Are You Fo’Real?

I was scrolling through my good friend, Kimberly’s blog today and came upon an interesting blog entry that she posted a few weeks ago about Windows 7. Being the tech-savvy guy that I am, I decided to continue on her evaluation of Microsoft’s marketing campaigns.

Microsoft recently launched a new campaign featuring its Windows Phone 7.

I thought the commercial was pretty funny, especially the scene where the smartphone user drops his phone into the urinal. I understand the point that the commercial is trying to communicate across to its audience: everyone is so connected these days that they’re missing out on the important things in life.

But, how does this relate to Windows Phone 7? The tagline: “A phone to save us from our phones”. So what is Microsoft trying to tell me? Well, we need saving from. So, the Windows Phone is more superior than the other smart phones in the market. Perhaps it’s more organized and efficient that it allows us to remove ourselves from our work and enjoy life more. But, this is hard to interpret from the commercial. An article that I read evaluating this commercial actually stated that perhaps the phone was very hard to use that users would just put it away in their pockets. Or it didn’t include any of the essential functionalities of a smart phone that people won’t even use it.

Here’s my take on it. Whether you thought the commercial featured the Windows Phone as a superior or inferior phone is not important. But rather, the way in which the message was communicated across. I think that the message was very ambiguous, and allowed for a high degree of interpretation from the audience. And people interpret situations differently. In the end, I think the commercial actually worked against Microsoft and didn’t help much with promoting the launch of its new phone.

Relating this all back to Kimberly’s blog, I enjoyed the Windows 7 commercials much more than the one I discussed. It was much more succinct and communicated to its audience well about what features were offered in the new Windows 7 Operating System. Perhaps highlighting the differentiated smart phone features would be a better way of selling this product, seeing how the growing trend is that people are always attached to their phones. Microsoft should leverage this trend to their advantage and differentiate themselves from other smart phones in the industry…

Thank you, Kimberly! Your blog really showed me the effect that simplicity in a commercial can have on consumers!