You may already have seen one of Apple's new ads from its "Get a Mac" campaign, which has opened to rave reviews from most who've seen it. In case you haven't seen them yet, you can view the ads on Apple's web site.
They're definitely fun to watch. The part of "I'm a PC" is played by corporate-looking John Hodgman from "The Daily Show." The part of "I'm a Mac" is played by cool cat Justin Long from "Herbie Fully Loaded." Just by looking at them you quickly get the idea Apple wants to portray for its brand - Apples are cool and fun, while PCs are stodgy and old-fashioned.
My favorite of the six is "Viruses" that starts with PC sniffling and talking about all the 114,000 viruses for PCs out there. He then warns Mac to stay away, but Mac makes it clear only PCs can be infected. It ends with PC saying I'm going to crash . . . and he does.
While no products are shown, I think even a young child would quickly get the message Apple wants to convey -- Macs are safer.
Michael Gartenberg at Jupiter research loves the ad campaign and says, "There's no doubt here that Apple's looking to capitalize on things like the Vista delay and reinforcing the overall negative perception of the PC."
Now Microsoft has to worry about a war on two fronts. One from Google on the Internet front and another from Apple on the hardware/operating system front. We knew Apple was getting serious when it decided to use Intel and enabled its Macs to run Windows.
We haven't seen this type of campaign from Apple since 2002, when it ran the "switcher" campaign. Today's audience may be more willing to act given all the dissatisfaction out there with Windows, its insecurity as well as other technical problems.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
5-03-2006 @ 2:59PM
Joel Heffner said...
The ads will be even more effective once all the new Macs are in. When they add the less expensive line of iBooks (or whatever they ultimately will call them) the switch to Macs will probably accelerate even further.
5-03-2006 @ 3:46PM
Sam Achilli said...
These ads have some real impact! Their fun, exciting and are up with the times. Just the name "PC" is outdated with its' usage. I REALLY believe these ads TELL the story. As hard as it is to advertise in this type of an arena (basically boring), APPLE I think has hit a homerun!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
5-03-2006 @ 9:18PM
Tom Budetti said...
The ads are definitely clever. You do not need to be an expert on subliminal advertising to see that Apple is portraying itself as the young,hip, up and comer while the PC is for the tired wornout 40 and 50 somethings. Which is all TRUE by the way. Of course, I am a loyal 40 something Mac user for the past 15 years!!!