[mikestew]

An iPhone is a good example. Real life example: my wife bought an iPhone, I was impressed and bought one, which led to me buying a MacBook to do dev work (and because "hey, they do make good machines"), which led to a whole house full of Macs and various Apple gear.

Because they made what I thought was a decent phone at the time, they sold some other gear as a result.

[rsync]

I disagree - I think that's a confused example of what a halo product is.

I am not sure that Apple has a halo product, but if they did, it would be the new mac pro. (regardless of how you feel about the new mac pro...)

[r00fus]

Initially the iPhone 8GB sold for $600 on-contract, which worked out to an ASP of around $800 or higher, and average TCO over 2 years of $3k.

Also it was announced 6 months prior to release, was often sold out after it's release, and completely unavailable in most countries until months or years after initial release.

It was very much a halo product (at release, less so over time).

In fact, I would probably consider it as one of the most successful halo products ever - as it not only cast it's halo over the entire Mac+iPod product line, but it eventually became the revenue driver of the entire company.

[mcosta]

Apple itself is the halo.

[mikestew]

Assuming the phrase "halo product" derives from "halo effect", I'm confused about how my example isn't the quintessential definition. 1. Buy iPhone. 2. Enjoy iPhone. 3. "Hey, I'll bet Apple's other products are pretty good, too." 4. Profit for Apple.

Disagreement on the definition, or poorly explained personal example?

(EDIT: now that I think about it, our first iPods were the halo product that made me discard old Apple biases that I was carrying from the 90s.)

[sosborn]

It was the iPod that device that really demonstrated the value of a halo product.