D
Deleted member 11852
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Yeah. Its like price is a factor or something!
All purpose Sales and Sales Rumors and Anecdotes [2016 Edition]
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DuckThor Evil
Legend
Yeah. Its like price is a factor or something!
This conversation is starting to be little tiring...
Can't you understand the difference between "price is not a factor" and "price has not been much of a factor, because the prices have been at the same level most of the time" ?
No one said the consoles don't sell more when they are priced lower on Black Friday, or that the demand of one console doesn't go up, when the price goes down. of course they do.
Also looking at nowinstock.net, you'll see the PS4 deal in Amazon is currently the best one you can get out of all places. Quess what? it's going to move some units at Amazon then.
Some other week Amazon might have $30 off on Xbox One S and it moves better than normally but shit like that evens out, if you look at mid/long term you don't get ideas from "hourly" lists.
D
Deleted member 11852
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Quit then, quitter!
But seriously, it is a pointless conversation for the reasons I keep outlining. Factors for purchase decisions differ person to person and there's no way to measure which factors are more important than others or when a combination of factors will sway a decision.
Silent_Buddha
Legend
Man, I'm gone from the internet for almost a week and this happens. 
I think everyone is roughly correct on the price thing. But, IMO, it can easily be broken down somewhat.
First. All things being equal, the cheaper console (product) will win. Marketing and time to market can also affect things. But again, all things being equal, the cheaper product will win.
Second. This modifies the first. Consumer perception of a product will determine which wins if price is equal. Consumer perception is formed from all kinds of variables. Marketing, past experiences, reputation, capability, library of content (in the case of consoles), etc.
Which means, that when combined, products must be priced competitively to their competition while taking consumer perception into account. However, there is a point where price cannot overcome consumer perception.
This also means that the cheapest product isn't necessarily going to be the best selling product. In many markets, the cheapest product is almost never the best selling product. For example, the iPod quite handily beat its competition despite generally costing significantly more than most of its competition. Competition that in many cases was not only cheaper but in many cases, superior in capability.
You can't discount products such as Gamecube or Dreamcast or whatever without putting in numerous qualifiers.
IE -
"The cheapest console within consoles of roughly equivalent power." But then that makes things awkward. As the PS3/X360/Wii generation you'd have to leave the Wii out of the comparison.
or
"The cheapest consoles with roughly equivalent game libraries." But that also makes things awkward. As in the Dreamcast/PS2/Xbox/GC generation you'd have to leave out everyone except PS2. Or compare everyone else except PS2.
or
"The cheapest consoles from a company with a history of making consoles" But that becomes awkward as you'd then have to leave out PS1 and Xbox in their respective generations.
Etc.
The fact is, that consoles are priced relative to their competition based on what the company feels their consumer perception will be or can be made to be while still having the prospect of potentially becoming profitable.
Microsoft with the Xbox decided it was a premium gaming experience so priced it accordingly relative to the PS1. That wasn't going to fly (the higher price), so they dropped it to a similar price to the PS2 without undercutting PS2 in a major way. Dropping the price too much was viewed as counter productive to the product as a brand. So sales volume was sacrificed in the first generation in order to not damage too much brand value. Also note how the pricing for XBO rarely exceeds 50 USD less than the competition. Value can be added by including bundled products, but if you lower price too much relative to the competition and the competition is doing well, then you risk doing irreparable damage to your brand. IE - it becomes the "cheap" lesser brand.
Ouya is something opposite. It was determined by the makers that it was a budget brand. It was never going to be able to offer a similar gaming experience to the PS3, X360, or Wii. And was priced and marketed as a budget gaming console. Not only to reflect the reality of its gaming capabilities, but also consumer perception of the console. Even with that however, it was soundly rejected by consumers due to lacking any significant gaming library outside of Android games.
What's this all mean? It is not uncommon for the cheapest product in a given product category to not be the best selling item in that product category. This is true for consoles, true for food (cheapest is almost always never the best selling), true for vehicles (in the US, the cheapest is never the best selling), true for clothing, etc.
TL: DR - Cheapest product in a given product category (like Consoles) is almost never the best selling product in a given product category. That is, unless you want to put in so many caveats, that it becomes ridiculous to make it about "cheapest" product in a product category.
However, cheaper among 2 (or a few) products that are very similar can sometimes sell better. But even that isn't guaranteed. For example, the Honda Accord in the US was the best selling car in its category for many years, but was almost never cheaper than its very similar competition.
Regards,
SB
I think everyone is roughly correct on the price thing. But, IMO, it can easily be broken down somewhat.
First. All things being equal, the cheaper console (product) will win. Marketing and time to market can also affect things. But again, all things being equal, the cheaper product will win.
Second. This modifies the first. Consumer perception of a product will determine which wins if price is equal. Consumer perception is formed from all kinds of variables. Marketing, past experiences, reputation, capability, library of content (in the case of consoles), etc.
Which means, that when combined, products must be priced competitively to their competition while taking consumer perception into account. However, there is a point where price cannot overcome consumer perception.
This also means that the cheapest product isn't necessarily going to be the best selling product. In many markets, the cheapest product is almost never the best selling product. For example, the iPod quite handily beat its competition despite generally costing significantly more than most of its competition. Competition that in many cases was not only cheaper but in many cases, superior in capability.
You can't discount products such as Gamecube or Dreamcast or whatever without putting in numerous qualifiers.
IE -
"The cheapest console within consoles of roughly equivalent power." But then that makes things awkward. As the PS3/X360/Wii generation you'd have to leave the Wii out of the comparison.
or
"The cheapest consoles with roughly equivalent game libraries." But that also makes things awkward. As in the Dreamcast/PS2/Xbox/GC generation you'd have to leave out everyone except PS2. Or compare everyone else except PS2.
or
"The cheapest consoles from a company with a history of making consoles" But that becomes awkward as you'd then have to leave out PS1 and Xbox in their respective generations.
Etc.
The fact is, that consoles are priced relative to their competition based on what the company feels their consumer perception will be or can be made to be while still having the prospect of potentially becoming profitable.
Microsoft with the Xbox decided it was a premium gaming experience so priced it accordingly relative to the PS1. That wasn't going to fly (the higher price), so they dropped it to a similar price to the PS2 without undercutting PS2 in a major way. Dropping the price too much was viewed as counter productive to the product as a brand. So sales volume was sacrificed in the first generation in order to not damage too much brand value. Also note how the pricing for XBO rarely exceeds 50 USD less than the competition. Value can be added by including bundled products, but if you lower price too much relative to the competition and the competition is doing well, then you risk doing irreparable damage to your brand. IE - it becomes the "cheap" lesser brand.
Ouya is something opposite. It was determined by the makers that it was a budget brand. It was never going to be able to offer a similar gaming experience to the PS3, X360, or Wii. And was priced and marketed as a budget gaming console. Not only to reflect the reality of its gaming capabilities, but also consumer perception of the console. Even with that however, it was soundly rejected by consumers due to lacking any significant gaming library outside of Android games.
What's this all mean? It is not uncommon for the cheapest product in a given product category to not be the best selling item in that product category. This is true for consoles, true for food (cheapest is almost always never the best selling), true for vehicles (in the US, the cheapest is never the best selling), true for clothing, etc.
TL: DR - Cheapest product in a given product category (like Consoles) is almost never the best selling product in a given product category. That is, unless you want to put in so many caveats, that it becomes ridiculous to make it about "cheapest" product in a product category.
However, cheaper among 2 (or a few) products that are very similar can sometimes sell better. But even that isn't guaranteed. For example, the Honda Accord in the US was the best selling car in its category for many years, but was almost never cheaper than its very similar competition.
Regards,
SB
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This is needlessly muddying the waters.
Console A - $500 - 8% market
Console B - $400 - 17% market
Console C - $300 - 55% market
Console D - $200 - 13% market
Console E - $150 - 7% market
By our definition, the cheapest console isn't the highest selling. By yours, it is because you exclude cheaper consoles than Console C by saying the cheaper consoles aren't 'credible'. By doing that you're not really talking about the cheapest console.
Why are you adding this caveat? Surely it's far more sensible to use a different definition than 'cheapest'? I'll be very surprised if anyone weighs in on this conversation agreeing with you that the cheapest console doesn't necessarily mean the one with the lowest price.
how about cheapest-most-desired console? lulz...
loekf
Regular
Sony has sold 50 million PS4s, incl. the OG, Slim and Pro.
http://www.theverge.com/2016/12/7/13867050/sony-playstation-4-sales-50-million
In May 2016 it was 40 million, now at 50 million. Wow...
http://www.theverge.com/2016/12/7/13867050/sony-playstation-4-sales-50-million
In May 2016 it was 40 million, now at 50 million. Wow...
10 million in 7 months. That's a great average.
It was 35.9m units total at the start of the year so roughly 14m with a month left:
http://www.polygon.com/2016/1/5/10717142/ps4-lifetime-sales-35-9-million-holiday-2015
http://www.polygon.com/2016/1/5/10717142/ps4-lifetime-sales-35-9-million-holiday-2015
If you think about it, it wouldn't be too difficult to be 100% right on that one: produce 60m consoles and ship them. BOOM.
Sony doesn't overshipped console...
The difference between shipped console number and sold through number on Sony side is low... Very esay to verify with the different announcement, 47,4 millions consoles shipped the 30th september 2016 if I remember well...
edit: oh my bad end of september 2016 not end of october 2016
http://www.dualshockers.com/2016/11...ptember-2016-60-million-predicted-march-2017/
edit: oh my bad end of september 2016 not end of october 2016
http://www.dualshockers.com/2016/11...ptember-2016-60-million-predicted-march-2017/
http://blog.us.playstation.com/2016...undle-249-99-december-11-through-december-24/
And they are aggressive this time...
And they are aggressive this time...
They have before and they might again if it meant meeting a projection. It all depends on whether they determine that the impact of overshipping is less or more costly than adjusting the projection.
Search all PS4 announcement(shipped and sold through), probably before the PS4 but the number between shipped console and sold through console is minimal since the PS4 launch and most of the time they increase projection during the fiscal year by a few hundred thousands...
Just because they have not yet doesn't mean that they won't ever. Projections aren't perfect as you yourself pointed out. If they can under-estimate sales they can just as easily over-estimate them.
Yes but I doubt they just did their best black Friday of all Playstation history worldwide... I think like since the PS4 launch they will easily reach their goal and like I heard from friends working in french retails PS4 sales will reach a new high for Christmas.
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Sure. I'm not disputing whether they *can* meet the projection without over-shipping. I'm disputing that they *wouldn't* overship if they needed to to meet a projection. You made an absolute statement, "Sony doesn't overshipped (sic) consoles" and that was what I was taking issue with.
Meaningless PR as Black Friday has become a thing outside of the US, meaning for the time being, every BF will be the best ever as sales spread and become more commonplace. Once it either becomes the norm or retail has sense to axe it, we'll be able to compare BFs to see if they're better or not.
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