Apple promoting iPhone 4 in four new FaceTime ads

So what?

There is a certain presupposition in these ads that facetme is ubiquitous and that people are using it daily as the actors don't seem at all amazed by the new technology. That is the main message. People have been using Apple video calls since forever, well since last week at least, so what is your problem? You should get with the program.

As usual, Apple innovates even with advertising by pitching its smartphones at the vast numbers of casual users which massively outnumbers the geeks that the Android marketing seems to want to woo.
I've never understood why Android panders to the fans who don't need to be expensively marketed to rather than the broader market. I believe it is possibly because Google knows it is not yet competitive from a look and feel perspective to appeal to casual users.

Its As If Apple Has Hired Don Draper

The other day I was talking to an old friend. Not only is this friend outside the tech sphere, hes just about as opposite of tech savvy as a person can be. Hes basically a luddite. In fact, I was surprised he was even IMing with me, hes so seldom online. But I was more surprised by what he asked me. What do you think of the new iPhone?

Its one thing to know what an iPhone is, but the fact that he was aware that there was a new iPhone caught me a bit off guard. As did the fact that he was talking to me about it. I directed him to my review. But he took one glance at the 3,500+ words and immediately came back at me. I just want to know if its any good. I told him I thought it was the best out there. He thanked me and said goodbye. But before I let him go, I asked him why on Earth he wanted to know. I mean, again, this is a guy who undoubtedly uses one of these types of phones. He said that he travels a lot now and wants a better way to connect with his girlfriend on the road. I asked him, why the iPhone? His answer? The commercial.

Watching Apples iPhone 4 FaceTime commercial again, it reminds me of something: Mad Men. The television show is starting its fourth season in a couple of weeks, but the commercial takes me back to the end of season one an episode called The Wheel. Ive actually talked about this episode before because it contains a scene that is perhaps the best in the entire series. In it, ad man Don Draper gives a presentation to Kodak showing why Sterling Cooper should be handling the account for their new picture projector.

The pitch (which you can see here, but sadly I cant embed) starts out with two execs from Kodak acknowledging that creating an ad around this wheel is hard because wheels arent really seen as exciting technology, even though they are the original. Draper fires back, Technology is a glittering lure. But theres the rare occasion when the public can be engaged on a level beyond flash. If they have a sentimental bond with the product.

In the iPhone 4 FaceTime commercial, thats exactly what Apple is playing up. As were all well aware, video chat, even on phones, is nothing new. Sure, Apple has simplified it, but theyre not really showcasing that here. Instead theyre going right for the heart strings. Theyre doing something rather incredible. Theyre conveying how youll feel if you use the product, by making you feel alongside those in the commercial. Theyre creating this sentimental bond.




Draper continues, talking about an old copyrighter he used to work with, Teddy. He also talked about a deeper bond with the product. Nostalgia. Its delicate. But potent. Draper fires up the projector. Teddy told me that in Greek, Nostalgia literally means the pain from an old wound. Its a twinge in your heart far more powerful than memory alone.

Again, thats this FaceTime commercial. Its not old pictures, but its more powerful. Its loved ones that you havent seen in a while, that youre apart from, right there in front of you, live. It takes us to a place where we ache to go again, as Draper puts it. It lets us travel the way a child travels. Round and around and back home again. To a place where we know were loved.

And Apple goes a step further. Rather than just playing up the family bond which they do with the baby crawling on the bed, the mother with the baby, and the grandparents with the graduating grandchild, Apple shows a pregnant wife getting an ultrasound and her husband in the military, presumably overseas, watching. When the wife hits the button to flip the camera and show the unborn baby on the monitor, they cut to a shot of the husband and his face drops as if hes about to cry. Its extremely powerful stuff.

Then Apple kicks it up another notch. They show a girlfriend waving to a boyfriend through FaceTime just as any other couple might. Only then they reveal that the boyfriend is deaf. But thanks to the video functionality, the two can sign with one another. The commercial wraps with them each looking at the phone in awe after they sign their goodbyes, as if theyve just done something unbelievable. Something extremely important to them. And they have. Its delicate. But potent.

It shouldnt be surprising that Apple hired Hollywood director Sam Mendes (American Beauty, Revolutionary Road) to direct this commercial. Levels of sentiment that people often feel while watching movies rarely, if ever, travel over to advertising. But they have in this FaceTime commercial, just as they have in Drapers Kodak presentation. Its as if the Apple commercial borrowed a page out of the playbook that Draper was talking about in that episode.

Apple, of course, has a history of great advertising campaigns. From the 1984′ Super Bowl commercial (directed by another Hollywood guy, Ridley Scott), to the Think Different campaign, to the Get a Mac spots, each was effective at conveying different things about the brand. But this latest commercial is the first (to my knowledge) that really aims to connect with people on a deep emotional level. And its going to help Apple sell a massive amount of iPhone 4s.To people like my friend.

http://techcrunch.com/2010/07/10/app...me-commercial/

These ads are absolutely incredible.

Really nice and effective ads.

Incredible marketing. Stories that could be in anyones life. These commercials really show the need for FACETIME. And they really are heart tweakers.
Have to give Apple credit...........the BEST at what they do.

Hilarious!

Fortunately for consumer its not just brilliant marketing, but brilliant HW and SW to back it up.



I think youre absolutely correct.



Agreed. I dont see myself using FaceTime much, as I have rarely used it on my Mac with iChat A/V, Skype or other apps, but they sure make me want to.

"or presenting a creepy woman muttering about esoteric features"

I though she was cute. Not beautiful, just cute. She just had a bad director.

Any time a fandroid starts yapping about how he can customize the crap out of his Android phone's wallpaper or home screen, just tell him this: "It's not what you can do to your phone. It's what your phone can do for you."

You can follow that up with "So who's really the Android? You or your phone?"

And any time a fandroid spouts screen size specs, or raves about how great AMOLED looks by candlelight, or slides out an archaic hardware keyboard, just ask him "Does 'Droid do' anything to actually make your life better?"

Still don't want one.

Was I the only one expecting the woman to take off her clothes in the last commercial?

I cringe at the thought of how Microsoft might copy and modify this.

Wait, I've got it:

Welcome to AppleInsider.

Seriously though, this is some next-level (or at least other-level) kind of stuff.

Totally no focus on normal calls or reception or data speeds (muah ha ha ha ha) ... or the full glass and external antenna design (muah ah ah ha ha ha x2) ... or more seriously, no focus on apps.

Bold, certainly emotive, brave (no background music at all!) ... and centered on relationships between people (which is what FaceTime would be used for, most likely).

And... kids and babies and families, yet again. I feel left out, because I'm single, no kids (and not working on one at the moment), not one of the ethnicities represented (well okay I'm half-Chinese, so kinda represented LOL), and my dad doesn't have a bushy beard, unfortunately.

Don't take me too seriously, just typing off-the-cuff here.

What is interesting is that the main user is your 18-35 year old male in all the ads. They do all centre around being in a relationship, 3 of which involve children. This main user, or protagonist, I would say, is NEVER SHOWN. Which in other words, puts the viewer, and target audience of 18-35 males, as the protagonist. In other words, the viewer of the ads *becomes* the one interacting with the person on the other side of the video call. Quite intriguing.

The shy girl with braces ad is a rip of a milk ad from years ago. I couldn't find it on
YouTube. Does anyone remember? The girl in the milk ad was way cuter and a much
better actress.

Mate, trust me, you're definitely not.

In any FaceTime ad, past, present or future, anything that involves a reasonably attractive woman of legal age of consent... I expect (or at least imagine) some nudity to happen.

Now see, there is some seriously powerful advertising.

Specs don't mean shit, it's passed specs now, specs were when extra mattered, when you were selling to people who even knew what they meant. Basically anything you buy now can do anything you want, unless you are a professional and use them as tools to create content and even then unless you have very deep pockets it still doesn't really matter.

Man, I like these adverts better than I like the iPhone 4 or the iPad.

This is a genius above design. As the poster above said, no music, nothing. Just 100% focus on the emotions and the interaction.

To echo another comment up above, fortunately the way FaceTime is designed makes for an ad like this to be possible. Cause it would look awful on what is currently considered video calling via mobile phone.

Apple just figured it out.

Not mine... *sniff* Maybe it means I should get a Droid instead. Or that Dell Streak.

LMAO Because once again Apple about to define an entirely new market -- and by being first to claim it in this way Apple will OWN the positioning in everyone's mind. Every single following attempt by any mfg/vendor is going to be judged and related/tied in a prospect's mind to these engaging Apple ads and Apple's FaceTime.

And in any case iPhone and iPad on a global scale will be pretty much in high demand going into at least the end of 2011. OWN is a good term you have used.

Sure, the world may end up with more Android phones out there than anything else, but Apple's role now is simply to make iPhones and iPads fast enough while maintaining quality and support.

LOL
"are you alone.."
"you know that thing we've been working on recently.."

That should be the fifth ad. Stunning SoCal girl talking to bf at say, Yale or something. ".... I miss you. Let me show you how much (pause ...girl blows big kiss). Now handsome, aren't you glad we got the phones?"

At AZ State or UCSB the english would be too painful to bear.

I was expecting them all to (well, maybe not the grandad).

I don't really like these ads. The original one with the Apple staff seemed a lot more genuine. When you see the aged eyes of Scott Forstall looking into the camera talking about his daughter, it conveyed a sense of why some of them builds these products. They see a need to use these products in their everyday lives.

But in that ad, you also get the less genuine elements like Greg Joswiak with the rimless glasses and caricature expressions to maintain some false ideal perceptions. Jonny Ive with his pretentious designer way of talking.

When you have actors in these shots, it loses the whole genuine appeal. It's like when Microsoft have shots of a family event with one black, asian, hispanic, caucasian person or mixed race or when they have a perfect family of 4 in their middle-class minimalist living room playing games together in front of the big TV.

I'd say even the 'When you're smiling' iPhone ad was better than these. I don't think they're terrible and they certainly would appeal to some but the reality just isn't there. When is a teenage daughter going to get a $700 phone same as her dad instead of a $20 webcam? When is a grandad going to get a smartphone instead of a $10 no-contract phone off Amazon, not to mention how the guy finds an open wifi connection in a hospital. Even a man and wife having an iPhone 4 each seems a bit of a stretch.

Once you narrow down the odds of people who own an iPhone 4 each, who have access to wifi at the same time to make a call, who aren't a dysfunctional family and actually want to talk to each other, it's gonna be like 6 people using this thing including Steve and Jonny.

As for the Droid people, their claim won't be about aliens at all but simply that they can do the same thing and over 3G using Fring or maybe Skype - they have front facing cameras too. They will also rightly claim people have been doing this for years, like with a Sony Ericsson k800i from 2006:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VP19WoVBeU4

Nice ads, but... Oriental? WTF?


I think that what's critical is that they're not passing these off as real, candidly shot moments. Everyone knows they've been scripted and filmed. They're meant to be emotive, which they are. We're all familiar with these situations, or if we're not we can empathize. My father wants to get an iPhone 4 so that we can talk when I leave home and start my job. It's a common pattern.


I'm not sure that a couple both having an iPhone when they're already sharing a family plan is that strange. If they didn't before, Facetime seems like it would likely push them over the edge. I also don't know where your $700 number is coming from why would they buy the phones unlocked?

Boyfriend to girlfriend is a big sell. Skype video calling is really popular among friends and couples and being able to remove yourself from the computer is big. It's not hard to find WiFi and eventually it'll be on 3G. I think the reasoning is that grandparents would buy an iPhone 4 -in order to- talk with their grandchildren, not that they would just happen to have one already. That kind of thing is a really strong sell. Also, I can't corroborate this, but I've read that free WiFi is becoming more and more common in hospitals, particularly newer ones. Expectations are different these days.


What the iPhone 4 will have on its side is ubiquity and zero setup. You'll know which of your closest friends and family members have iPhone 4s since these are the people you'll want to be talking with the most. Soon, once it comes to other phones, it'll be even bigger.

That should have ended with her showing some of the completed pottery they've been working on.

F* me the more I see the iPhone4 videos, Greg and Jonny look like, really, really high. Jonny particularly, maybe it's the lighting or just him, he seems like he's in another world. That explains the antenna design, probably.

[QUOTE=Marvin;1672265]
I don't really like these ads.

That's fine with me and no discussion about that from my side.

Overall, your post left me with the intent to give you a big hug and say: Hey, the world might seem so bad (feel free to replace bad with another adjective), but it isn't!

Come on...

If you stop the commercial BEFORE the punchline they'd be great and genuine. It just gets too scripted each time they wrap it up with the punchline. It just kills the magic every time.

... especially the last one.. and the baby one.

Yeah that would be quite avant garde[?] actually, if you had to mentally "fill-in" the last line.

Sadly, for the average American audience, that could be asking too much.

Really like the way you present all 4 commercials in an iPad friendly way we can view each one easily. I agree with the most positive comments above.

Just a bit too sappy for my tastes.
How about something more... pratical?
As an eg - Daughter calling dad for help on a project she is working on?

Although I have not used FaceTime, have you noticed how steady the user is holding the phone in these videos? To me it really sticks out. I presume real life use is not that steady?

Wait! what? Girl? I thought that was Macaulay Culkin.

... but I'm sure it will work with the intended customer; indeed. I would do something like the keynote video about the product, but with customers talking about the product.

Luckily they are on wifi. If they were on 3G they would drop the call because three of the four off camera subjects are holding the phone incorrectly...

This is lame

Every hospital of more than moderate size I've been to recently has had public wifi. One of the big drivers for the change has been that Doctors want to use their own laptop computers/mobile devices for research. You don't want them using their home pc's on your internal network so you allow them access to a public wifi with encryption. If they need access to hospital systems they authenticate in through the firewall.

Very mart commercials.

However, there is something fundamentally skewed when making use of such pure emotions and human experiences in order to sell a product in such a convincing, cathartic manner: pregnancy, hearing impaired soldier separated from his loved ones, a daughters graduation( all in the first commercial). Not that it's a new concept, just sort of unnerving. We are living in a very emotional age and Apple is expertly playing that hand.

Apple is also selling Facetime as if it were a practical application, which they would have to, but the reality is that it's going to be a while, and most likely only when the networks allow the functionality, that it becomes ubiquitous and useful in the ways that they present it.

One of the hallmarks of Apple is that they focus on benefits rather than features. That's right out of the Marketing 101 textbook, but so many companies fail to embrace that. I like that Apple focuses on what technology can DO FOR PEOPLE (or what it allows them to do), rather than simply focusing on what the technology can do.

Where have you been for the last 100 years?

Lots of advertisers have done this for ages - it's just that some are a lot more subtle.

There are several ways to advertise:
- Educate consumer
- Humor
- Appeal to greed
- Appeal to emotions

The latter is not at all uncommon, just the theme changes. A few years ago, the appeal was often to patriotism. Appeal to family ties tends to show up in every generation. How about those McDonald's commercials at Christmas every year. Some of them STILL make me cry.

Apple's not doing anything new here or breaking any original ground. They're just attempting to do something routine better than anyone else. Whether they pull it off remains to be seen. Only time will tell.