Apple iPhone sales in India increase by 400 percent: Report

In the past couple of months, Apple has stepped up its marketing initiatives in India and it seems that Cupertino's strategy is now paying off.
As per a report by Apple Insider, the sales of Apple iPhone in India have shot up by a whopping 400 percent. This is thanks lately to the schemes launched recently.

Apple along with its Indian distribution partners had launched cash back schemes that enabled users to exchange their existing smartphone for a new iPhone 4. Furthermore, it had also introduced monthly installment schemes that made it easy for the common man to purchase Apple iPhone.

Apple Insider is quoting analyst Sunil Tirumalai, who states that prior to launching these scheme, Apple was selling 70,000 to 80,000 units per month. Tirumalai says the benefit of the new initiatives is clear, "The 4-9 percent implicit discount coupled with the option of easy EMIs spread over 6-12 months became popular. Within a few months, our discussions with handset retailers indicated that iPhone sales went up 3-4x, forcing companies to respond."

In the month of April, Apple had introduced the cash back scheme for its iPhone 4. Under this scheme consumers had to bring in their old smartphone and could take home a brand new iPhone 4 at a minimum discount of Rs. 7,000. As per the conditions of the scheme, Rs. 5,000 was the cash back discount given and the additional Rs. 2,000 was the minimum resale value pegged for the old smartphone.

If the consumers tried to exchange a smartphone, whose resale value was more than Rs. 2,000 then the effective cash back to them was Rs. 5,000 plus the value the resale of the phone. Initially, the scheme was launched for just 15 days. However, given the popularity the scheme was extended till May. Even now, Apple is running a scheme, where in students are eligible for Rs. 7,777 discount on purchase of Apple iPhone 4. Apart from this, the American Express card holders can get an additional 10 percent on purchasing this smartphone.

With the success of these schemes, one can hope that Apple along with Redington and Ingram Micro will look at introducing more innovative schemes for its existing line-ups, in a bid to up sales of Apple products even further.