Will Microsoft’s $300M Campaign Work?
There is one message that was pounded into my head all throughout college.
It’s the same message that any marketing professional has heard 1,000 times…
Never try to be all things to all people.
Here are the typical examples people use time and time again:
Winners Losers
- Apple - Hardees
- Harley Davidson - GM
- Disney - Sears
- Google
The last thing a company wants to do is position their products for everyone and not carve out a specific niche… If that’s true, would you spend $300 million on a campaign telling that targets nobody?
Well… That is exactly what Microsoft is doing. They just launched a new campaign to rebuild their brand… (which means Apple’s commercials must be working.)
The first part of the campaign was the Mojave experiment… I first thought this was a joke because it follows the same format as Pizza Hut’s commercials promoting their new pasta dish.
The second part was the teaser commercials with Jerry Seinfeld… Which was less than impressive.
And the third part… A commercial showing that all sorts of people use Vista:
I mean… I think I get it. It tugs at the emotional side of humans. It tries to get us to feel a sense of unity for being a PC owner. But I don’t think it will work… Do you?
PS - At one point, I Googled “Microsoft Campaign” and the first link was to a site called, “The Microsoft Boycott Campaign” Someone at Microsoft should work on that…
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4 Responses
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I think the ads will prove to be at least marginally effective. I doubt the target audience is either young people or apple users, but rather 30-somethings deciding whether to make the move to mac or Linux. Up to this point only Mac really had captivating ads, which meant that Mac was able to define a “pc user.” Microsoft is finally trying to break down that definition. It may not be the ideal ad campaign but it appears that they are moving in a better direction.
I like how the ad specifically starts out with a guy that looks like John Hodgman, then sprouts out from there. It made me feel as if Apple was making fun of guys like PC (and you could probably include me in that demographic).
What I think is interesting is that Microsoft DIRECTLY addressed the Mac commercials - sometimes in advertising that is the wrong thing to do, as you generally just draw more attention to what your competitor is saying. However, I think Microsoft did it in a ballsy way, framing the argument not as Mac vs Microsoft, but as Mac vs ordinary people.
A lot more people out there own a PC at the moment, and if they get caught up in the idea that Mac is trying to convey a sense of I’m-better-than-you, then Microsoft might have done its job with the ads.
First off, I’m a Mac guy. So, naturally I thought it wasn’t the greatest ad.
Here’s my problem with the ad though - why are they simply showing PC users? It’s already obvious that the majority of computer owners own a PC. It’s not shocking.
Mac has done a great job of being the odd (wo)man out. PC can’t try to fill a niche that’s already been taken.
Rough idea. Probably won’t do anything except lead to promotion through blog posts like this
Do you think Apple is too dependent on Steve Jobs?