1. Introduction
Nothing known as one of the most hyped smartphone brands of 2022 and most talked gadget of
the year. started by the One Plus Co-Founder Carl Pei. Company was founded in 2020. It is a
London based tech company and their mission is to remove barriers between people and
technology. As of now company has two product categories
1. Nothing ear (1)
2. Nothing Phone (1)
2. Executive Summary
This brand is known for their products as well as the hype they have created before, during and
after their product launch. This is all possible with Carl Pei, the company's founder has generated
hype for the brand by copying a strategy he devised for OnePlus. As he used the strategy for
oneplus by solving a problem of providing flagship grade smartphones in a mid range price
segment, As of now he is doing the same by solving the one more Industry problem.
Nothing claims that a lack of reinvention and a lack of innovation by brands has made consumer
tech boring. And the majority of people appear to agree. There isn't much happening in the
smartphone industry right now but modest increments, aside from foldable devices. The founder
of company had given a example of apple that they are so big and so successful there's
opportunity for someone else to come in because when they're so big they have to cater to
everybody so then you cannot be special to anybody so if another company is willing to focus on
a smaller group of consumers but serve them even better to fill the gaps available in the market.
As of now they are focusing to fill the gaps in the market by providing Innovative, aesthetic and
Flagship mid range smartphones.
References
● Nothing website
● Wikipedia
● Blog by MUO
● Nothing’s Carl Pei Wants to Start a Smartphone Revolution (Again) by WIRED
● In-house teams: how Nothing is hoping to build an ecosystem to rival Apple by design
WEEK
● The Ranveer Show Interviewing 'Nothing' Founder Carl Pei
Company background and operating environment
3. Nothing was set up by 32 year-old Swedish entrepreneur Carl Pei, who previously co-founded
Chinese smartphone giant OnePlus. Carl Pei who is known for his outstanding marketing and
execution strategies while he is in One Plus. Nothing raised their $7m in seed financing from
friends and investors who share their mission, including iPod inventor Tony Fadell, Twitch co-
founder Kevin Lin, Reddit CEO Steve Huffman, and YouTuber Casey Neistat. In 2021 the
company raised $15 million in their series A funding by GV. Company unveiled Teenage
Engineering as a founding partner of Nothing to produce the design aesthetic of the brand and its
products, with Tom and Jesper being the visionaries behind their product designs. In January,
Adam Bates joined as a Nothing’s design director in the London office to build the design team.
Prior to this, Bates worked for Dyson for 14 years.
The Nothing Ear 1, named as the "ear (1)", is their first product. Revealed on 27 July 2021, it is a
set of wireless earbuds with absolutely amazing features. Ear (1) black edition was launched to
show that the company is accepting cryptocurrency payment and this became their first step into
integrating Web3 in the future ecosystem. After the launch of its first product, the company
received overwhelming response from the users and their fanbase with features like Customize
equalizer, gestures, Find My Earbud etc. Nothing Ear (1) is officially carbon neutral and this is just
a starting journey to becoming a carbon neutral company. Nothing announced its first smartphone
named the Phone (1) on 23 March 2022. It includes all the flagship features like wireless charging,
lightweight and aesthetically beautiful along with the Glyph Interface.
Pei says One principle they have for designing products is that somebody should be able to see
the product for two seconds and then close their eyes and be able to sketch a very iconic part of
it and they want to create the most compelling alternative to Apple, when apple started they hired
lot of creatives from different fields due to that they can able to get more people attracted towards
their brand, because they were the culture makers, the writers, artists, and people who created
culture. But now apple is so giant and mainstream, there is no brand catering to those early
adopters anymore so that's the gap which is filled by Nothing. Nothing has their own way of
designing their products and their designs follow a function and design is aesthetically beautiful.
Pei says today’s industry is very boring and sleepy. Here we are with something brand-new, ready
to shake things up. A startup like Nothing can be the solution, in an industry that has felled giants
like HTC and LG, And it is no doubt fueled by the success he had at OnePlus by using the same
strategies used to create excitement in the markets about the brand. Nothing has three teams
across the globe, with headquarters in London, Shenzhen (China) and Stockholm (Sweden)
where it shares a studio with Teenage Engineering.
4. Segmentation,Targeting and Positioning
These three terms are are base of any marketing strategy this includes the segmentation and
develop strategies according to those segments, In targeting we need to customize that product
for a specific set of people and in positioning it is shown how these products positioned in the
market to reach their target audience efficiently.
Segmentation: In terms of segmentation the company has the segment of audience who
is into some tech or aesthetics and want to try something new. They had divided market into two
segments
1. Who is purchasing products because it's unique and something new in industry.
2. The ones who are looking for the best product in a mid range price segment.
These are the two types of behaviors and based on this company has decided their strategies.
Targeting: The company is targeting the potential audience who are looking for the best
option available in the market in a mid range segment and the one who are bored from the usual
designs and technologies by providing something different. The major market share is of youth in
terms of targeting. After youth there are tech geeks who are looking at some unusual and brilliant
things in the industry and after them there are some great range of professional audience who
can use these devices because of its elegant design which represents a sense of simplicity and
creativity to its users.
Positioning: The brand has positioned itself as the best mid segment phone and other
products too available in the market which includes some great specifications and outstanding
designs also the Nothing phone is known as the alternative to iphone or a modern day iphone
due to its sleek design, parts allocation and in terms of feature its an android phone but with
some really good features.
5. Marketing Mix Analysis
As of now, the company deals in two product segments: earbuds and smartphones, and the
motive is to provide the best product at the proper price and remove the barrier between users
and technology. Research says this could be the evolution of smartphone design in the tech
industry as well as smartphone design. According to the company's initial product line, this could
be the one company capable of bringing a design revolution with the best specifications available
in the industry. Nowadays, there are two types of audience behavior before purchasing any
product. The first are those who go through all of the specifications and look for user reviews and
their requirements; based on this scenario, they decide whether or not to purchase a particular
product in terms of this type of audience Nothing is providing one of the best specifications
available in the industry, which includes leading quality and design, outstanding performance, and
a good user experience. The second one includes the audience, who make decisions based on
the things they hear in their surroundings. This can be done through marketing campaigns, word
of mouth, or any other strategy to gain a particular social status, but this is the most important
method that affects the purchasing decision of the user. To deal with this company, they have
created a great hype in the market before launching their products, and this helps their audience
directly or indirectly to go ahead with their decision. Compared to other competitors They know
what is lagging in the industry and how to fill these gaps with what is available in the industry. For
example, nowadays, many brands are coming up with the typical smartphone with not much
excitement, so nothing is filling this gap by providing the cool features with the aesthetically great
body of their smartphones and earbuds.
Elements of marketing mix
1. Product
● Features
● Quality
● Branding
● Packaging
● Services
● Warranties
2. Price
● Price Strategy
● Pricing
● Allowances
● Discounts
● Payment terms
6. 3. Place
● Channels
● Market coverage
● Assortment
● Location
● Inventory
● Transport
4. Promotion
● Sales promotion
● Advertising
● Public Relations
● Direct marketing
7. Product: The brand portrayed their product so well by creating a great hype. the different
element which distinguishes this brand from the other competitors in the market, for getting a
proper understanding of the product I have segregated this into six pointers.
Features: Nothing came up with their product with the best specifications which any brand
can provide this includes utilization of latest tech to boost their consumer experience and provide
the latest products as they have two product category first is named as Ear (1) which is ultralight
and weights only 4.7 grams with powerful 11.6mm speaker which is designed and cater by the
teenage engineering also includes the feature of active noise cancellation and battery upto 34
hours this is and sweat and water resistant too. And the second category is Phone (1) which
comes with features like fast charging, OLED display along with Gorilla Glass. This phone comes
in three variants which vary from the options of 8 GB to 12 GB and 128 to 256 GB of memory.
This phone comes with a Glyph interface which is on the back side of the phone the unique light
patterns which a user can use for customizing notifications. In terms of camera it comes with a
dual 50 megapixels camera to capture great shorts packed with all features like studio lighting,
night mode etc. In terms of performance it comes with high end gaming chipset in terms of network
this phone is 5G ready to too meet future demands.
Quality: As this brand knows how to stand out so while manufacturing their products they also
take care of the quality of products and brand also follow some practices like neutralizing carbon
footprints and purchasing additional carbon credits for the remaining emissions. Nothing uses 100
% recycled aluminum in their products basically compared to other industry giants. As these
products are manufactured using high quality of raw materials which gives quite durable quality
and performance which seems to be a good purchase at this price point.
8. Branding: As with this is the brand whose founder is Carl pei and this brand works with
teenage engineering works so we can expect some out of box branding. The brand focuses on
creating a specific set of curiosity with the way it portrays itself in the market every time. As
Nothing claims, consumer tech is becoming boring nowadays so they came up by fulfilling this
need and obtained a competitive edge over their competitors. They keep their brand in the most
creative and aesthetic way possible as a youth. I can say this is the brand which got my eyes
because I loved the way this brand is portraying itself in the market. This brand has a logo which
creates a type of curiosity in the audience because the logo says nothing. Yes, the only thing you
can see in the logo is the word nothing.
Packaging: Either brand reveals the product on box packaging which they have done in Ear
(1) or they go with the approach by keeping their product mysterious and comes with the slimmest
phone box ever which makes us think whether there is any product available inside the box or not
by providing very minimalist or few hints on box this also shows that their packaging team is doing
great by designing the type of packaging which maintains the standard of hype created by the
brand. It also gives a great unboxing experience to its users.
Services: As the main motive of brand to fill the gap between tech and people so nothing
provides some outstanding user experience with great and fast service network with best
coverage as brand also believes that if they can provide support and service on time so there are
more chances to get repeating customers as this is one of the strategies applied by the founder
during the launch of oneplus.
Warranties: Every product of this brand comes with a standard warranty of 1 year which is
limited to the country where the products has been purchased except the accessories they have
the warranty of 180 days. There are certain terms and conditions which are applicable while
availing the warranty like product should be purchased from authorized sales partner etc. Nothing
has various service centers where we can avail the warranty of their devices with the necessary
documents. You will get the best service from this brand in the industry because providing the
best after sales service is one of the main motto which is said by the founder in various interviews.
9. Price: Company has put great efforts to keep the price affordable for everyone with the best
possible product.
Price strategy: To get into competition the company used competitor based pricing which
helped them to get into the market and grab the attention of the audience who is looking for a
specific set of products in those price ranges with relevant specifications.
Pricing: The price point they are providing for Ear (1) starts from $99 and for Phone (1)
$400 which is quite less then other competitors in the market so this is one of the major things
which makes people purchase these products.
Allowances: Company has tied with various regional banking partners and ecommerce
partners to give home great allowances to their buyers because this saves their distribution
costs.
Discounts: In terms of discount brands have tied up with e-commerce platforms to get
some seasonal and regular discounts to their buyers.
Payment Terms: They have multiple and flexible payment options as most of their sales
are happening on regional e-commerce websites.
Place: The product will be sold from various sources and it will be available at multiple
platforms.
Channels: Products are sold on various Online platforms like amazon and offline partner
stores which varies from region to region.
Market coverage: The aim of the brand is to cover the global markets so they penetrate
their target markets efficiently which directly helps in the success of various marketing
strategies.
10. Assortment: product has been assorted into various specifications which is sold according
to different market needs and demands.
Location: The brand has global coverage into 40 countries which includes UK, Japan, India,
and mainland Europe which helped them to successfully accomplish their marketing strategies.
Inventory: Due to great aspects, brands keep their inventory updated by fulfilling stock and
as they know what is the current demand in the market so they keep focusing on meeting those
demands.
Transport: In terms of transport brand doesn't need to bare much cost because they have tied
with multiple e-commerce platform so this process is taken care by those platforms.
11. Promotion: The main goal is to promote their products so everyone can recognise them
after seeing their products one time with the help of the team who thinks, designs and implements
out of box this brand achieved a great response prior to launch of their products. Nothing has
communicated successfully with their target market with the help of their promotional campaigns
and gained consumer attention and helped them to make their decisions to purchase their
products.
Sales promotion: The company uses the most hyped Unique selling proposition of the
product in terms of phones which is their glyph interface also known as show off feature of this
phone which is the group of 900 tiny led lights at the back panel of the phone which looks cool
because this is not a thing which we see in our day to day life and the design of this everyone
says its like a alternative of iphone due to its first look and impressions.
Advertising: This brand has the one of the brightest minds on the planet named as Carl pei
who also has his loyal fan following due to his formidable performance in the past he got
popularized between lots of people. Nothing has used the technique of revealing the droplets of
information before any product launch and bit by bit they reveal the coolest features of their
devices which create a overall scenario of hype in market because feature like led light or glyph
interface is not the usual thing which users see in market in day to day life so if someone see this
kind of products which have something unique and different it's obvious they will get excited about
that product. Along with this the main focus of the brand is to make tech fun as nowadays industry
is too boring and not doing any revolution.
Public Relations: Nothing maintains a great public relations with everyone whether its
media or their audience because the level of brand image created within a span of time is just
unbelievable. There are lots of famous media companies like WIRED, Wallpaper etc. who have
published a blog. In terms of pr company founder also took an active participation to create a
bond and trust between people and their company.
Direct marketing: One of the main highlights of a great branding is how the brand is
presented between the people and by which methods. Nowadays one of the major things for any
brand is social media marketing and nothing has done a great job in terms of influencer marketing.
The brand is using social media platforms for a marketing blitz to spark the interest of tech fanatics
across the world. They have promoted their brand and products with world famous tech geeks
and influencers and this has great influence on their audience. As they have tied up with top e-
commerce websites of different different regions so they also got their product live sale and
marketing on their site.
