The Onion and Apple Poke Fun at Microsoft's Ad Campaign
Wednesday November 5, 2008
The Onion, known for being a "fake news" organization, has tapped into the controversy surrounding Microsoft's $300 million ad campaign. The site jokes that the commercials are responsible for giving the blue screen of death to more than 70 million televisions.
The first commercial has PC piling up money for its advertising and making a small pile to "fix Vista." The second commercial features PC holding a buzzer to bleep out any mention of the word, "Vista."
Which company's commercials are more effective, Microsoft or Apple, and why? Share your opinion.
- Are Apple or Microsoft Ads Better?:
Share Your Opinion - Gates and Seinfeld:
The Quirky Commercials - Dumped:
Gates and Seinfeld Break Up - The Onion Story:
Microsoft Ad Campaign Crashing Nation's Televisions - New Mac Ad:
Mac Vs. PC Version 1 - New Mac Ad:
Mac Vs. PC Version 2
The first commercial has PC piling up money for its advertising and making a small pile to "fix Vista." The second commercial features PC holding a buzzer to bleep out any mention of the word, "Vista."
Which company's commercials are more effective, Microsoft or Apple, and why? Share your opinion.
Comments
I would not say that the PC ads are officially a flop yet. In order to measure their success, they need to keep in the public eye (however not by making 4 minute mindless commercials). Instead of focusing on the ‘hip’ aspect, Microsoft needs to broaden the horizons a little and work harder. Their PR people should be working just has hard, if not harder, to increase the pulic image of Vista.
Wouldn’t it be a shock if hardcore nerd Bill Gates was featured in Gentleman’s Quarterly?
I believe that the commercials could quite possibly make for a smooth transition to Mac’s popularity. The average consumer has never used a Mac. I believe that if they were to back off from dissing Microsoft just a bit while focusing on their product, then the returns would be great.
Take for instance my idea for a spec ad. When the next mac OS debuts, what if they were to have a commercial showing the screen shots of how easy it is to accomplish things on this ‘new operating system’ and talk about how they slaved to get a quick learning curve, even for a monkey (as you see a monkey sitting there with the mouse.) Then they tel the audience it is a Mac. That would resonate with the PC users who have never used a Mac before, on the account at first they would be led into thinking that the new Operating System was windows based.
However, the above is only what I would suggest for the companies. However, I am quite pleased with the commercial war going on right now.
Microsoft’s ad campaign is definitely a flop. You don’t hire Jerry Seinfeld for $10 million just to fire him two commercials into the ad campaign. Seinfeld wasn’t the problem. The entire ad campaign is the problem.
The Mojave commercials and the I’m a PC commercials are just not working. I’ve never used a Mac but if I chose a product simply based on commercials, I would choose Apple.
Microsoft is just letting Apple beat the tar out of them over Vista. MS hasn’t responded one bit to show people what Vista is or how it’s better. I don’t have a problem with Vista but I didn’t want on it my new computer at first just because there are so many consumers out there saying it’s terrible.
Apple’s response to that is to show how Microsoft is pouring hordes of money into a useless ad campaign. Microsoft’s response is to ignore the problem and talk about being a PC. If you’re a Mac person, you’re not switching to PC over that commercial. If you’re a PC, those commercials aren’t going to convince you to buy another if MS is simply trying to hold on to its current consumers.