Yankee Group’s Howe sets the record straight on Apple iPhone and Android devices

Carl Howe reports for The Yankee Group, “A number of reports over the weekend surfaced referencing a statistic from my latest report, “Why iPhones Matter“. An article in CNN Money was the first to start this meme, stating in his article that: ‘The iPhone is also the gift that keeps on giving: 77% of iPhone owners say they’ll buy another iPhone, compared to 20% of Android customers who say they’ll buy another Android phone.'”

“Now that would be an extraordinary statistic if it were true,” Howe reports. “Unfortunately, it isn’t.”

The following excerpt from the report correctly describes the data we collected:
• iPhone owners intend to stick with Apple. Unsurprisingly, not only do 88 percent of iPhone owners intend to buy another smartphone, but 77 percent of iPhone owners intend to buy another Apple phone.
• Significant numbers of non-iPhone owners intend to buy iPhones. A third of smartphone owners of all types who intend to buy a smartphone intend to buy an iPhone. In fact, Apple is the most popular choice for a future smartphone among all mobile phone owners.
• No other manufacturer can claim nearly the loyalty of iPhone owners. RIM BlackBerry owners see a touch-screen device as the antithesis of their hard keyboards. However, even in this category, 23 percent of respondents plan to buy an Apple iPhone. We see similar results with all other mobile phone owners. In fact, 36 percent of Google-branded Android phone owners say they plan to buy an iPhone, surpassing the 32 percent of Google-branded phone owners who intend to buy another Android phone.

Howe writes, “This is no knock on CNN Money; it’s hard to condense 3,500 words statistically describing iPhone owners and their behaviors into a paragraph. However, given how much play the statistic is getting, it seems like a good idea to set the record straight.”

Full article here.