Just because someone spends a ton of money on a promo, doesn’t mean it is any good. Take the newMicrosoft commercial made by CP&B with Jerry Seinfield.
How many millions did this cost to make? How many millions have been spent on placement? But where is the core message? What does it offer the buyer?Â
In my opinion (and I’m sure others will disagree), it’s not even funny. But it fails mostly because the CP&B folks (and MS) tried too hard to be Apple-esque–quirky/witty as the Mac/PC ads have been–and in copying (without looking like they were copying) they stopped being themselves.
So, you can spend a butt-load of money, but it will fall flat if you forget to be, well, you.
(thanks åsk for the link)
I have to say…I don’t get it? WHAT is the message?
Huh?
I think that this is a series of videos , to reintroduce america to microsoft. it’s the first of many and will help slowly get people familiar with the brand that they are trying to sell. i think comparing this one commercial to the entire body of apple’s “mac and pc” commercials is a bit unfair.
i think that it did what it was supposed to and did it well. it didn’t offend or try to hard to be something or try to hard to NOT be something. it was just a slightly quirky , non-offensive , general-population-consumable commercial.
Plus i don’t think that they spent too much money. how much is ‘too much’? we’ll see. if it gets people to believe in a product or have more confidence in a product, and the numbers show it, then whatever the cost, it was worth it. could they have done it differently? sure. but you can’t be all things to all people.
But to answer one of your questions directly:
“But where is the core message? What does it offer the buyer? ”
it offers a safe, non-threatening commercial that allows someone other than bill gates to be the nerdy one. It offers the buyer confidence that microsoft can be relevant while not trying to overtly oversell the consumer with “YOU MUST BUY THIS TO BE FULFILLED!!”. I think that as the series of commercials come out it will be a good mix of ‘buy this’ and ‘we are able to be relevant’.
Rocksteady,
Danno~
Well, I dunno…but I do know that not one of my friends or family thought it had any redeeming qualities. Not one. And on a discussion group of people in advertising from all over the world of which I am a part, those who commented all had negative things to say.
I think it’s (further?) proof that CP&B is on a downward trend and I predict we’ll see a new hot shop in the future.
-Leslie
And that may be true about CP&B, we’ll have to see.
As for this first commercial, here’s an article that gives more details than I could, said better than I could:
http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/09/04/microsoft-ads-first-phase-to-engage-consumers-spark-conversation/
some good quotes from microsoft:
“The ads are just an icebreaker, he ads, to reintroduce Microsoft to consumers.”
“The first phase of this campaign is designed to engage consumers and spark a new conversation about Windows – a conversation that will evolve as the campaign progresses, but will always be marked by humor and humanity.”
so i think it’s something that might just work out… we just have to wait and see 🙂
Rocksteady,
Danno~
ps : liking the new manual 🙂
Rocksteady,
Danno~
This seems to be a teaser for a campaign series… and too be honest in my opinion yes it was odd but I think it’s what CPB does best. Start out with a quirky oddity and turn it around on the viewers/consumers.. just look at VW and BK (the king was creepy at first).
check out what Ad Age had to say: http://adage.com/article?article_id=130763
It definitely has people buzzing.
For those of you who have been reading the comments, I just deleted one by “Jeep” that praised the ads. Why did I do that? Because it came from the CP&B server!!! In other words, it was a planted comment by the ad agency.
I figured this out when I got a second post from the same person. It felt odd, so I checked the server info a bit more closely. There is was: denout01.cpbgroup.com.
What pissed me off about it? That they didn’t have the guts to stand up and say “We made this and this is why we think it is good.” I could respect that, but pretending you’re just “somebody” with a comment is smarmy at best. So, buh-bye.
-L