Sustaining Premium Pricing in Competitive Markets: Evidence from Apple and a Growth Flywheel Model of Price-Increasing Competition

DOI

10.2991/978-2-38476-609-3_24How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Pricing Power; Value Reconstruction; Competitive Isolation

Abstract

According to the classical market competition theory, product convergence which results in price wars is what it maintains. However, there are many products in the market that have similar configurations but quite different prices, leading to a contradictory situation where "the higher the price, the more intense the competition". The existing research shows that the heterogeneous strategy has the potential to make the equilibrium price increase, yet the specific marketing mechanism is still not entirely clear. To address this issue this article by means of systematic literature reviews as well as case studies has made use of Apple Inc. This study shows that the establishment of sustainable pricing power for enterprises depends on three dynamic and collaborative core mechanisms: Firstly, value reconstruction, that is, infusing emotional and aesthetic elements, shifting the competition focus from product functional parameters to subjective experiences, and reshaping consumers’ value perception and reasons for payment; Secondly, competitive isolation, which is to systematically reduce the perceived substitutability of products by constructing a unique ecosystem or binding unique values, thus protecting the premium space; Thirdly, signal transmission, which is to strategically select high-reliability and strongly emotionally resonant signals according to one’s own market position to verify value and directly catalyze payment willingness. The core point of this article is that these three mechanisms do not operate in a linear way but form a self-reinforcing "growth flywheel" system: value reconstruction initiates the flywheel, competitive isolation keeps the rotation speed, and signal transmission provides acceleration, with reinforcing cycles among them.

Copyright

© 2026 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Bo Liang
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/09/04
TI  - Sustaining Premium Pricing in Competitive Markets: Evidence from Apple and a Growth Flywheel Model of Price-Increasing Competition
BT  - Proceedings of the 2026 3rd International Conference on Public Relations and Media Communication (PRMC 2026)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 212
EP  - 227
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-609-3_24
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-609-3_24
ID  - Liang2026
ER  -