“Apple Inc.’s newest TV commercials, showing consumers enjoying its products while an actor reads the company’s corporate philosophy, are a flop compared with earlier ads from the maker of iPhones and iPads,” Peter Burrows reports for Businessweek.
“The company’s latest ad, which began airing June 10, has earned the lowest score of 26 Apple TV ads in the past year, according to Ace Metrix Inc., a consulting firm that analyzes the effectiveness of TV ads through surveys of at least 500 TV viewers,” Burrows reports. “The ad scored 489 on the company’s scoring system, below an industry average of 542 and far below past iconic Apple campaigns that often topped 700.”
Burrows reports, “The change in tack started earlier this year, with similar ads that highlighted the iPhone’s status as a popular camera and music player. These ads, which show contemplative montages of people using iPhones in their daily rounds, also fared poorly by Apple’s standards on Ace Metrix’s scale, with scores of 560 and 537, respectively.”
“Apple’s new ad, dubbed ‘Designed by Apple in California,’ scored a 528 on ‘Information,’ versus an hardware-industry average of 603,” Burrows reports. “A recent ad for Samsung’s new Galaxy S4 phone that showed features such as the ability to answer a call without touching the screen scored a 757 by that same measure.”
MacDailyNews Take: The reason why the Apple ads in question scored low on the “Information” metric is because they are not informational ads.
Shocking, we know.
Burrows reports, “Edward Boches, a professor of advertising at Boston University. said the final seconds of the ad may strike some viewers as inappropriately political. The words ‘Designed by Apple in California’ appear as the voice says, ‘This is our signature, and it means everything.’ ‘Is this a subtle way of saying we’re not a Korean company? That’s not the way a leader like Apple should talk,’ said Boches, who also described himself as a ‘huge fan’ of Apple.”
MacDailyNews Note: UPDATE: June 28, 2013 @ 2:05pm EDT: This report has been called into question due to the fact that is has since been revealed that Ace Metrix counts Samsung among it’s clients. Read more:
Businessweek says Apple’s TV Ads ‘flop’ based on survey from Ace Metrix – which counts Samsung as a client – June 28, 2013
Read more in the full article – Think Before You Click™ – here.
MacDailyNews Take: It also doesn’t help that, in America, a California riddled with high costs, taxes, heavy traffic, chronic budgetary crises, a public education system crying for reform, a general pervasive dysfunction, etc., may also not be considered the booming success story it once was.
For those of us who have lived in California and since fled, the words “Designed by Apple in California” are invariably followed by the thought, “better you than me.”
Why exclude 49 other states when you can easily include them? Perhaps Apple should say “Designed by Apple in the USA” instead? Doing so would broaden the appeal to the whole country.
On the MDN take and question: “Why exclude 49 other states when you can easily include them?”
Apple’s roots are in California, that’s what they see themselves at. It’s like Santa village, it’s at the North Pole with subsidiaries around the world.
“Perhaps Apple should say “Designed by Apple in the USA” instead? Doing so would broaden the appeal to the whole country.”
Yeah right, if Apple did do this then some other people would come by and say….”Why exclude 140 plus countries when you can easily include them?”
I mean can you imagine the reaction in America to be included with a group of other countries. HECK NO, unless of course there’s a war or a fight going on, it’s the American way.
The same thing would be said then about your other comment, that “Perhaps Apple should say “Designed by Apple on planet Earth” instead? Doing so would broaden the appeal to the whole global community.”
Can you imagine chaos and the reaction in the USA to a statement like that? It would be pandemonium. Why the company would be shut down faster than the stock could drop, and that’s pretty fast.
The ads are great, keep them that way.
I agree with many, half of Apples profits and sales are now outside the US and growing so a parochial advert that talks about California (and calling things Mavericks for that matter) is hardly going to impress most of us these days, just makes them look inward looking. Maybe 30 to 40 years ago when California was a magnet to others, but these days neither California nor the US generally are exactly what they were in the mind of the World’s consumers and an advert like this just makes Apple look out of date and unaware of World realities when they need to project a more world wide vision.
In the 60s when we were going through a similar economic/confidence decline and we had a ‘Buy British’ campaign which was a total failure and gave a similar provincial image, this Apple attempt may be a far more classy attempt at restoring self confidence and motivation but in all honesty it hasn’t a chance of succeeding as all those American trolls on here extolling the virtues of Asian companies make clear. If its for employees then make it private for American ones and make sure that foreign ones don’t get to see that they are very much second class citizens.
Every USA citizen must be proud of California as well as every USA citizen must be proud of NY, Chicago, Atlanta, Seattle, Alaska, Hawaii. If someone refers to one of my children by name and talks wonders about him/her, I’d be proud, not jealous and my other children should agree.
Agree. This is like Chrysler’s well done ads, “Imported from Detroit”. One must take pride in their work and in their home for others to share or see that pride. California is the home of Apple and “Designed in California” has been printed on the devices since the days of Steve Jobs.
This is nothing new but just Apple being Apple. People should get over themselves and learn to appreciate. California is over its slump and it is the ritzy, nature rich, progressive maverick state it used to be. The economy is fixed and in the black again. Yay.
The problem with the ads is that they don’t focus on the products. It’s focused on people whom we don’t know and don’t care about (no time in a commercial to develop who someone is). I liken it to the BASF or CSX commercials – the ads aren’t focused on getting the consumer to buy anything, so they say “So what?”.
The other problem is that many people in the country hold a prejudicial view of California, for whatever reason, so touting that Apple products are designed in California doesn’t help.
Apple should keep developing great, simple ad campaigns based around its fantastic products.
Bizlaw you nailed it.
Using people in ads is the problem because nobody knows them and nobody cares about them. They mean nothing to the viewer and it’s tune out time. No call to buy anything. And forgettable.
And California? It comes off first as arrogant. What does that mean to someone in Canada? Germany? I’m not in the US, and to me I immediately thought of sweat shops in China. Ya, designed in California BUT built in China. And then I think of the tax havens. It’s a negative reaction.
Jobs was excellent and likely understood that focusing on humans in ads is dumb because nobody cares about them. He kept the ads simple and focused on the Hero, which is the product. Just whitespace and the Hero. When he did use people, it was the switcher campaign that lasted for years where the audience got to know the actors.
I buy Apple because they work! It is the same with any products I buy. If something won’t work, I won’t buy it again.
One of the most successful advertising campaigns of all time was “Think Different”. Not a single Apple product was shown. All we saw in the commercials (as well as posters and magazine ads) were black-and-white images of some famous people from history. The TV commercial also had some narration about square pegs and round holes, etc…
Every once in a while, a successful company will create an advertising campaign around their brand. Rather than aggressively plugging some product or service, they will create a brand-awareness message. As we know from the “Think Different” campaign, these can be extremely effective. Many people don’t buy specific products; they buy specific brands. A good brand-awareness campaign can significantly increase brand appeal and consumer loyalty.
These are very good ads.
The problem with the ad is that could plug in any one of a thousand product names on it and run it. Ok, the ad gives you vague, positive feelings, so who could possibly be against that?
I have seen the ad run several times, and I don’t even notice it until just a few seconds before its over, and my first reaction is : Who? What product? Uh, ok it’s Apple. And I ask myself: what does it have to do with the 20+ Macs, and the iPhone that I have owned or own.
Answer: uh I don’t know.
I have worked professionally with ad people on a corporate level and there are just an unfortunate number of them who believe that if they present you with something that is vague, unfocused ,”creative” , then by definition it is therefore too sophisticated for me, a mere non artist to understand, it must then be superior,therefore I should give them many thousands or millions of dollars to create it.
No
In the 80’s I worked for Nissan Motor Corporation, parent company of Infiniti. Wonderful cars!, but their first ad for the Q45 never showed the car, just vague gauzy images of rocks and trees. As a result, Toyotas’ Lexus brand got a head start that Infiniti has taken years to catch up too, even though the car is at least as good.
I am a teacher these days, and I am constantly amazed (horrified) at some of the work turned into me by students who don’t know the difference between creativity and random chaos. I can’t accuse Apples’ ad of being randomly chaotic because it doesnt make enough of an impression to get me up to the level that chaos would.
But I still buy Apple products because they do the best job, and love Infiniti cars even though their first ad made people laugh. The actual product overcomes the advertising.
Works for me.
This study is a sham. Samsung is a big client for Ace Metrix Inc. MND should upate the post with that information.
Exactly. Why the editors of MDN have recently begun to repeat clueless FUD as if it were fact is beyond me. Samsung appears to be throwing vast amounts of PR money around recently, and MDN of all publications should realize the implications.
And Metrix’s client is Samsung!!
Case closed!
I have a cure for all you California haters’ envy, come on over and visit and watch one of our beautiful sunsets, you are all most welcome to do so. But be aware, you might just end up staying. Peace.
There is a larger proportion of haters on this thread. That’s because the haters have nothing better to do in their states than to come on here and troll about. While in California, people are busy being productive and enjoying life outdoors. Speaking of which, surfs up.
Plus professional astroturfers for the opposition. The tone is unmistakeable.
Ad is irritating, pretentious, condescending, and, worst of all, boring.
OK I WAS GOING TO COMMENT ON THIS ARTICLE…
BUT IT IS SO WONDERFUL TO HAVE SPENT THE LAST 15 MINUTES WRITING A LONG AND THOUGHTFUL COMMENT JUST TO HAVE MAC DALY NEWS APP CRASH BECAUSE ITS SO FREAKIN BAD…
WHEN WILL YOU FIX YOUR CRAPPY APP?
IT IS BARELY HOLDING TOGETHER!
Write it as an email and when finished, copy and paste.
After the post shows up, delete the draft…;-)
They need to fix their crappy “analyses” as well…
There ads come off as smarmy crap because they may be designing theier products in California but they’re made by slaves in China. I know there a lot of people that think Apple is the greatest company that ever existed but they are not. There are a lot more companies in this country that take care of the workers and the environment and they get no credit for it. Apple out sourced all their labor. They treat their workers like crap, make marginal products and the media treast them like Gods when the reality is they are just money grubbing assholes like every other tech company.