Failure is good for business

Apple Inc the computer folk have posted some great earning results yesterday. Remember folks, we’re in a recession! It appears that most of the earnings is thanks to the iPhone which they introduced in 2007. So far 21 million iPhones have been sold.

What is even more amazing, considering how young the iPhone is, is that it is predicted that in just a few hours the one billionth iPhone app download will happen. Apple’s website has a counter on the front page creating some hype about it. You’ll miss seeing it in a few hours. Apple is so phenomenally able to hype about all sorts of things.

35 000 applications are available to download for your iPhone. That is some number. And by the looks of the speed of the counter, they are awfully popular. Do remember that many of these are free. So that can contribute to the popularity.

That all sounds like a huge amount of success, so where is the failure then?

Well, Apple has had a fair number of failures. But what has made me think of this was an article that was speculating whether Apple would venture into the Netbook market or whether they thought it would not be worth playing in that space.

Many years ago I was selling Apple computers. It was just part of my job of selling products during my time as a manger for a computer training centre. We had this hair brained idea that as we were already selling courses on Apple computer we might as well sell the machines. Not a good idea to slip away from ones core business. But one lives and learns.

One of the items for sale in those days was the Newton. Great little gadget. Precursor of the iPhone and a Netbook. Didn’t make it though as a product. Probably way ahead of its time although there seem a fair number still in use.

Apple learnt from it. Where they failed would have been addressed in the iPhone to make that a huge success. And if they ever do produce a Netbook, be assured the mistakes they made with the Newton would be incorporated.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the most successful companies are the ones who have made more mistakes than other companies. Of course it may be taken as read that you have to learn from those mistakes!

Don’t be afraid to make mistakes when you start your own business. Those are the greatest learning opportunities. Those are the times when you can really develop a solution for your clients that hits the spot.

Grab hold of them with both hands.

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