The Microsoft has been cramping the PS3’s style from the get-go. If it wasn’t advertising Gears of War on PS3 preorder pages, illustrating the 360’s cost advantage with beer, or crashing the PS3’s European launch, the company was spending beaucoup bucks on exclusive content for multi-platform games. But when Microsoft answered Sony’s $100 PS3 price reduction with one of their own in August, they not only put the Xbox 360 Premium substantially below the PS3’s price point, but the Core System within striking distance of the $250 Wii. Should Sony and Nintendo be shaking in their boot cycles?

Microsoft’s strategy of cutting prices across the board appears to have been effective. The chart below shows online retail demand for the US market, based on people shopping consoles at SKU level pages. What’s interesting is how the directional changes between the Wii and 360 diverge in August; excluding the most recent month, these two consoles follow very similar trends. In terms of hardware, the Xbox 360 is the only console that didn’t experience a substantial decline in august shoppers.

  • Demand for the Wii and PS3 is nearly tied, with both consoles receiving just under 600,000 online shoppers in August.
  • From July to August, demand for the Xbox 360 climbed about 2%. At the same time, Wii demand fell by 15%, the largest drop since January, when the console was recovering from the holiday rush.
  • Despite Sony’s $100 price cut in July, PS3 demand declined by over 16% in August. It should be noted that demand for the PS3 is nearly 35% higher than it was in the 3 months leading up to the price reduction.
  • In August 2007, 360 Demand is more than 40% higher than it was in August of 2006.

How has this – and the PS3’s - price reduction impacted the market? Looking at June (the month prior to the PS3’s announcement) and August (after both price cuts were announced) illustrates a dramatically different console market. The following graphic demonstrates this change, showing the total number of shoppers for each console, as well as the overlap between each console.

  • Demand for both the 360 and PS3 have grown dramatically in terms of demand, while the Wii shopper count has declined.
  • Overlap between the Wii and the 360 grew by nearly 6000 people. Since the Wii’s demand also fell, a much higher percentage of Wii shoppers are now considering a 360. This is also true of Wii shoppers considering a PS3.
  • Given the growth in both PS3 and Wii demand, over the time period, overlap has actually fallen on a percentage of total shoppers for both consoles, potentially indicating that consumers have made up their mind about with platform to pursue.
  • Nearly 1.4 % of console shoppers considered all 3 consoles in August, up from 1.1% in June.

With Halo 3 coming out next week, Microsoft has another monster card up its sleeve. Come back next week to see how it all ties together.


Analyze more domains: + +

Done reading? subscribe: To get an automatic feed of all future posts subscribe here, or to receive them via email enter your email address in the box in the right column.

Link to This Post:     


Comments

RSS feed for comments on this post.
  1. Iceman321

    Sales are linked to the quality of the games that come out, which means being in sync with (a) std popular games, and (b) anime manga in vogue. Anime manga sites can give you an idea of how the trend is going because people freely post and vote for the stories they like. I have a site which can give you an overview, http://www.justexpressing.com, or you can visit other sites to get a similar idea.

  2. Mike Volpe - HubSpot Internet Marketing

    Not sure if you can really call visitors to a website “demand”.. it is possible (even quite likely) that the Wii is getting a lot of visitors to its website because it has a lot of buzz and it so different from the other consoles and people are interested in checking it out… but browsers are not “demand”. It would be interesting to compare these stats to actual SALES (true demand).

  3. Sean

    these graphs make no sense

  4. justin

    yes just wondering if you would have a graph of the xbox 360 because I’m doing a math project for my school and i need one so please help me!

  5. BestCityEva

    I would like to see a chart for this month and next because the PS3 is going to be selling a ton more and I believe they will surpass the Wii. With the HD format wars out of the way, consumers will be buying the PS3 as a Blu-Ray player, which will increase their hardware sells big time. I believe it is already picking up steam from the latest NPD numbers that were published.

  6. Dan

    I’ve LOVE to see this data updated for 2008 given what’s happening in the consumer and retail space. Since all spending on everything non-essential has essentially stopped in the last 8 weeks, I’m imaging that the graphs will look quite a bit different.

  7. Sohbet,Forum

    The Special Blog thanx JeSsiCa sohbet chat sohbetci


Have something to say? Leave a Comment

Get the comments RSS feed, instant notification of new comments

Latest Blog Posts:


Jul 2: White Gloves & Thrown Elections: Michael Jackson vs. Iran Election
Jul 1: Did the iPhone 3G S Steal the Palm Pre’s Thunder?
Jun 30: The Role of Search in the Online Auto Insurance Market
Jun 29: MJ or Bust: Millions Hit Web to Learn of the Loss of Their “King of Pop”
Jun 26: Digital 180 with BabyAge.com President Jack Kiefer
Jun 25: With Help from Media, Twitter Overtakes Google as Leading Search Engine for “Iran+Election”
Jun 24: T-Mobile and BillShrink.com: Friends with Benefits?
Jun 23: Top Coupon Sites: Saving Money Now Easier, More Popular Than Ever
Jun 22: Unemployment Claims Sites Seeing Dramatic Increases in Traffic.
Jun 19: For those about to RockYou.com, we salute you!
Jun 18: Summer Movie Blockbusters Go Big on MySpace
Jun 17: Palm Pre Shoots to Rival the iPhone Launch
Jun 17: Digital 180 with Canoe Ventures’ David Verklin
Jun 16: Target vs. Wal-Mart: Online Conversion Battle Heats Up
Jun 16: Digital 180 with Virgin Mobile’s Bob Stohrer
Jun 15: May Data Highlights: Twitter’s Growth Shows Signs of Fatigue
Jun 12: Touchscreens: A silver bullet in the wireless phone market?
Jun 11: Bing Attracts New Searchers, But So Far Only For a Trial
Jun 11: Jon and Kate Divorce Rumor Searches Soar, those for Britain’s Got Talent’s Susan Boyle Plunge
Jun 10: May Search Market Share: Pre-Bing Launch, Sponsored Referrals Dip at MSN/Live


Download MoviesBuy NeroBuy Cheap OEM softwareDownload mp3Buy Cheap OEM Software