Apple has made a name for themselves with creative and often humorous commercials through the years, from the legendary 1984 Mac introduction video through the Think Different campaign through the Pentium-toasting PowerPC commercials through the infamous ‘I’m a Mac …’ spots with John Hodgeman and Justin Long.
Now they have launched a series of three new iPhone 4 commercials themed “If you don’t have an iPhone”. Each features a specific iPhone-specific ecosystem that you are missing if you don’t have an iPhone: one touts the App Store, another the iPod and iTunes, and finally iBooks.
By the end of the Hodgeman / Long campaign, the spots had lost their humor for many who took issue with specific points or insinuations made in the commercials. Yet that hasn’t stopped others from using a similar theme – the Kindle has constantly poked at the iPad screen glare, and the T-Mobile MyTouch 4G commercials are blatant copies that poke mostly at AT&T. The ‘Droid Does’ campaign and the Verizon / AT&T map wars were all along similar lines. In other words … it’s advertising, folks, what did you REALLY expect?
So while at first I found the commercials felt a bit on the arrogant side – mainly because of the tone of the “If you don’t have an iPhone … you don’t have an iPhone” tagline – on reflection I like what the ads offer. They look at three specific areas that are unique to the iPhone: App Store, iPod & iTunes, and iBooks. They show the devices in action utilizing the features and step through an actual process many of us have done dozens if not hundreds (or thousands) of times on our own iOS devices.
Of course it is debatable whether featuring iBooks so prominently was denial, hubris, wishful thinking (that it will help sales), or … ? I’ll leave that one to CarlyZ!
Oh, and as I have stated before, while I have an iPad and 4th gen iPod Touch (amongst myriad others), I don’t have an iPhone … and I’m quite OK with that.