed the causality somewhat there. Making money with low volumes means high margins. It's also possible to have high margins with high volumes, Apple being a case in point. In the camera industry, Canon being another. It's quite interesting how their accounts reliably show them achieving higher margins than the competition, possibly due to the other factors that you mention.

I agree - wasn't implying causality. Sustaining high margins at high volumes is an interesting trick as to the different ways it can be done.

You can have high overall volumes if you can efficiently target and serve a large number of segments. Described by the CMO of Unilever as the "segment of 1" approach, although I'd say that's hyperbole. I've looked at custom, short-order paint manufacture.

Arguably with Apple, the segments are about content and the platforms are the hardware and system software. No idea about Canon.

Andrew

Apologies for misunderstanding. It seems to me the high volume, high margin trick has to do with the 'designer' illusion, the epitome of brand engineering. I customers in large volumes can be convinced to buy your product solely for the brand, despite the fact that there are competitive and cheaper products of equal functionality, then you've mastered it. The real question is for how long it is sustainable. It's all about the intangibles that the fans interpret as 'better'. In fact, Olympus is very good indeed at this. If you look at the discussions on this forum, where a certain group of people will swear blind that when it comes to image stabilisation/weather proofing/optical quality/innovation/build quality/etc Olympus is simply 'the best' without any really hard evidence to back that up, and you see how effective they are. Their problem is not having been able to convince as many people as Apple (or for that matter, Canon) did. But, in the lower volume, high margin segments, that capability could serve Olympus well.