Too much choice

there is only "too much choice" if you leave your criteria for choice too wide.

one way to narrow down choice is to go for "best buys" in your fav hifi mag. but i guess everyone on this forum will know that this is most likely to result in an unsatisfactory solution -- musicwise. in fact likely disaster!

a better way is to decide what you are trying to achieve with your hifi, in your own mind. you can get an idea by listening to various hifi systems -- including friends -- hifi dealers, musical evenings, hifi shows etc...

in yiour case, an immediate question is - why are you replacing your speakers?? what is it that the intros will do that your royds cant?? how do you know its the royds that are letting you down right now?

if you nail down a few parameters, the road to musical nirvana becomes clearer...

enjoy...

ken

Actually, I think every marketing specialist would praise Naim's politics in that field. Unlike companies like B*** or S***, they even manage to produce excellent products. Congratulations to Naim, and live a long life !

Basically, IMO the main idea behind that huge choice is to generate upgraditis. The present (excellent) forum probably helps increasing the sales of naim gear, because the poor bloke who "only" owns a six-pack eventually has to end up with a 3-500 just because some proud & happy 500 owners love spreading jealousy among other naimites. Childish, but certainly understandable.

The guys who swop their six-pack with three 500's maybe sell their 135's to three owners of 180's or 250's. But using 135's only with SBL's ? No way, sell the stuff and buy NBL's. And keeping that CDX ? Pfff... get a CDS2.

The bloke who bought the SBL's now needs to have a CDX instead of his 3.5. And better not choose other stuff than Naim, because of the interconnects, the already bought PSU's, and the reassuring feeling that Naim equipment surely works well together.

The other possibility is to implement the US strategy of "More expensive = more sales, and less need to improve the actual sound quality because the oil sheikhs and startup yuppies don't care about musicality anyway". The drawback is that they don't sell too many of these units, and there's not much to be upgraded (e.g. M*** L*******). So the user of this kind of gear keeps it untouched for 10 years at least.

Last, but not least, hifi is much about toys. Quite a few Naim users "cherish" their gear as if it were their baby. And they can upgrade as much as they want. Being stingy with my baby ? Never.

Seen that way, this huge choice makes everyone happy: the company, the dealers, the users.

If I worked in the upper storeys of Naim, I'd do the same. Any ACTUAL marketing specialist out there for a reaction to this short analysis ?

Bernard

I'm with Ken C on this. Whether Bernard is tight or wrong, if you know what you want, you're basically immune to marketing.

Let me more blunt about something Ken is hinting about. Most Naim forum participants would look at the source first in your system. It's an old Linn/Naim indeological stance: garbage in, garbage out.

You need to listen for yourself. If you're buying new, you can listen to your stuff with the new speakers AND you can have the dealer demo a more source first and/or a more amp first approach.

If you know what you want, you can be happy even if the mag writers hate what you've bought.

Regards.

Phil

Bernard

Think that you're bang on track there but I'd add also add that the behaviour's you descibe are present, albiet to different degress, with almost everything we buy. We naturally want to communicate about things we have in common, share ideas and experiences which in turn change our own ideas and motivations.

Putting my marketing hat on, let's have a go at segmenting that the market.

1. "Air Guitarists" - the music lovers

Note: It is essential to have catchy segment names so that us marketers can remember them and make us look creative to the accounts whose money we need to spend. In addition this also serves to frighten them, moving them out of their comfort zone and become more susceptible to believe that there may some merit in your promotional ideas. Hmmm I disgress.

2. "Collectors" - purchase more black boxes, CD racks and music than is humanly concievable.

3. Gadget freaks - will purchase anything black that had a coloured LED mounted in it. Actually that's changed significantly over the last couple of years, now it's anything silver.

These segments are mutally exclusive, customers can be in many at the same time. Unfortunately this negates any real benefit segmentation offers. However you can usually put numbers against segments with quantitative research which the accountants really like and it gives them something to talk about at the Marketing Review meetings.

In the marketing world customer research is a little bit of an in-joke. We've managed to con the accountants out of more money to do the research and then ignore it because we really know what's happening in the market a lot better than any customer is likely to tell a stranger over the phone.

Where am I going here? Right Naim believe that doing things their way enhances the enjoyment of music. Proprietary elements such as power supplies, DIN cables and system synergy are key components on the journey to audio nirvana.

Luckily this appeals to all our major segments. "Air guitarists" are happy because the music sounds great, "collectors" are pleased with all the black boxes they've aquired and "gadget freaks" are happy that they're managed to fill a previously empty space in their lounge with glowing green logos and ominous looking black boxes.

Personally I love Naim equipment because it

1. makes great music
2. offers me worthwhile upgrading options
3. simplifies my decisions

Jay

The only choice is buy Naim, be happy!

Phew, this thread's generated a bit of interest, I pleased to say!

Ref: Ken C's reply...

quote:

---

in yiour case, an immediate question is - why are you replacing your speakers?? what is it that the intros will do that your royds cant?? how do you know its the royds that are letting you down right now?

---

How might any crazy Scotsman know? Actually I have had lengthy demos of different kit with my CD player / amp / speakers. Indeed some dealers even advocated and demo'd different sources. But, for what I wanted to achieve, I just needed to get away from the Royds. And the search for something AS GOOD but BETTER (!?) i.e. not a WHF best buy at £800 led me to the Intros. So I have achieved that useful step change. The problem with finding a problem is that you want to solve it. And so with the Royds (which are damn good and damn damn good for £240) there is a little bit of lack of body and criticisable (sp?) treble performance. But hey, we've all got different ears!

Anyway, the real point of the CHOICE thing was all the other snash that can be done e.g. bi-amping, equipment racks, mains conditioners, different power leads, DACs, etc. No combination of demos will ever sort this out for anyone because it's too damn complex. So the bottom line has got to be to trust the dealers (not the mags!) who have the time and expertise to narrow down the choice.

There ya go, answered my own question without even reaching for the straitjacket.

Yum, yum, show's yer hi-fi...

"So the bottom line has got to be to trust the dealers (not the mags!) who have the time and expertise to narrow down the choice."

But how can you tell what the motives of a dealer really are vs the motives of the hifi press? I assumed the press were more motivated to seek the best sounds because they are more financially independent from the manufacturers and don't have to think about what spiffs they are getting. Perhaps some experts would shed light on this.

Personally I would like to see more choice at dealers. I have found it really hard to compare high-end brands because a single dealer won't stock many. Sometimes the most practical way is to read magazine comparisons. Furthermore, there is cooperation among certain manufacturers and dealers to promote brands or limit choice and certainly to fix sales prices. All this tweaking stuff is also sometimes used as a hook to engender confidence and loyalty from customers and create dependency for advice - and to capture more revenue.

I say trust your own ears and don't let the power of suggestion fool you. Be healthily cynical. Don't be suckered by the "it needs lots of fuss to make it sound at its best therefore it is better than something that doesn't need fuss" argument.

BAM