Analyzing Customer Satisfaction of Apple AirPods Using Exploratory Data Analysis and Classification Techniques (Part 1)

Introduction

Apple AirPods are wireless earphones manufactured by Apple. When the AirPods were first introduced in 2016, they were considered the highest level of satisfaction for a new product from Apple, with 98% of customers said they were very satisfied or satisfied with the product. In this analysis, I conducted a survey to explore customers’ satisfaction with AirPods in different aspects. The findings from 89 selected respondents in Durham, North Carolina, show that 97.7% of customers said they were completely satisfied, very satisfied, or satisfied with the products, which is relatively the same as the abovementioned research. Especially, the Design received the highest satisfaction level of the AirPods, with 94.4% of respondents said they were completely satisfied, very satisfied, or satisfied. Our analysis also recommends that Apple improve Battery life, Secure fit in-ear, Tapping functions, and Sound quality since they are the most important feature from the user’s point of view.

Photo by Alejandro Luengo on Unsplash

In Part 1, I will focus on the visualization stories behind the industry, Apple, and AirPods themselves before talking more about the satisfaction analysis in Part 2.

The US headphones market

The headphones market includes on-ear headphones, earbud headphones, and over-ear headphones. As of December 2020, under the impact of COVID-19, the US market’s size is $2,023bn with 145.34 million units. The US headphones market has a consistent growth in the last six years, with a CAGR of 4.5% before decreasing in 2020. However, it is projected to continue the growth in 2021 at a rate with the 5Y CAGR of 4.9%. Details on the US headphones market in value and units are in Figures 1 and 2 below.

Figure 1: US headphone market — by value ($m) — Image by Author

Figure 2: US headphone market — by million pieces — Image by Author

Wireless headphones have a market share of 14% among the total headphones market and are projected to have a faster growth with the 5Y CAGR of 20%. Among the wireless headphones, Apple is currently the market leader with a 60% market share, way ahead of the competition. The rest of the market is quite fragmented, with many other players. Major players include Jabra’s Elite Active 65t by Jabra, Samsung’s Gear by Samsung, Jlab’s Jbugds Air by Jlab. Market-share of the market is illustrated in Figure 3.

Figure 3: Market-share of wireless headphones — Image by Author

Headphones market is relatively interesting, with 53% of millennials owned at least 3 pairs of headphones, and 73% admitted that they used headphones to avoid interacting with others.

In catching up with the increasing trend in fitness tracking, headphones manufacturers are developing products equipped with fitness tracking and monitoring features. In 2018, Bose first introduced SoundSport Pulse, wireless headphones with a heart rate sensor to create a stable and comfortable fit that can track the consumers’ heart rates during the workout session.

Apple Inc.

Apple AirPods is a product of Apple, an American technology company headquartered in Cupertino, California. The company is considered one of the Big tech companies and ranks #4 in the Fortune 500 company as of December 2020. In 2018, Apple was the first company to reach a trillion-dollar market capitalization. 60% of the revenues of the company come from outside the US. The company offers a wide range of products: iPhone (accounts for 60% of the company’s total revenue; services such as App Store, iCloud, Apple Music, Apple Pay (accounts for 15% of total revenue) and hardware products such as iPad, Mac desktop and notebooks accounts for 10% of total revenue, the rest of the revenue comes from wearables (Apple Watch, AirPods) and other products (HomePod). Apple’s total revenue and income in the last five years are illustrated in Figures 4 and 5.

Figure 4: Apple’s revenue from 2015 to 2020 — Image by Author

Figure 5: Apple’s net income from 2005 to 2020 — Image by Author

I have identified Apple’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats as below:

Apple SWOT analysis — Image by Author

With a wide range of products, Apple has strong competition for each product line. To name a few, some of the major competitors for each product line is in the below table:

Apple Competition — Image by Author

Apple’s customers are relatively young and have medium to high income. Apple's customers' average household income is 99k, relatively higher than the average household income in the US.

US young consumers also show an interest in Apple products. When asked, 1 in 4 people in 18–34 age shows a strong interest in buying any Apple product at any point in the next six months.

The company also possesses a strong, loyal customer base: 54% of consumers who purchase an iPhone also have an iPhone as their last phone.

Apple consumers are strongly affected by their social relationships: 25% of customers purchased Apple products just because their friends had one.

Apple AirPods

The product was first launched in 2016 and became the second best-selling product within two years of launch. Unit sales of AirPods are illustrated in Figure 6.

Figure 6: Performance of Apply products after launch — Image by Author

A pair of AirPods costs from $109 to $199, a high-end price in the headphone market. Despite highly-priced, AirPods’ revenue increased 50% annually. In 2020, Apple forecasts to sell more than 82 million AirPods, a growth from 61 million units as of 2019. However, Apple is reportedly losing market share compared to other wireless earbuds brands from Samsung and Xiaomi (decreased from 50% to 35% of true wireless earphones market).

Besides playing audio, Apple AirPods feature a built-in microphone that can filter background noise, allowing users to take phone calls and talking to Siri. AirPods holds a charge of around 5 hours. The device is compatible with any device that supports Bluetooth 4.0, including Android devices. The latest Pro version offers additional high-end functions like water resistance and noise cancellation.

When being launched, the majority of AirPods customers were male. When we take a closer look, the data shows that males buyers are relatively younger than females. Buyers by generations by Gender are illustrated in Figure 7.

Figure 7: AirPods buyers after launch — by Gender by generation

AirPods’ high satisfaction from customers is demonstrated by the fact that there is only 1% of the customers who lost AirPods say they won’t replace the accessories. It is estimated that people spend more than $500m every year to replace the lost AirPods.

Despite being the wireless headphone segment’s market leader and preferred for ease of use, comfort, and portability, AirPods are not highly perceived for high sound quality.

In Part 2 of the analysis, I will provide more insights into customer satisfaction of AirPods product resulting from Classification and Machine Learning techniques with survey data.

Update: You can read Part 2 of this analysis here.